Council members voted 4-1 Tuesday to prohibit smoking in all town parks, Mayor Bob Ravasio said. Councilman Michael Lappert cast the dissenting vote.

In addition to being a “health issue,” the new ban will boost park-goers’ comfort, Ravasio said.

“It increases the comfort and enjoyment of people in the park,” he said.

The ordinance amendment applies to all parks in town limits and will take effect in 30 days, officials said. Corte Madera’s smoking ordinance dates to 1981 and prohibits lighting up in certain areas that are open to the public.

Lappert said he voted against the amendment because he believes the dangers of second-hand smoke are overstated and a smoking ban in parks is unenforceable.

“It’s an ill-conceived law that’s unenforceable and it’s based on inaccurate data,” Lappert said.

Also Tuesday, the Town Council further considered its plans for exiting the Association of Bay Area Governments, or ABAG, Ravasio and Lappert said.

Council members discussed the possibility of starting a new Marin council of governments agency for better local control, while recognizing that that plan would be “extremely time-consuming and (take) a lot of energy,” Ravasio said.

Corte Madera has started the 15-month process of leaving ABAG, he said.

The slow but steady expansion of local anti-smoking laws may be taking another step in Arlington, where a City Council committee has begun re-examining the city’s smoking ordinance.

Councilman Robert Rivera pushed the council to take another look at the ordinance. Some other council members, including Mayor Robert Cluck, a physician, have supported previous restrictions.

It’s a good time to go through the ordinance again, and tourist attractions like Rangers Ballpark and Cowboys Stadium are a good place to start.

The last major revision in the ordinance came in 2006 when the council made indoor smoking off-limits at restaurants, hotels and motels. Smoking is allowed at some establishments — private clubs, bars, nightclubs, sexually oriented businesses, pool halls and bingo parlors — all of which must not admit patrons or employees under 18.

Other places set their own rules. The University of Texas at Arlington is a nonsmoking campus. One stimulus for that ban, phased in over two years, is that the Cancer Prevention Research Institute of Texas will not fund research projects where smoking is allowed.

Some Texas cities, including Dallas, Fort Worth, Austin and El Paso, ban smoking in office buildings, and there’s a long list of other restrictions in cities across the state.

After decades of research, litigation and public policy-making on the issue, it’s hard to argue with the core reasoning behind smoking bans. That is, tobacco smoke, including secondhand smoke, kills.

Still, smoking ordinances attract controversy, mostly over the issue of personal choice. People who know the deadly risk and still choose to smoke should be allowed to do so, the argument goes. And businesses that wish to serve smokers — and other people old enough to make personal choices — should not be restricted from doing so.

Those two points led the parade of arguments against Arlington’s 2006 ban on smoking at restaurants, hotels and other places. Distinctions were made: A business that makes at least 75 percent of its income from selling alcohol is a bar, where patrons can smoke. Places that make more than 25 percent of their income from selling food are restaurants, where smoking is banned.

Smokers also can’t light up within 50 feet of a door or window that opens to a place where smoking is banned.

The “smoker’s choice” argument does carry some weight. Because of that, smoking ordinances have evolved from broad-brush bans to more fine-stroke efforts targeting those places where nonsmokers should have the liberty to inhale clean air.

Arlington’s economy draws much from Rangers Ballpark and Cowboys Stadium, and the city owns both venues. Smoking should be banned there.

Councilwoman Sheri Capehart, who leads the Municipal Policy Committee, said committee members will carefully examine the need for any smoking ordinance changes.

Here’s another suggestion: Ann Hicks, a soccer referee and member of the Star-Telegram 2012 Community Columnist Panel, has pointed out a problem with a 2007 ordinance provision that banned smoking within 50 feet of dugouts, bleachers, playgrounds, restrooms and plaza areas at athletic complexes. (See: “Calling foul on Arlington’s permissive smoking ordinance,” April 9)

Even at that distance, Hicks says from a wealth of personal experience, tobacco smoke drifts across the playing fields and bothers young athletes.

Banning all smoking at city athletic complexes would be worth the council committee’s consideration.

Mohammad Irfan Butt, age not available, pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Roanoke to committing one count of conspiracy to sell more than 10,000 untaxed cigarettes. Butt entered into a plea agreement reached between his legal counsel, Kathleen M. Todd and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeb Terrien.

