Smokeout quantifies support for tobacco-free campus

November 22, 2010 by Haley Etchison 

Students sign petition to ban tobacco from UNLV by spring 2012

“Are you a sucker for cigarettes?” asked a costume-clad Dustin Sorenthal as he handed a student a lollipop. “Not smoking makes you kissable!”

Sorenthal paraded around Pida Plaza on Thursday afternoon, drawing passers-by to a table where students representing Colleges Against Cancer were soliciting signatures for a petition to make UNLV a tobacco-free campus.

“This is to show that we have faculty and students’ support,” said CAC member Samantha Johnson, “so when we take this to the board of regents and our president (UNLV President Neal Smatresk), we have physical proof.”

Backers of the Tobacco Free UNLV campaign recognized the Great American Smokeout on Thursday with an allied effort to garner support for strengthening rules against use of all kinds of tobacco on campus.

The project aims to use a combination of education, cessation resources and school legislation to make it illegal to smoke cigarettes, cigars or hookah or use chewing tobacco on university property by spring 2012.

“It matters to me because second-hand smoke is a big issue now,” Sorenthal said, “and so many people smoking in such close proximity intensifies [the problem].”

A continuous stream of students arrived at the CAC table eager to sign the petition.

“I don’t like walking behind people while they’re freakin’ puffing smoke,” said Natalie Garcia, explaining why she signed the form.

Jackie Fisher said she signed because the issue has a personal tone for her — she recently saw a grandparent die of lung cancer as a result of smoking.

“I think everybody has a right to choose,” Fisher said, “but not in my space and my air.”

Johnson agreed.

“It’s disgusting to walk through a cloud of smoke on the way to class,” she said.

But the project is even bigger than one person’s discomfort.

Johnson explained that organizers see the tobacco-free campus effort as an investment in the future of the Las Vegas community.

“If we can start an initiative where we have a tobacco-free campus, those attitudes could filter into the workplace that students are going into,” she said.

Johnson is the event chair for the committee that runs the UNLV effort at the annual Relay for Life.

She invited students who are passionate about air quality and health on campus to come to the kickoff event for the relay, Tuesday from 5 — 6:30 p.m. in Student Union Room 208B.

There, they can sign up a team, learn how to raise money for the relay and enjoy a free dinner.

Tobacco Free UNLV is a $500,000 project led by UNLV nursing professor Nancy York. It represents a partnership between the Southern Nevada Health District and UNLV through a $14.6 million grant to the health district from the Centers for Disease Control.

The CDC grant is part of that organization’s Communities Putting Prevention to Work Initiative and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Community partnerships are part of the grant’s requirements.