Canadian Group Says No-smoke Policy Works
By Michael Hart -- Tradeshow Week, 2/14/2005
There are plenty of good reasons why association meeting planners pick one city over another: space rates, hotel room availability, members' peccadilloes. But how many make decisions based on the host cities' official policies on smoking in public places?
Not many. But that might be changing, at least in Canada.
"We're trying to put our money where our mouth is," said Dr. Albert Schumacher, president of the Canadian Medical Assn.
In 2003, the organization passed a resolution declaring it would no longer hold its annual meeting in any city that did not have a smoke-free ordinance on its books. So far, the earth has not exactly moved. In the fine print of the resolution, it is made clear that the association will not break any contractual obligations already in place, and space commitments were already made for its annual meeting (to be held in August this year in Edmonton, Alberta) through 2007.
After that, all bets are off. And since Montreal had been penciled in for 2008, according to CMA Meetings and Travel Management Director Michelle Gravelle, and Montreal at this moment does not have such a policy, things could get interesting.
Or maybe not. Schumacher said the point of the policy is not to make life more complicated for people like Gravelle or those at the convention centers and convention and visitor bureaus she negotiates with. Besides, both Schumacher and Gravelle would be among the first to admit almost any city could live without CMA's annual meeting in town. The organization has a tiny tradeshow and typically somewhere less than 600 attendees at its annual meetings.
The point, though, is to get cities and provinces to make it more difficult to smoke in public.
Is it making a difference?
"It's hard to define," Schumacher said. "Is it that, or is it a whole bunch of things?"
Regardless, when the CMA adopted the policy in mid-2003, about 50 Canadian cities had what the organization calls a "gold standard" regulation, meaning smoking is outlawed anywhere people are employed.
"We are now just shy of 200," he said.
What's more, eight other Canadian national and two provincial health care-related associations have also gotten on board.
Similar policies apparently have not caught on yet with U.S. health care-related associations that hold tradeshows. Of about two dozen associations contacted by Tradeshow Week, not a single one said it had such a policy on the books.
"And, to my knowledge, we have no plans to adopt such a policy," said Stephanie Batson, promotional and administrative coordinator with the American College of Emergency Physicians.
Going even one step further, Marguerite Leishman, meetings manager for the American College of Health Care Administrators, said, "Many of our members are smokers, so I doubt that would sit well with them."
