INDY'S WEEKLY ALTERNATIVE NEWSPAPER HIGHLIGHTING ARTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

Smokers and non-smokers unite

I consider myself a fiscal conservative, but social libertarian. In other words, I don’t want the government taking more of my money than necessary. And by the same token I want them to spend my money wisely. So, needless to say, you can only imagine how shocked I was when I looked through the biennial budget to discover where this state is allocating millions of our tax dollars.

This state has decided to spend millions of dollars on technology development grants, AIDS education and research, Hispanic and Latin affairs and residential services for developmentally disabled citizens. This is not a good thing!

Now, I know many of you are scratching your head in some kind of bewilderment right now, wondering, “Abdul, what’s going through that head of yours?!”

Well, the answer is easy: The above mentioned programs are being paid for with money from the settlement with the tobacco companies.

You remember the tobacco settlements of the late 1990s? You recall how attorneys general from 46 states (including Indiana) signed what was then called the Master Settlement Agreement with the nation’s four largest tobacco companies to recover the costs associated with the millions and in some cases billions spent on treating tobacco-related illnesses.

The tobacco industry was estimated at the time to pay the states nearly $200 billion over 25 years to treat the costs associated with smoking like lung cancer, heart disease, bad breath, kidney stones and every other disease smoking is reported to be responsible for. And don’t even get me started on second-hand smoke.

Now, I will admit at the time I thought this was a good idea. I was employed as a media spokesman for the Illinois attorney general when all this suing and settling was taking place, so I had some pretty intimate knowledge of what was going on. What better way to spend money from the tobacco settlement than to pay for the costs of smoking and smoking-related illnesses.

But ladies and gentlemen, work with me on this one.

The following is a list of programs that will receive funding from the Master Tobacco Settlement. I pulled them from HB 1001, which is the starting point for the biennial budget for FY 2005-2006 and FY 2006-2007. The numbers I list are only those for FY 2005-2006. In many cases there was not much change to the next fiscal year; however, why make you twice as upset as you should be. So assuming HB 1001 is passed as is, here’s how money from the tobacco settlement would be allocated:

• 21st Century Research & Technology Fund, $37,500,000

• Technology Development Grant Program, $4,500,000

• Commission on Hispanic/Latino Affairs, $124,188

• Indiana Prescription Drug Fund, $8,000,000

• Family and Social Services Administration Children’s Health Insurance program, $26,503,056

• Division of Disability, Aging and Rehabilitative Services, $3,012,462

• Residential Services for Developmentally Disabled Persons, $23,000,000

• Minority Health Initiative, $2,091,224

• Sickle Cell, $232,500 • AIDS Education and Services, $3,087,304

• Maternal and Child Health Support, $176,000

If you see anything in the above list that has something to do with smoking or smoking-related illnesses, please e-mail me. I’m sure the developmentally disabled need a place to live, but should money from the tobacco settlement be used to pay for it? I’m all for kids having insurance, but should we take money that was originally geared for treating the costs of smoking be used for it? And to be brutally honest, I didn’t know sickle cell still existed.

Now, in all due fairness to lawmakers and policy drafters, there is money being spent on smoking and smoking-related programs. For example, more than $15 million is going to community health centers. Ten million dollars has been earmarked for use prevention and cessation. And $150,000 is going toward prenatal substance abuse and prevention. However, you have to admit that something is fundamentally wrong when more money from a multimillion dollar tobacco settlement is being spent on technology than on smoking treatment and prevention. By my count (which I admit is incomplete), in FY 2005-’06, Indiana will spend four times more on non-tobacco related programs than it will on tobacco and smoking-related items.

Both sides of the smoking issue should be outraged. If you are an anti-smoking advocate you should be ready to run out and light up over the fact that more money will be spent on the 21st Century Research and Technology Fund than towards community health centers and smoking prevention and cessation. And if you’re a smoker you should be ready to quit over the fact the government, which is already taxing you to death (pardon the pun), is taking the money it makes off your bad habit and is funneling it into its own pet programs.

I know there isn’t much that smokers and non-smokers agree on these days, but I think I just may have found one of them, or about 100 million of them, depending on your perspective. You have met the enemy, and he is your government. Imagine that!

Abdul in the Morning can be heard weekdays from 6-9 a.m. on WXNT.