Someday I'll Figure Out What This is About

The lead article in The Star today suggests a debate is coming over whether Ontario should outlaw smoking in some apartment buildings. If Cressa and I are able to get onto the house-buying track as soon as we want to any resulting legislation would probably be moot, but given our current situation it’s a topic I’ve got some interest in.

For the past several months a heavy smoker has been living in one of the apartments near ours. The hallway frequently reeks of smoke, but what’s worse is that an awful lot of it manages to make it into our apartment. Ironically, it’s at its worst when we open the windows as, due to some quirk of differing air pressures, this actually causes more smoky air to be sucked in from the hallway.

John Tory, the leader of the Conservatives said something I agree with:

“People have a refuge, which is their home,” he said. “Where does it stop? What do you start telling people what they can and can’t do in their homes?”

In principle I’m not in favour of “telling people what they can and can’t do in their own homes,” but the sentiment goes both ways: it’s immensely frustrating when Cressa arrive home to our “refuge” to find it smelling like an ashtray. If a neighbour is keeping me up with loud music in the middle of the night, I can call the bylaw officer; there’s not a heck of a lot we can do right now about the smoke.

Tory suggests that “the province would be better off improving the building code to stop smoke from drifting from unit to unit than legislating [people's] behaviour.” If new buildings were constructed to such a code, I think that’d be a great step in the right direction, but it doesn’t really help people living in existing apartment buildings.

I don’t really have a good solution to the problem; it’s in a sort of gray area where one person’s personal freedoms interfere with another’s. Maybe it’s good enough for now that the issue is being debated, and maybe with debate there’s a middle ground to be found.