By DENNIS HUSPENI

A judge Monday tossed out most of the charges against three bar owners cited for defying the state’s smoking ban by allowing customers to light up.

El Paso County Court Judge Karla Hansen dismissed 19 of 23 misdemeanor counts against Bruce Hicks, owner of Murray Street Darts in Colorado Springs. She also dismissed all but three charges apiece against bar owners Jeffrey Eickman and Gary Bishop.

Hansen did not rule on the legality of the ban. But she noted that under Colorado’s Clean Indoor Air Act, which prohibited smoking in bars effective July 2006, bar owners could be cited for one violation per day.

A conviction carries a maximum $200 fine.
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By Evan Belanger
After more than a week of consideration, Mayor Don Kyle announced Thursday he would not veto the city’s new comprehensive smoking ordinance.
Passed in a 3-2 City Council decision Aug. 6, the ordinance bans smoking in all of Decatur’s public places, including bars, restaurants and outdoor sporting arenas.
When it takes effect Oct. 1, Decatur will become the largest city in Alabama to ban smoking on such a stringent level.
Kyle made his announcement during a press conference at his sixth-floor office shortly before noon Thursday. He said he was disappointed the council majority refused to negotiate a compromise ordinance, but he couldn’t veto the measure knowing children would continue dining in smoke-filled restaurants.

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More than one in three tobacco retailers have considered reducing staff or even closing as a result of the trade in smuggled and counterfeit products.

Research by the Retailers Against Smuggling pressure group says 36% of retailers had considered reducing staff and 38% had considered closing their business after losing revenue to illegal tobacco suppliers. The survey also reveals that 37% of retailers had themselves been offered smuggled goods or knew of someone who had.

A spokeswoman for the group said: “For some retailers, the threat of the illegal tobacco trade is greater than that posed by big supermarkets. Not only do they lose out on tobacco sales, but also the loss of customers reduces sales of other goods to the point that many small shops are cutting back staff and, in some cases, facing closure. The problem is so acute that one in five shopkeepers is considering closing as a result.”
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By Emma-Kate Lidbury

More than £7,000 worth of cigarettes were stolen from a shop after thieves scaled a seven feet-high gate.

Police are appealing for witnesses after a stock room at the Londis store in Sinodun Road, Wallingford, was burgled. The incident, which happened on Sunday at 12.30pm, saw two offenders distract shop assistants while a third forced open a door at the back of the shop.
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Government has so far paid out more than $3,9 trillion to tobacco farmers in support price for flue-cured tobacco deliveries to the country’s three auction floors.

According to figures released by the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board, farmers have received a total of $3 946 129 713 799 against $12 billion for 2006.The money was paid out against the delivery of 63 million kg of flue-cured tobacco to the floors since the beginning of the marketing season on April 24.
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DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

Three tobacco companies are required to pay a total of $24 million to tobacco farmers in Pennsylvania and Maryland under a recent North Carolina court ruling, according to Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett.

The companies, Altria Group Inc’s (MO) Philip Morris USA unit, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. (RAI), and Loews Corp.’s (LTR) Lorillard Tobacco unit, must make the payments through 2010 under the ruling, which is subject to appeal.

Under the ruling, the Fair and Equitable Tobacco Reform Act of 2004 didn’t affect the companies’ obligation under a 1999 trust agreement. The Trust agreement called for tobacco farmers in 14 states to receive payments from the major tobacco companies to compensate for reduced demand for tobacco leaf as cigarette consumption declines.

The companies had asserted that they no longer had to make payments to farmers in Pennsylvania and Maryland under the reform act, which provided for payments to tobacco farmers in all the grower states except Pennsylvania and Maryland, according to Corbett.

The sales of hookah pipes and associated tobacco called shisha has gone up ten-fold in the last couple of years, says a local tobacco seller.

Peter Hogue, a manager at Old Morris Tobacconists on Government, said most of the sales are to university-aged people, around 21 years old although some users, including himself, are up to 35 years old.

“It’s a young thing. It’s a social thing. The general population is not doing a reefer in it,” Hogue said, adding that in many cities including Vancouver and Seattle,  hookah bars are springing up.
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By MICHAEL FELBERBAUM Associated Press Writer

RICHMOND, Va. — Philip Morris USA, the nation’s largest cigarette company, said Tuesday it will introduce a moist smokeless tobacco product this fall under the Marlboro brand, selling it first in the Atlanta area.

The company will sell the loose, spitting tobacco in original and wintergreen flavors, and in long and fine cut, for about $3 a can. It is part of a wider effort to sell more smokeless products in the U.S. as cigarette consumption declines due to concerns about health, smoking bans and price increases.
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Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler announced today that the State of Maryland and its tobacco farmers have achieved a victory in their efforts to hold the nation’s largest tobacco companies accountable to a 1999 Trust Agreement. The North Carolina court ruling requires Philip Morris, USA, Inc., R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, and Lorillard Tobacco Company to make payments through 2010 totaling about $13 million for the benefit of Maryland farmers, and $9 million for Pennsylvania farmers.
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By APRIL JOHNSTON

It’s time. After 10 days in a propane-heated barn, the green leaves have cured to a golden yellow, like autumn come early.

Craven Register grins as his sons and the two migrant workers they’ve hired for the summer heave and flip an 800-pound bale of tobacco onto the covered concrete slab with a thud.

“We’re closer to getting some money back now,” he says, pushing back his red ball cap and wiping his brow with a handkerchief. “We’ve been putting out since the first of the year.”
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