Florida is trying to enlist citizens in a campaign against tobacco tax cheats.The state made the trade in illegal cigarettes more lucrative this year by increasing the cigarette tax by $1 a pack.
The Division of Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco on Wednesday announced that it’ll begin paying informants up to 50 percent of fines collected for illegal cigarette sales.
The agency also has set up a toll-free hot line to report sales of cigarettes without the required tax stamp.

One Kanawha County lawmaker believes targeting tobacco could be the key to combating rising health care costs and paying down debt in West Virginia.
When the Legislature convenes in January, Sen. Dan Foster wants fellow lawmakers to look at increasing the state cigarette tax by an additional dollar. That tax now stands at 55 cents in West Virginia.
“I always push for increasing the cigarette tax. Nothing makes more sense in terms of revenue and affecting public health,” said Foster, who is a doctor and serves on the Senate committee for health and human resources.
The last time the state cigarette tax went up was in 2002 when it increased from 18 cents to 55 cents.
Earlier this year, legislators debated a proposal that would increase the tax another 65 cents to a total of $1.20 per pack. The measure ultimately failed. Some supporters of the legislation said they believed the bill would have been successful had Congress not decided to raise the federal tax on cigarettes at the same time. The federal cigarette tax jumped 61.6 cents in April to $1.01.
If the state decides to raise its cigarette tax by one dollar, West Virginia smokers would be paying a total of $2.56 in taxes per pack.
Foster, a Democrat, estimates the buck-a-pack increase could bring in as much as $100 million in additional revenue for the state, but says the incentive for smokers to kick the habit is equally as important.
“The farther you go (with increasing the state tax), the more effective it is,” Foster said.The senator brought up the issue during an interim meeting Tuesday after new DHHR secretary Patsy Hardy gave a presentation to a legislative oversight committee.
Foster asked Hardy whether she would support the cigarette tax hike. The secretary sidestepped the question, saying she needed more information before weighing in.
DHHR spokesman John Law told committee members the tobacco tax is “probably the best way to reduce cigarette use” in West Virginia.However, Law said he would defer to the governor before making a decision about whether to back the increase.
Tuesday also provided the first opportunity for many lawmakers to hear from Hardy, who took over the reigns at the DHHR in September.
The secretary gave a comprehensive report on the department’s progress, highlighting several areas of concern lawmakers have brought to her attention in the past few months.
For example, the DHHR has come under fire in recent years for its consistently high number of job vacancies. Hardy said the department has hired close to 100 additional staff members in the 100 days since she took office.
Hardy also vowed to keep the lines of communication open between her department and the Legislature, addressing another criticism from lawmakers.
Several legislators have said they support the idea of dividing the DHHR into two separate departments in order to make it more effective.
The massive agency has 6,000 employees and is responsible for hundreds of programs that provide a wide range of services to state residents.
“The services impact them from the day they are born until the day they die,” Hardy said.
Delegate Don Perdue, D-Wayne, plans to push for a special committee to study the idea of splitting up the DHHR during the 2010 legislative session.

The Iowa Wholesale Distributors Association is part of the Coalition to Stop Contraband Tobacco. The goal of the coalition is to urge Congress to pass the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act of 2009 (S.1147). The House passed the PACT Act by an overwhelming bipartisan majority. All five of Iowa’s representatives voted for the act.
As distributors of tobacco products, this legislation is important to keep tobacco products out of the hands of minors and to ensure a level playing field with respect to tobacco retail sales. Remote sellers - those who most commonly sell tobacco products over the Internet - routinely circumvent tax and age verification laws.
A 2001 study by Forrester Research predicted states could lose as much as $1.4 billion in tobacco revenue in 2005. Industry analysts and the federal government estimate states are now losing as much as $5 billion a year. Further, a 2004 Journal of American Medicine study found that more than 96 percent of minors ages 15 to 16 were able to place an Internet cigarette order in less than 25 minutes, with most being able to complete those orders in seven minutes.
The PACT Act will help ensure fair competition for local businesses, ensure the state collects the appropriate excise taxes, and help protect our children from underage tobacco use. Iowans should let Senators Grassley and Harkin know they support this bill and urge them to pass the PACT Act in the U.S. Senate.
- Craig R. Schoenfeld, executive director, Iowa Wholesale Distributors Association, West Des Moines

The New Jersey Senate has approved a bill that restricts the sale and use of electronic cigarettes.
The bill expands the definition of “smoking” to include e-cigarettes and extends the ban on smoking by minors to include them.
Electronic cigarettes look like the real thing but don’t contain tobacco. Instead, they employ a metal tube with a battery that heats up a liquid nicotine solution. Users inhale and exhale the resulting water vapor.
The Senate bill, approved Thursday by a 38-0 vote, prohibits their use in public places and workplaces. It was approved Monday by the state Assembly and now goes to Gov. Jon Corzine.U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg has called on the federal Food and Drug Administration to remove e-cigarettes from the market.

