Council, Casino at Odds Over Smoking Ban Change KANSAS CITY, MO (kcur) - A Kansas City Council committee took testimony Wednesday on two proposed changes to no-smoking ordinance.

There was no opposition to allowing an exemption for the city's few cigar stores. But Troy Stremming of Ameristar Casino took exception to banning smoking in the concourses that lead to casino gaming rooms. Smoking is allowed there under a section of the lengthy smoking ban voters passed. So Stremming contends that voters intended to allow smoking in the concourses.

But those details of the ordinance were not in the ballot language, and Councilman John sharp said most voters only read what was on the ballot. He added that many children are in those concourses on their way to the movie theater at Ameristar, or the pizza restaurant... and that smoking is currently allowed right outside a child-care center there.

Ameristar's Stremming protested that enforcing smoking throughout the complex would be impossible.

The debate continues at next week's Public Safety and Neighborhoods Committee meeting.
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