Imagine: You arrive at the beach on a sunny day. After unloading beach chairs, towels, toys and your kids from the minivan, you trudge up the wooden ramp and onto the sand. The ocean is blinding. Waves roll in and a Frisbee whizzes by. As you find the perfect spot to plant your loot, your kids start making castles and burying each other in the sand. Some time passes and people begin filling in the empty area around you. Then, you smell it. That unmistakable smell of burning tar. Someone near you has lit a cigarette.
The enjoyment of the ocean environment has disappeared in a cloud of smoke. Now imagine that, because one of your kids is asthmatic, you have to pack all of your belongings up and move to a safer place on the beach. One that won’t make your child cough.
Does that seem fair to you?
It doesn’t seem fair to me. That is why I commend Michael Bange, whose family of four has faced this annoyance too many times. Bange recently asked the Township Council to consider making at least one of Brick’s beaches smoke-free. And I think that’s an excellent idea.
Although people go to the beach to walk, to run, to surf and to swim, people also go the beach because of the natural environment. Most of these activities could be done in one’s own back yard. But people enjoy the salt air and the cool breezes of the beach.
For me, this scene is dirtied by cigarette smoke. And maybe more importantly, it’s soiled by cigarette butts that are left carelessly on the beach. A volunteer for Clean Ocean Ac-tion told me this week that the main source of litter found during the organization’s beach sweeps is cigarette butts. While other kinds of litter are undoubtedly a problem as well, it’s all too easy to swiftly bury a cigarette butt in the sand and leave it there for the tide to wash away.
The Township Council should pass an ordinance banning smoking at Brick Beach III, the beach that Bange said is heavily used by young people, before next summer. Or they should consider Belmar’s solution: Designate specific smoking areas that are stocked with disposable ashtrays.
Smokers have their rights, this is true. But others have the right to a clean beach and to enjoy the sea air without having to inhale cigarette smoke into their lungs.
Jennifer Dome
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