Tobacco-product marketers face an uncommon business problem: They have to lure new customers to replace the nearly half-million Americans who are killed by their products each year.
These folks are smart or, should we say, devious. They know that some people never start smoking simply because they don’t like the smell on their clothing and their breath, or because laws prevent them smoking indoors and they don’t want to face the social stigma associated with lighting up outdoors or chewing and spitting. And some smart and determined smokers are able to quit for the same reasons.
So, these clever marketers have come up with new tobacco products that smell minty, produce no smoke or need to spit, and can be used discreetly. They claim the new smokeless tobacco isn’t aimed at teenagers, but the evidence clearly indicates otherwise. They have catchy names like Snus, Orbs and Stride and come packaged in brightly colored, cell-phone-size containers. Some look and taste like candy. They can be carried and used without parents or teachers catching on.
And they contain so much highly addictive nicotine — triple the amount in cigarettes — and they’re so easy to use, that once a kid gets hooked, he or she usually stays hooked. Even better for tobacco pushers, they often move on to cigarettes once they’re addicted, and studies show the younger people are when they start smoking, the harder it is to quit.
For tobacco companies, it looks like problem solved.But these new killers, being test-marketed in Columbus, Ohio; Portland, Ore.; and Indianapolis, Ind., are creating a new set of health problems for users and for taxpayers who will have to help pay their medical bills. Because these innocent-looking products can cause disfiguring and sometimes fatal mouth and throat cancers. And, since their toxins are carried throughout the body, they contribute to heart disease, stroke and cancers afflicting other organs, including liver cancer, which has an overall five-year survival rate of only 10 percent.
Unintended victims of the new smokeless products are children and toddlers who could find an open container and ingest a dangerous number of the candy lookalikes. The companies tout their containers as child-proof, but as parents can attest, that doesn’t mean children won’t find a way into them. A 1-year-old could become seriously ill or even die from ingesting as few as 10 of the mint-like Camel Orbs. These dangerous products have passed no clinical trials for safety, nor do manufacturers have to reveal their ingredients. Altogether, they are a recipe for public-health disaster and should be banned.

A Thai advertiser who organised an international tobacco exhibition was yesterday fined Bt20,000 for allowing banners carrying images of cigarette brands and logos at the event.The unnamed company was fined Bt20,000 for violating a 1992 law that prohibits pictorial or narrative displays of brands of cigarettes and other tobacco products.
The violation took place at the Tabinfo Asia exhibition, which was held at a Muang Thong Thani exhibition hall, from Wednesday until yesterday.
A team of Public Health Ministry inspectors and local police met the staff of the company on Thursday to notify them of the offence. The staff appeared at the Nonthaburi provincial court yesterday and pleaded guilty, resulting in the initial fine of Bt40,000 being halved.
Public Health Minister Witthaya Kaewparadai hailed the court penalty as a sign to the world that Thailand’s law on controlling tobacco consumption was effective and any violator was equally punishable. He said it would be used as a model at all upcoming international events of a similar kind to be held in Thailand.

Detectives are preparing files against nine men arrested over Europe’s largest ever seizure of smuggled cigarettes.
Three of the suspects detained after an international investigation smashed an attempt to bring 120 million cigarettes into the Republic have been released.
Six other Irishmen held after armed police intercepted a ship carrying the 50 million euro contraband as it entered Greenore Port in Co Louth were freed earlier.

HARTSVILLE— A work by Coker College art professor Jean Grosser is featured in State Art Collection: Contemporary Conversations, Part I an exhibition at the 701 Center for Contemporary Arts in Columbia through Nov. 1.
Contemporary Conversations highlights 188 works by 95 selected South Carolina artists including painter Jasper Johns, photographer Cecil Williams, and printmaker Thomas Seawell. The collection reflects the diverse voices and concerns of South Carolina artists who are inspired by social issues, memory, local and national history, and imagination.
Grosser’s artwork in Contemporary Conversations is a shrine-like box called “Smoking by Pregnant Women.” A mixed-media piece made from wood, paper, metal and cigarettes, it uses a 1937 Life magazine advertisement for Camel cigarettes. In the advertisement, a woman sharpshooter declares that cigarettes aid her digestion and relaxation. At the same time, the Surgeon General’s warning on the cigarette pack warns that smoking may result in fetal injury, premature birth, and low birth weight.
Author Eleanor Heartney, contributing editor to Art in America and Artpress, chose all of the pieces in Contemporary Conversations from the 448-piece State Art Collection, which is maintained by the South Carolina Arts Commission. Part II of the exhibition runs November 5 to December 6 at the 701 Center for Contemporary Arts.
Grosser is chair of Coker College art department. She holds a master’s of fine arts from Ohio University and a bachelor’s of fine arts from Alfred University. She joined the Coker College faculty in 1985.

OCEANA COUNTY — Authorities responded to an early morning break-in Thursday at an Oceana County convenience store where nearly $4,000 in cigarettes was stolen.Oceana County Sheriff’s Road Patrol Lt. Craig Mast said an alarm system alerted the owner of Stony Creek General Store, 5400 W. Shelby, of the break-in.
Deputies at the scene discovered a rock had been thrown through one of the store windows and about 60 cartons of cigarettes — worth an estimated about $4,000 — had been taken, Mast said.
Nothing else was taken and there are no known suspects at this time, Mast said. The case remains under investigation.