Allowing smoking in Norfolk’s casino will endanger the health of patrons and employees and could contribute to worsening some peoples’ gambling addictions, anti-smoking advocates say.
“No worker should ever have to choose between their health and a paycheck, but that’s exactly what will happen when this casino opens,” Juana Wilson with the Virginia arm of Casino Employees Against Smoking Effects said in a release. She briefly worked at Rivers Casino in Portsmouth.
“Casinos are the only places in Virginia where you can still smoke indoors, and casino workers bear the brunt of that decision.”
Wilson’s group is planning an event ahead of Wednesday’s casino groundbreaking to call on Boyd Gaming and the Pamunkey Indian Tribe to prohibit smoking at the planned casino.
Boyd did not respond to emailed questions from WHRO about its smoking policy and concerns from advocates.
The casino was supposed to be a non-smoking casino under previous plans, though Norfolk city attorney Bernard Pishko said that was never put down on paper. Now, with Boyd on board, the plan allows smoking.
The reason, Pishko told city council: the developers say they’d lose money if they went smoke-free.
A 2022 report on changing gambling habits after the COVID-19 pandemic indicates casinos that outlawed smoking didn’t take a revenue hit, though other casino-backed studies have found otherwise.
Bronson Frick, the director of advocacy for national anti-smoking group Americans for Nonsmokers Rights, said revenue loss is a red herring and there are a litany of good reasons to outlaw smoking.
“Secondhand smoke is a leading preventable cause of heart disease, cancer, heart attack, stroke, COPD, asthma, so unfortunately, opening another casino with indoor smoking is going to result in a cost to the community in terms of health outcomes,” Frick said.
He noted that tobacco use is at record lows among the U.S. population and surveys of patrons lean in favor of outlawing indoor smoking at casinos.
Smoking indoors has been banned under Virginia state law for 15 years, but the ban includes an exemption for casinos. Frick said Americans for Nonsmokers Rights is working with legislators to eliminate the carve-out.
In the meantime, he said Boyd could simply follow what it’s done at several of the company’s other casinos and prohibit smoking.
“Even one casino typically employs thousands of people, more than all of a region’s bars and restaurants combined, so the health impact is really significant,” Frick said.
Americans for Nonsmokers Rights also argues allowing smoking in casinos worsens gambling addictions. The National Council on Problem Gaming has endorsed smoking bans because of potential links to gambling addiction. By forcing gamblers to step away from the slots or tables to go have a cigarette outside, the thinking goes, it gives a break that helps reduce problem gambling.
Earlier this year, Americans for Nonsmokers Rights tried to get Boyd shareholders to consider outlawing smoking at all of the company’s 28 casinos, but the measure overwhelmingly failed.
The Rivers Casino in neighboring Portsmouth also came under fire over its handling of smoking when it opened in early 2023.
Guests complained of insufficient ventilation and the casino declared half of its gaming floor ‘smoke free.’
However, there are no barriers separating the smoking half of the casino from the non-smoking half.