Conspiracy to sell contraband cigarettes carries a maximum penalty of five years in a federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000, according to the agreement.

U.S. Judge Michael F. Urbanski accepted the plea agreement. Under the deal the court then would dismiss Butt’s remaining charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States, trafficking contraband cigarettes and money laundering.

Butt and other co-defendants, including Mohammad Kashmiri, engaged in a scheme to buy untaxed cigarettes and then sell the items in states charging higher tax levies to make a profit, according to information filed in the case.

Butt and other defendants paid undercover law enforcement agents more than $8.68 million for contraband cigarettes and members of the ring sold the items to buyers in New York and other localities, the information states. Butt participated in more than one purchase of contraband cigarettes during the scheme which authorities say took place between April 2009 and November 2011.

Butt, on Dec. 17, 2009, bought approximately 1320 cartons of untaxed cigarettes at a warehouse set up by undercover law enforcement agents. During the delivery, the defendant told agents he planned to take the cigarettes to New York, according to the information document. Butt paid undercover agents $37,160 in cash for the cigarettes. Butt and another person bought contraband cigarettes from the warehouse a few days later, the information states. Butt and another person went to a gas station near Middletown on Dec. 28, 2009, and paid an undercover agent $180,300 for previously purchased contraband cigarettes, the document states.

Butt told the agent he had previously taken cigarettes to an individual in New York. Butt said the buyer paid him $200 per trip but when he asked for more money, the person fired him. Butt then went to work for another trafficker, according to the document.

The fee is called a Tobacco Premium Program. It’s part of the UT SELECT Medical Plan, a medical-benefits program for UT System employees. According to the UT System website, the UT System will implement the program because tobacco use is one of the leading preventable health risks worldwide, and the use of it doesn’t match with the healthy environment the system wants to have.

Members of the medical plan will pay a monthly surcharge of $30 per tobacco user per a month starting in September, or after the first month of declaring that he or she is a user, according to the website.

Surcharges are broken into three categories — members, spouse and children — each costing $30. The surcharge for dependent children is $30, no matter how many may be using tobacco. The maximum surcharge is $90 per a family.

Members must declare whether he or she or any covered dependant uses tobacco by signing into the My UT Benefits website. This can be done during Annual Enrollment, a time where members can change benefits and eligible dependents. Enrollment is July 15 through July 31.

UT System’s website declares a tobacco user as someone who has used the product in the past 60 days.

Once enrolled in the S.T.O.P. program, researchers from the CAMH may contact participants up to four times in one year. Participation is completely voluntary and you may decline to participate or withdraw from the program at any time.

The Port Hope CHC is offering a couple of options to those interested in taking part in the S.T.O.P. program: One-on-One consultations, or one-time group session workshops.

All programs include support, information, encouragement and free Nicotine Replacement Therapy – i.e. patches, gum, inhalers and/or lozenges (or a combination of NRT). Group session participants will receive a one-time 5 week NRT kit. Participants who choose one-on-one support will receive NRT at each visit.

The first group session is scheduled for June 4, 2012 from 10:30 am -12:00 pm at the CHC, located at 99 Toronto Road, Port Hope.

S.T.O.P. is offered to anyone who is interested in quitting smoking. Participants are not required to be clients of the Port Hope CHC.

The penalties for illegally selling tobacco to those under 18 include revocation of the seller’s retail license.

Tobacco is the leading cause of preventable deaths in the United States, said Gonzalo Coronado, coordinator for the county’s Tobacco Control Program.

Now the county ordinance is on the books it is hoped municipalities in the county will follow suit, several supervisors said.

For complete details see Wednesday’s Salinas Californian.

Many patients of MS report to have spasticity, which is a condition that makes their muscles tight and difficult to control. There are some drugs that are available, but many of these treatments tend to not show improvement in patients’ conditions. The report, recently published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, states that smoking cannabis could help reduce muscle tightness and pain for MS patients. However, smoking cannabis could also have negative cognitive effects.

In the experiment, researchers from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), held randomized, double-blinded controlled trials with 30 participants. They hoped to better understand if smoking cannabis could affect muscle spasticity for patients who weren’t able to respond to other treatments. Scientists rated the spasticity of patients’ joints on the Ashworth scale, which has commonly been used to look at the intensity of muscle tone. The results of the project showed that pain scores decreased by 50 percent and that the participants who smoked cannabis showed a one-third decrease in the Ashworth scale, which was 2.74 points on a base scale of 9.3.

