The Nassau County Planning Commission recommended leaving two village anti-smoking measures in Great Neck in the hands of local municipalities at its Thursday meeting, clearing the path for the Village of Great Neck and the Village of Great Neck Plaza to prohibit new businesses that profit from on-site smoking.
The move allows the village’s boards to move forward with a simple majority vote on eight-month moratoriums on new smoking businesses, introduced following controversy over the permitting of a planned hookah lounge in the Village of Great Neck.
“It should be noted that the proposed law cites the positions of the American Lung Association, the American Cancer Society, the World Health Organization, all of whom acknowledge the risks associated with [hookah smoking,]” planner Michael Katz said as he introduced the measures to the planning commission.
Katz added that the county’s board of health did not have a formal position on hookah smoking, but had noted to his staff that businesses offering the use of the Middle Eastern water pipes are typically prohibited from also serving alcohol.
Both the Village of Great Neck and the Village of Great Neck Plaza introduced moratoriums for the stated purpose of allowing their boards time to study the health effects of hookah smoking and decide if permanent regulations were warranted.
The legislation was spurred by public backlash following the Village of Great Neck’s granting of a conditional-use permit to a hookah lounge in July. The lounge, which will serve a non-tobacco smoking blend and is subject to noise restrictions, agreed to prohibit outdoor smoking of the pipes after complaints from neighbors and a request from the Village of Great Neck’s board of trustees.
The property’s landlord is Mike Yeroush, a Great Neck-based developer whose company A1 Universal Development Group has worked on dozens of properties in Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Long Island and Upstate New York, according to the company’s Web site.
The village had previously said it could not unilaterally alter the lounge’s permit, though Village of Great Neck Mayor Ralph Kreitzman said at Tuesday’s meeting that a new village law allows the modification or revocation of permits if the hookah lounge violates its conditions.
At an early August meeting, Kreitzman said he was sensitive to residents concerns and that the board would be responsive to complaints that the lounge was violating its permit, but emphasized that village attorney Stephen Limmer had told the board it had no legal recourse to revoke the permit or regulate the smoking of non-tobacco products.
Kreitzman suggested that advocates could lobby the state to regulate all smoke as it does tobacco smoke, but said that had the village tried to block the use it could have been subject to a legal challenge it would likely have lost.
Village of Great Neck Plaza Mayor Jean Celender has said that her village’s measure, introduced in September, was spurred by the planned hookah lounge in the Village of Great Neck and would allow the village to discuss possible restrictions on alternative forms of smoking, like hookah pipes and e-cigarettes, that Celender said could pose public health risks.
“It’s a time out to look at this and evaluate what we want to do going forward,” Celender said in September. “It did raise to a more serious concern that it could be imminent and on our doorstep.”
The measure, if approved, would suspend for eight months the issuing of permits to new businesses that profit from on-site tobacco smoking.’
During that time, Celender said, the village would consider whether to take more lasting action, including the possibility of lobbying Albany for tighter state smoking regulations or implementing a law similar to the Village of Great Neck’s tobacco smoking ban on some public sidewalks.
