Agenda Packets - 1995/04/03 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Flom:Julie Trude To:Mounds View Pofice Dept. 3130/95 at 13:14:08 MEMORANDUM To: City Council Fm: Julie Trude Re: Meeting re proposed ordinance licensing tobacco sales Date: March 29, 1995 The Chief and I met with three business representatives and a health educator today to discuss our proposed ordinance licensing tobacco vendors. Here's a synopsis: Mark H., local S.A. manager. Mark has no problem with the proposed fines, license fee or penalties. He was proud to note that one of the three minors he employs successfully passed their own internal cigarette sale compliance check this week. He does not feel minors are more likely to sell to underage customers. He'd like to see the community continue to educate kids through DARE and to enforce laws against kids who smoke. He has recently begun biting younger employees through a high school work program because it has become difficult to fill positions. S.A. now offers a tuition incentive program to employees and may attract more young employees as a result. He thinks a restriction on who can sell cigarettes in his store would make it difficult to staff using any employees under 18. Therefore he is asking us to remove that restriction from the ordinance. Mark may attend the counsel work session. Ed Hanson,manager of Snyders. Ed employs from 6 -8 persons under age 18. He mainly hires these young people to work the cash registers and believes he would not be able to meet his staffing needs if all employees weren't able to sell cigarettes. (These are not a large - volume item in his store.) A store manager is always in the store but is not always available at the cash register to assist with every cigarette sale. Currently they have a policy that anyone who appears under age 25 is ID'd on cigarette sales. A manager is called if a customer has no ID to determine whether a sale should be made. Ed has had to turn to younger employees because it's become more difficult to staff with only adults. Ed suggested an alternative, persons under age 18 could sell cigarettes if there is an employee over 18 in the store at the time. Ile and the other business owners acknowledged there's always an adult manager on the premises at their businesses so an ordinance with this requirement would not change any business practices. Rd was grateful for being invited to discuss this proposed ordinance. In fact, all three businessmen thanked us for listening to them before we took action. They seemed to leave the room with a general respect for our city process. Paul Fedor of Fcdors Market. Paul's daughter is 16 and works at his store. Paul stated that with a stiff Minn. law on the books, we don't need another and weaker law in our city. He is concerned that because people make mistakes his business might be ruined. He uses several training aids to help his employees follow the law. He said a loss of a tobacco license would put him out of business. He thinks the city should emphasize DARE and train kids to not smoke. He would like us to fine kids who smoke. -1-