Overall, spasticity in patients improved compared to a placebo group in the experiment. In the group of participants, 63 percent were female, the average age was 50, 20 percent used wheelchairs, and more than half the participants needing walking aids. This experiment differed from past projects in that it looked at the impact of smoked cannabis instead of oral cannabis.

“We saw a beneficial effect of smoked cannabis on treatment-resistant spasticity and pain associated with multiple sclerosis among our participants,” noted Dr. Jody Corey-Bloom, a researcher of the Department of Neuroscience at UCSD, in a prepared statement. “Although generally well-tolerated by our participants, smoking cannabis was accompanied by acute cognitive effects.”

Participants were also asked to perform an additional test with focused attention. The test showed that cognitive function was affected negatively by the group of participants who smoked cannabis. The mild effects on attention and concentration as well as increased fatigue proved to be short-term.

“Using an objective measure, we saw a beneficial effect of inhaled cannabis on spasticity among patients receiving insufficient relief from traditional treatments,” stated the authors in summarizing their research. “Although generally well-tolerated, smoking cannabis had acute cognitive effects. Larger, long-term studies are needed to confirm our findings and determine whether lower doses can result in beneficial effects with less cognitive impact.”

Researchers believe that more studies need to be done to confirm their findings to see if lower doses of smoking cannabis can have positive results, but with less of a cognitive impact.

The majority of people with MS experience cognitive changes at some point in their lives,” remarked Dr. Nicholas LaRocca, vice president of health care delivery at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (NMSS) and a non-affiliate of the study, in an interview with MSNBC‘s Rachael Rettner. “We don’t want to add any additional cognitive deficits with treatment.”

This study was the fifth clinical test on the possible effectiveness of cannabis, as reported by the University of California Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research (CMCR – www.cmcr.ucsd.edu). There have been four other human studies by the CMCR that examined the control of neuropathic pain, all of which have showed positive results. The CMCR helped provide funding for the current study.

“The study by Corey Bloom and her colleagues adds to a growing body of evidence that cannabis has therapeutic value for selected indications, and may be an adjunct or alternative for patients whose spasticity or pain is not optimally managed,” commented Dr. Igor Grant, director of the CMCR.

According to MSNBC, researchers are also looking at possible treatments for MS patients with exercise and Botox injections.

“We need to continue to explore all of those possibilities, because any given person with MS may respond better to one [treatment] than another,” LaRocca of the NMSS told MSNBC.

The South Dakota Attorney General’s office says it’s likely the first criminal case, following a statewide ban of the illegal substances.

Police say Phillip Plunkett, 50 and Jason Toben, 39, both of Goodwin, each face several felony charges.

Since November of 2011, local police have had their eyes on the Chicago Avenue Bar & Grill in Goodwin.

The town of Goodwin is the home of around 100 people.

Police say it was local bar owner Phillip Plunkett and associate Jason Toben may have been responsible for using the bar as a place to sell synthetic drugs.

“I do know that ever since they kinda come into this area, we’ve had different crowds of people coming in here,” Goodwin Resident, Chris Fieber said.

Fieber has lived in Goodwin his entire life.

He says the allegations are shocking, but when the Chicago Avenue Bar was open the partying lifestyle in town was much more prevalent than usual.

Fieber says he heard of one incident in town during a street dance for the local fire department in which two young girls witnessed drugs being used.

“As we were setting up some girls had gone in there and they came back out and said, ya know they’re doing drugs in there and they hurried up and got out of there,” Fieber said.

According to Deuel County Court Affidavits; undercover officers made the same discovery, actually purchasing the synthetic drugs from both Plunkett and Toben themselves.

In the documents, special agent Jeff Bellon says on January 19, 2012, undercover officers made a controlled purchased of synthetic marijuana and a pipe from Plunkett.

On February 15th an undercover officer purchased synthetic marijuana from Toben.

Both purchases were made inside of the Chicago Avenue Bar.

According to the affidavit, Toben indicated that the bar was buying the drugs from the Minneapolis area and selling them at the bar.

For people like Fieber, they just hope if the charges are true, things will return to normal before drugs make their way back into the small town of Goodwin.

The court affidavits also mentioned several underage witnesses who were interviewed and confirmed the purchase and consumption of synthetic drugs in the bar.

Phillip Plunkett is currently facing ten charges.