The Newton City Commission has approved a policy to ban tobacco use at city parks and outdoor recreational areas.
The Tobacco-Free Parks policy will be effective on January 1st, 2024, and it will ban tobacco use in city-owned recreational areas, including parks, playgrounds, trails and athletic fields. Sand Creek Golf Station will be exempt from the policy.
The Healthy Harvey Coalition asked Newton High School students last spring to help with a study on tobacco litter in city parks, and in one park, the students filled a seven-liter bucket with discarded tobacco products. The Coalition also helped to encourage the City of Hesston to make its parks tobacco-free, and the group worked with the City of Newton on an ordinance to raise the age for buying tobacco products to 21.
The City of Newton and the Harvey County Health Department will receive free signs from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, and the signs will be posted at parks and recreation areas to remind visitors of the new policy.
[ photo from Harvey County shows students collecting tobacco litter at a Newton park ]
