New York Court of Appeals to Decide Parks Smoking Ban

The New York State Court of Appeals will be the next court to decide whether or not the state’s ban on smoking in parks–as well as several smaller parks in New York City–is valid, agreeing to take the case after the state’s Supreme Court, Appellate Division overturned a lower court’s ruling in Dec. 2014 and reinstated the ban.

At issue is whether the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation overstepped its bounds by implementing the ban, or whether or the ban is inline with the department’s jurisdiction of creating an environment that residents want to use while promoting the park experience. Previous legislation similar to the parks smoking ban has come from the state legislature, such as bans on smoking at public transportation waiting areas and playgrounds.

Leading the appeal of the ban is a group known as NYC Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment, or NYC C.L.A.S.H., whose attorney, Edward Paltzik, has called the ban government overreach and who maintain that such a ban must come from the legislature while also being more consistently enforced should it be enacted.

This will become the third legal challenge for the ban, which went into effect in Feb. 2013. In the fall of that year, a trial judge found the regulations invalid, but in Dec. 2014, that ruling was overturned and the ban was upheld unanimously by the five justices in the Appellate Division assigned to the case.

A decision is expected in March.