Recognition Programs for Clean Indoor Air Policies – 6/13/05

Q: Does your state have a recognition program to honor companies/organizations that have implemented clean indoor air worksite policies? If so, please share your successes and lessons learned.

A:

1. Alabama: The Area Grantees work with their coalitions to provide recognition to work sites implementing smoke free policies, so there is no formal set way of accomplishing this. Some areas choose to have coalition meetings at the business (if it's a restaurant), some do press releases and award certificates. Some businesses prefer to keep the decision quiet and not receive public recognition, so my only advice is to speak with the work site involved to see what they would like. An example of a success was when the Coalition for a Smoke Free Dallas County held a reception for all restaurants who were smoke free. The group raised funds from local businesses to pay for the reception at a smoke free restaurant and they invited the Mayor to award certificates of recognition to the restaurant owners. The press covered the event. The Mayor later went on to support a smoke free ordinance for the city, although it didn't pass the city council.
    
2. Massachusetts: no program.
    
3. Michigan: Michigan is currently planning for our state Surgeon General, Dr. Wisdom, to recognize various businesses for taking steps toward worksite wellness, including smoke free policy implementation. This will occur at a press conference in July where the business portion of the Steps Up website will be formally unveiled. At that time, Dr. Wisdom will recognize several outstanding businesses in the state in terms of wellness. This process should continue in the future through the website. Also, the Governor's Physical Fitness Council has a Healthy Workplace Award, which apparently they are trying to revise to include tobacco policies.
    
4. Mississippi: One of the things our state does is provide a certificate of appreciation for restaurants that have voluntarily gone smoke-free. At times if we can get media coverage such as news paper article etc. we do. In addition, The MS Dept. of Health provides a Certificate signed by the State Health Officer and presented to the business owner by all Tobacco Advocacies.
    
5. Nevada: does not have a statewide recognition program, but we would like to know what other states are doing and whether they get a lot of earned media.
    
6. New Hampshire: New Hampshire does not have a statewide recognition program for smokefree workplaces. However, many of our community coalitions regularly take out ads in local media congratulating newly smokefree businesses and/or listing existing smokefree workplaces in their communities. These ads serve the dual purpose of promoting the coalition and the businesses at the same time.
    
7. New Jersey: New Jersey has worked with the NJ American Cancer for 4 years on the " Worksite Program". The ACS would recruit 25 companies that would go smoke-free in that year and would do the onsite training of involved personnel. .This training would include information on the free State resources to quit such as the NJ Quitnet, NJ Quitline and the NJ Quitcenters. Often, representatives from the local Quitcenter would assist in making their services available to the company. Each year there would be recognition of the sites which could extend to a billboard recognizing the new smokefree status and serving as an incentive for other employers to go smoke-free. The companies ranged from small to large sized and were in a variety of industries. Typical examples would include Tror Pharmaceuticals, Simmons Mattress and SIB Mortgage.
    
8. North Carolina: North Carolina, saddled with a preemptive law in 1993, has promoted voluntary smokefree policies with considerable success, particularly in private smokefree policies in white-collar worksites. More than 78% of the North Carolina indoor workforce is covered by a nonsmoking policy for public and work areas at their worksite, compared to less than 33% of the state's workforce that was smoke-free in 1992. Although consistent progress has been observed in the effort to protect workers from job-related secondhand smoke in the state, some workers are less protected than others. For example, blue-collar and service workers are considerably less protected than are white-collar workers.
    
   Promoting voluntary adoption of nonsmoking policies and publicly celebrating those who adopt nonsmoking policies is what NC has done to achieve this level of change. Three websites share the work we currently are doing:
   
   • For information about environmental tobacco smoke training, education and research, visit EnTER.
   • Click if you are an employer interested in providing a smokefree work environment for your employees.
   • Click if you are concerned about exposure to secondhand smoke in your community.

   Many of our local coalitions around the state participate in various locally developed programs to 1) ID smoke-free worksites and dining establishments 2) Recognize smoke-free places and 3) establish positive peer pressure to convice more businesses to go smoke-free. Click to access the certificate used by one of those programs -- which has been adopted by the state for use by any county that wants to use it.

9. North Dakota: North Dakota local tobacco programs have a rewards program for businesses that have implemented clean indoor air. They provide plaques or certificates, offer free signs, and try to present the award plaques at a media event. In most small communities it generates free media when they present the award and do a press release or hold a news conference.

10. Oregon: In Oregon, our county tobacco prevention coordinators and our county coalitions present awards to businesses in their communities, however, there is no statewide coordination of these efforts. When our program was fully funded and we had a yearly conference, at least one very supportive business would receive an award during the conference.

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