A glimmer of hope for non=smokers.

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OTABILL
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A glimmer of hope for non=smokers.

Post by OTABILL »

We have essentially stopped playing VP locally here in Arizona because of smoke filled casinos. Took awhile, but we finally decided our health depended on avoiding second hand smoke. Now it looks like Vegas casinos may be heading in the direction of smoke free. At least we hope so and that our local ones follow suit.

In Sin City, an old vice gets snuffed out

olds442jetaway
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Post by olds442jetaway »

WTG OTB. I am tempted to make the same decision myself. We have non smoking areas at Mohegan, but they are not walled off and getting from point A to B and getting hit with it is like getting hit by a truck. I have written the legislature in Ct. and the Atty General too, but the state is afraid of lost revenue. My feeling is they would lose some for a few months, but then everyone would come back. The enforcement needs to be better too. I am constantly on their case in that area at the casino. I would say the casino right now loses about 1 hour of my play a session since I go outside no matter how cold it is to get some fresh air and walk. I can understand the older set not changing their ways after smoking 50 years or more, but it is so sad to see so many young people chain smoking. Besides their health, imagine how much they could save just by quitting. I have also noticed the poorer people appear to be, the more they smoke and unfortunately, the bigger girth they have. The only way CT and NJ will change their ways imo is if Vegas does it. The Ct casinos are about the biggest copy cats I have ever seen of Vegas in just about everything. Unfortunately, they don't quite have the managememt expertise to pull off everything smoothly like some of Vegas does. Edited to add this...all of the low denomination machines I have been playing lately are in the smoking areas and aren't available in non smoking. These are mostly of the spin poker variety. The casino definitely caters to the low budget smokers in that area. Many people that play them live locally and are there almost 24/7. My requests to move some of them to non smoking have fallen on deaf ears. As a matter of fact, after reading your post, I have decided that after the concert ( Dion ) tonight at Mohegan, I will not play in the smoke. i will just have to adjust my play downward in time or denomination and if that means playing less than 5 coins in smoke free, so be it. As I have always said and posted many times here, health is and should be number 1 for all of us. Again WTG OTB.

FAA
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Post by FAA »



“smoking is a powerful reinforcement for the trance-inducing rituals associated with gambling.”--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------No kidding. Staring at a damn screen for nine hundred damn hands while trancing out waiting for a quad is quite stressful!  Apt Comment: "I'm not a
smoker but it wouldn't be the same without the cigarette smell. I'm used
to it now and it wouldn't feel like Vegas without it." Or AC.


OTABILL
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Post by OTABILL »

Thanks for your support Olds. Second hand smoke is toxic. I have never smoked and my wife gave it up before we met. Playing in smoke filled casinos the last few years has probably impacted our health. Hopefully, avoiding the smoke will reduce any long term impact. Interestingly, all poker rooms here are smoke free as are designated areas in Bingo Halls. In the latter case, some are walled off so we intend to continue playing bingo in those casinos. We like Vegas which is a 6 hour drive and will probably play some VP there in non-smoking areas during our 1- 2 trips a year.

Other than the casinos, in-door space is smoke-free in Arizona. All the casinos are native american and located on tribal land which is sovereign territory. I assume the only way to ban smoking is either via tribal government or somehow incorporated into the gambling compact between the State and Tribes. Suspect the same in Connecticut. In any event, hope are successful in your efforts to reduce your exposure to second hand smoke and getting the casinos to either increase and wall off non-smoking areas or somehow going completely smoke free.

I know smokers feel they are being persecuted and should be allowed to expose us to second hand smoke. My response is, if you want to jeopardize your health so be it but not endanger mine. I would argue that folks who want to drink in excess can do so as well. However, they cannot do so while driving because it jeopardizes public health and safety and I would argue that banning second hand smoke especially in enclosed public spaces is analogous.

Vman96
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Post by Vman96 »



“smoking is a powerful reinforcement for the trance-inducing rituals associated with gambling.”--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------No kidding. Staring at a damn screen for nine hundred damn hands while trancing out waiting for a quad is quite stressful!  Apt Comment: "<span ="echo-stream-controls-stream-item-text">I'm not a
smoker but it wouldn't be the same without the cigarette smell. I'm used
to it now and it wouldn't feel like Vegas without it." Or AC.</span>



Try a non-smoking casino, and you might change your tune that it wouldn't be Vegas without smoke. Non-smoking casinos are pretty nice.

And just because the Westgate sportsbook is going non-smoking means little toward NV going toward non-smoking casinos. Poker rooms have been non-smoking for years.

This article also is misleading about Illinois's income slide when the smoking ban was instituted. This is what I wrote on another forum in response to that.

Yeah, it looks like smoking isn't losing the battle for them. Here are Chicagoland area numbers split between Illinois and Indiana. The bigger issue I believe is that younger people are less interested in slots, the casino's biggest money maker by far. And the newness of casino gambling has totally worn off. It's been legal in IA, IL, IN, and MO for over 20 years now!

I just looked at some June monthly data for a state comparison.

June 2007:
Illinois: $111,133,000
Indiana: $107,445,778

June 2012:
Illinois: $102,576,000
Indiana: $91,887,085

And has bar Video Gaming hurt the riverboats in the Chicago area? About as much as Indiana's riverboat slide. The Illinois side of Chicagoland riverboats roughly maintained their lead over Indiana! And note the slide for both states increased on a yearly average for 2012-2015 when the economy was "not as bad".

June 2015:
Illinois: $85,355,803
Indiana: $75,848,650

So yeah, they are losing revenue, but it sure isn't because they banned smoking! I love the fact that IL is non-smoking, but I actually prefer the IN casinos overall for other reasons. :(

jocker
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Post by jocker »

We stopped going to the Indiana casinos because of the killer smoke, it is just ridiculous. Now going to Illinois casinos where we can breath cleaner air.


Lets keep this going, maybe the right people will read these posts and really know how we feel and make some health changes for the better!

onemoretry
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Post by onemoretry »

Casinos in Ontario are totally smoke free. Unfortunately, now that Rama has pulled their good games, the VP isn't that great anywhere in the province, with the possible exception of Caesar's Windsor, where there is $1 full pay pick 'em (but, @ $50 a point).

Chicagoan
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Post by Chicagoan »

All that 2nd hand smoke has definitely impacted your health. The good news is that you can reverse the damage and the threat to your lifespan by quitting either smoking or inhaling 2nd hand smoke permanently.
Walling off an area of a casino and calling it smoke-free is deceptive. Unless the smoke-free area has a totally separate HVAC system, you are still inhaling 2nd hand smoke.
It is a powerful testimony to the lobbying ability of casinos that they alone have frequently been exempted from smoking regs. Although the New Orleans Harrahs is not my first choice of playable machines, it is nice as a totally smoke-free casino. Same with the Palace on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
I am willing to give up a few points in order to gain a few years of my lifespan.

FAA
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Post by FAA »

It sounds remarkable: smoke free Ontario. That pristine environment is certainly worth the points sacrifice. Heck, $50 per point is my mileage on full pay VP in AC. And I can get sandwiched by Smokestack Sam and Sally at any moment.

714Gambler
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Post by 714Gambler »

I smoke MORE when I go to a casino. Hey, when in Rome!

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