Act Now or Forever Hold Your Breath: Great American Smoke Out!

Tomorrow, November 19th is the American Cancer Society's 34th Great American Smokeout. You can celebrate by calling on lawmakers to get the smoke out of Michigan with the passage of a comprehensive smokefree law.

It's time to Act Now or Forever Hold Your Breath!

Email your Senator and Representative to tell them you want a comprehensive smokefree bill passed NOW.

Or give them a call directly. Call 888-NOW-I-CAN to be transferred directly to your lawmaker's office.

The Great American Smokeout began more than 30 years ago as a platform to encourage smokers to quit. Since then, the platform has expanded to not only encourage smokers to make a plan to quit, but also to encourage all Americans to advocate for comprehensive smokefree laws that help protect workers and patrons from exposure to secondhand smoke.

Today, more than 70 percent of the United States population is covered by 100 percent smokefree workplace laws, despite aggressive efforts by tobacco companies to defeat such laws. Please take action today.

Week 4: The Writing is on the Wall

ACT NOW! OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR BREATH

The "Writing is on the Wall" for our state legislators. It's time for Michigan to be smokefree!

This week, we're using Facebook to get our message across. Did you know many Michigan legislators have their own Facebook pages?

We need you to take action by posting a positive message on your lawmaker's wall or sending it directly to them via private message. When communicating with your lawmaker please be respectful but most importantly, let them know you want a comprehensive smokefree bill passed today! http://www.facebook.com/

Not a Facebook user? You can still take action by calling your legislators!

Tobacco Free Michigan has its own Facebook page. Become a "fan" here: www.facebook.com/tobaccofreemi

Here is what you can do in addition to posting on your legislator's page:

• Make sure all of your Facebook friends know about our page and encourage them to become a fan.



• Find your legislator and get "connected" with him or her today. If you don't know who your legislator is, go here: http://www.house.mi.gov/find_a_rep.asp or here: http://www.senate.mi.gov/



• Share our Facebook messages and alerts with your friends and post them in your news feed



• Visit the Campaign for Smokefree Air page, save the logo, and make it your profile picture for the week

As always, we want to hear from you. Once you've taken action, leave a comment on the Act Now! blog at http://campaignforsmokefreeair.wordpress.com/

WEEK 3: ACT NOW OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR BREATH

It’s pretty scary…

In the year since our lawmakers failed to pass a comprehensive smokefree bill, another 16,000 of our Michigan kids became regular, daily smokers. Don’t let our lawmakers fall for tobacco industry “tricks.” The Legislature can give our kids a real “treat” this year by passing a comprehensive smokefree bill.

IT’S TIME TO ACT NOW OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR BREATH!

This week, we want you to CALL your Senators and Representatives and tell them you want a comprehensive smokefree law NOW!

Teens who work in smokefree worksites are 25% less likely to smoke than those who work in places without smoking restrictions.

We want to hear from you. Once you've taken action visit our "Act Now or Forever Hold Your Breath" Campaign blog and leave a comment telling us what you've done!

Let’s have our kids collecting candy instead of cancer this year…

ACTION ALERT: ACT NOW OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR BREATH

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Take a look at this picture:

Something is not right. Michigan is one of the “unlucky 13” states that still does not protect its residents from the dangers of secondhand smoke. Please email your legislators TODAY and tell them it’s time to pass a comprehensive smokefree bill.

Despite the ongoing budget battle, last week the Senate took action to pass the legislation allowing you to hang items from your review mirror. The vote prompted Sen. Tupac Hunter, D-Detroit, to lament that the Senate spent time on "the fuzzy dice bill" when it could have devoted time to more substantial issues -- such as a comprehensive smokefree workplace law. We could not agree more!

Take Action Now or Forever Hold Your Breath!

Email your elected officials and tell them to stop "rolling the dice" with workers' health. Ask that they make the smokefree legislation the top priority instead of wasting time on frivolous legislation like "the fuzzy dice bill". We want to leave the other “dirty dozen” behind and pass a comprehensive smokefree bill today.

We want to hear from you. Once you’ve taken action visit our blog at http://campaignforsmokefreeair.wordpress.com/aignforsmokefreeair.wordpress.com/

Which issue do you think is more important to Michigan's residents?

ACTION ALERT: Save Tobacco Prevention and Cessation for Our State!

URGENT – URGENT – URGENT- URGENT

We need you to CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES to save tobacco prevention programs in our state. These programs keep kids from smoking and help people quit!

According to subscription only MIRS news, Andy Dillon has just proposed an increase in the Other Tobacco Products tax. This tax would generate $41 million in revenue for the state. Unfortunately, the revenue would not be used for tobacco prevention and cessation.

We need to contact Speaker Dillon, Governor, and Representatives and tell them to support these tobacco tax increases and use the money to restore the Healthy Michigan Fund tobacco prevention and cessation program. Our legislators need to hear from the public that people support tobacco taxes and the tobacco prevention program!

WHAT: Contact your Representative, as well as Speaker Dillon and Governor’s Office.

HOW: To find the contact information for your Senator and Representative visit the following links:
-House: http://www.house.mi.gov/find_a_rep.asp

Contact information for the Governor’s office: 517-373-3400
House Speaker Dillon 517-373-0857 andydillon@house.mi.gov

Pass this alert along to your networks and encourage them to take action.

WHEN: Immediately! There is no time to waste. Make these calls as soon as possible. Encourage people to keep calling until a final budget deal is in place.

