By Yael T. Abouhalkah, Kansas City Star Editorial Page columnist

In mid-2003 Kansas City Health Director Rex Archer began promoting a smoking ban for city restaurants.

It was a great idea, and it helped lead to a campaign on my part and many others for a regional smoke-free law for all public places.

Not everyone agreed, led by restaurant and bar owners, as well as people who didn’t want to lose their “right” to blow smoke where they wanted.

Fast-forward six years.

Today — after plenty of contentious debates, too many delays but also many positive moves by elected officials and voters — good laws now protect the great majority of area residents and workers from second-hand smoke in restaurants, bars, office buildings and other public places.

Cities without laws, such as Raytown and Grandview, have had plenty of opportunities to stop being the region’s ashtrays. All have badly fumbled their chances.

Here’s a grade card on how area cities handled the issue of smoking bans. To be clear, most cities now have decent laws. But recall that — by early this decade — dozens of cities and a number of states already had smoking bans in place.

A: Fairway

This city gets credit for being the first local one to move on the issue in late 2005.

B: Overland Park, Lenexa, Leawood, Prairie Village, Mission, North Kansas City, Roeland Park

Most of these cities took action in 2006 and 2007, and most approved a model law proposed by the Mid-America Regional Council.

C: Olathe, Independence, Lee’s Summit, Liberty

All four cities now have strict smoke-free laws, but several made the task tougher than it had to be.

Independence’s City Council refused to pass a ban; voters eventually endorsed a good law.

In Lee’s Summit and Liberty, elected officials initially approved smoke-free laws that had various loopholes. Concerned residents in both cities petitioned for tougher laws and placed them on the ballots.

Voters overwhelmingly passed the beefed-up ordinances.

Olathe’s elected officials passed a strong law, but a loophole lets bars become private clubs to continue allowing smoking.

D: Kansas City, Shawnee, Blue Springs, Gladstone

Kansas City had a special duty to lead the way in approving a strict smoke-free law upfront, and it failed to do so.

Instead, Mayor Kay Barnes and the City Council in 2004 passed a convoluted ordinance that would have only taken effect for restaurants and bars when 85 percent of the region’s population was covered by similar laws.

Three years later, the council passed another, slightly stronger law that still contained loopholes allowing smoking in public places.

When voters in 2008 finally got their chance through the initiative process to overturn the council’s decision, they endorsed a solid smoke-free law.

Politicians in the other cities have passed laws with various exclusions, essentially caving in to a few special-interest groups.

F: Kansas City, Kan.

With a lack of leadership from Mayor Joe Reardon, the Unified Government last year approved a loophole-ridden law that allows restaurants and bars to cheaply buy the right to keep offering a haven for smokers.

Double FF: Raytown, Grandview and several other smaller cities.

It’s amazing that elected leaders in these cities have failed to protect residents with reasonable smoke-free ordinances. Worse yet, they have studied the issue and come back with lame excuses for their inaction.

Still, this list is mercifully shorter than a few years ago.

Thanks to Archer and many others, hundreds of thousands of people today breathe cleaner air in public places throughout the region.

Editorial Board member Yael T. Abouhalkah can be reached at or 816-234-4887. He blogs at voices.kansascity.com. He appears on “Ruckus” at 7 tonight on KCPT, Channel 19.