Kentucky Smoking Ban Bill Expected to Pass Committee on Tuesday

After being delayed twice, a House committee is prepared to finally vote on a bill that would establish a statewide smoking ban in Kentucky.The House Health and Welfare committee has been plagued by absences. Without a quorum, it could not vote on the smoking ban bill.But Chairman Tom Burch says he’ll get his members to a special meeting tomorrow morning, where he’ll have the votes to pass the bill.“I think I’ve got 12, it’d be more than enough I only need nine,” Burch says.The bill’s sponsor, state representative Susan Westrom, is unsure of the bill’s fate once it makes it out of the House committee.“You know my concern I don’t think it has the votes to get out of the Senate. So we’re going to start counting again and if we don’t have the votes to get it out of the Senate I don’t believe we’ll vote on it on the House,” she says.Westrom says she hopes increased lobbying efforts will help drum up support for the measure over the next few weeks.