MESSAGE:

1. Increase tobacco taxes and fund and restore the tobacco prevention and cessation program!

2. The Healthy Michigan Fund and the Tobacco Prevention Program are essential to the health and economy of our state.

3. Michigan ranks 46th among all states in funding for tobacco prevention and cessation.

4. You cannot solve the problem of chronic disease by eliminating prevention funding in favor of Medicaid.

TAKE ACTION TODAY!

ACTION ALERT:

As you may know, Governor Granholm recently released her plan to balance the budget. Among her solutions to the multibillion dollar deficit were increasing the cigarette tax by twenty-five cents and doubling the Other Tobacco Products tax (64% of the wholesale price). Sadly, the Governor’s plan also included a $150-million cut to the Michigan Department of Community Health. (See Free Press article here)

It is important that key political leaders in the state executive and legislative branches hear from us over the next week as we convey the importance of allocating funding for tobacco prevention and cessation programs. The message is: “Raising the cigarette tax and the tax on other tobacco products is essential for saving lives and health care dollars.”

Please thank the Governor and Bob Emerson for proposing the tax increase and urge them to dedicate a portion of the revenue generated to helping people quit smoking and prevent kids from starting.

Governor Granholm: http://www.michigan.gov/gov/0,1607,7-168-21995---,00.html
Bob Emerson: EmersonB@michigan.gov

Please contact the House and Senate leadership, as well as their own legislators, with this additional message: “Raising the cigarette tax and the tax on other tobacco products is essential for saving lives and health care dollars. I urge you to dedicate a portion of the revenue generated to helping people quit smoking and to prevent kids from starting.”

Senator Bishop 517-373-2417; senmbishop@senate.michigan.gov
Find Your Senator: http://senate.mi.gov/
Representative Dillon 517-373-0857; andydillon@house.mi.gov
Find Your Representative: http://house.mi.gov/find_a_rep.asp

Due to the high volume of emails most legislators are receiving daily, it may be more effective to place a phone call.

Hey Convenience Store Lobby, don’t look now, but your pants are on fire

Last week the Michigan Petroleum Association and Michigan Association of Convenience Stores released an “Analysis of the Impact of an Increase in the Michigan Cigarette Excise Tax.” It is a “study” filled with incorrect data, out of date research, and numbers cooked up by tobacco funded statisticians. The point of the study was to demonstrate the regressive nature of tobacco taxes, but the researchers failed to extrapolate their data and thus their early arguments tend to focus on the benefits of a tobacco tax increase (like a $165.2 million increase in state revenues).

The researchers used quotes throughout the study to “prove” their points. Quotes from the Heartland Institute (a think tank funded, in part, by Phillip Morris) and Americans for Prosperity (a group that has been underwritten by tobacco companies) permeate the study, using the same type of “slippery slope” arguments made famous by Phillip Morris during the tobacco cases of the 1990s.

In addition some of the statistics used are wildly out of date. TFM counted fourteen errors on the “State Excise Tax Rates and Tax Revenues Sheet” cited in the study. The actual tobacco tax rates varied between $0.07 and $1.00 over what was listed. The study’s claim that Michigan has the sixth highest tax rate is off by four positions and Wisconsin’s cigarette tax rate will exceed Michigan’s by $0.52 on September 1.

Here are the study’s main arguments and faults:

Argument: Cigarette excise taxes are an unreliable, declining, and unstable funding source.
o The Truth: States that have raised their cigarette tax rates have subsequently received more tax revenue than they would have received without a rate increase, despite the fact that cigarette tax increases reduce state smoking levels and despite any related increases in cigarette smuggling or tax evasion. Higher revenues obtained by cigarette tax increases will decline over time as smoking rates continue to go down, but the revenue changes will be gradual and predictable. Moreover, cigarette and overall tobacco tax revenues are more predictable and stable than state income tax or corporate tax revenues, which can decline sharply during recessionary periods.

Argument: Michigan smokers will turn to border sales, Indian reservations, the internet, and counterfeit smuggling operations.
o The Truth: Smuggling and tax evasion account for only a relatively small minority of cigarette sales and do not come close to eliminating revenue gains or making tax increases unproductive.

Argument: A 25-cent increase in Michigan's current cigarette excise tax of $2 will likely result in huge losses to Michigan’s Convenience Store profits.
o The Truth: When c-store owners were asked how their cigarette trends have been relative to excise tax increases, “90% said in line or better than they expected…” Since the federal excise tax increase, industry profits have actually grown for tobacco companies. Reynolds reported an 8.2% increase, Altria reported a 3.8% increase, and Lorillard’s profits increased 21.4%. Consumers didn’t stop consuming, they just switched brands, reported UBS tobacco analyst Nik Modi. Moreover, money spent currently on cigarette sales will not disappear when the smoking declines from a cigarette tax increase reduces cigarette sales, it will simply shift to consumer expenditures on other alternatives.

Argument: Cigarette excise taxes target low-income consumers and are regressive.
o The Truth: Higher smoking rates among lower-income groups means they are now suffering the most from smoking and will, consequently benefit the most from any effective new measures to reduce smoking, including tobacco tax increases. Low-income smokers are much more likely to quit because of state tobacco tax increases than higher-income smokers.

Therefore any state that significantly increases its cigarette tax rate will also end up increasing the portion of the state’s total cigarette tax revenues that are paid for by higher-income smokers and reduce the portion paid by lower-income smokers. It’s also important to note that cigarette companies (and the convenience store lobby) have no problem with levying new charges on low-income smokers when it increases their own profits.

Michigan’s economy is in dire straits. We need a win and tobacco tax increases are that win. The Governor’s proposed tax increase is a win for health, a win for the state budget, and a win with the public. The tax increase would result in reduced youth tobacco use, generation of over $150 Million in new state revenue, and is overwhelmingly supported by Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike.