Note to Self: Open Tobacco Store in Schaumburg

By Matt Wood in News on Jan 12, 2006 4:15PM

Just as the city of Chicago is set to start enforcing its public smoking ban, Elk Grove Village is considering banning the sale of cigarettes completely. Mayor Craig Johnson told the Tribune it would be hypocritical to pass a current village proposal to ban smoking in public while still allowing the sale of cigarettes. If passed, the Trib says that a ban on selling smokes in Elk Grove would be the first of its kind in the country, according to the American Lung Association and the Illinois Coalition Against Tobacco.

The assumption that no individual is responsible for their own choices is apparently widely-held in Elk Grove Village. Five years ago they passed an ordinance requiring all people, baby-faced frat boys and grandmas alike, to show ID before purchasing booze.

Chicagoist is going out on a limb here because we hate smoking too, but this is one of the more useless ideas we've seen come out of any government lately, kangaroo suburb town council or not. Indiana forbids the sale of alcohol on Sundays, but that doesn't stop Hoosiers from heading out of state to buy their booze, stocking up on Saturday, or getting shitcanned at any establishment that also serves food where the rule doesn't apply (read: sports bars showing football). If Elk Grove Villagers (Grovers?) can't buy smokes near home, they'll just head to Schaumburg or Itasca and build a bomb shelter out of Marlboro cartons, costing Elk Grove a black lung full of sin taxes. They might as well keep taxing the hell out of cigarettes in an attempt to make people quit for economic reasons. And if they don't, more money for the people that live past 55.