Redding high school students call for tobacco ordinance enforcement 

“Think about it this way, imagine your pencil breaks during class and your teacher doesn’t have a pencil sharpener,” said Angelique Turner, a sophomore at Enterprise High School as she spoke to the Redding City Council last night. 

“You turn to the person sitting next to you and you ask, ‘Do you have an extra pencil I can borrow?’ Sometimes they say yes, and sometimes they say no. For many young people, accessing a vape can feel just as simple. If one person has access, it can quickly be shared with someone else.” 

In 2023, the California Department Of Public Health found that Shasta County had the highest rate of teens with self-reported tobacco use in the state, at around 41%. That compares with a statewide average of about 6.4%, according to CDPH. 

A local tobacco retail ordinance passed by Redding council members last year was intended to address the issue. To curb the use of tobacco products by minors, it requires tobacco retailers to pay an annual fee of about $1,176 in addition to the existing $265 state-mandated fee. The Redding ordinance also prohibits new tobacco retailers from operating within 600 feet of a K-12 school. Statewide, it’s already illegal to sell to minors or to sell any flavored tobacco products.

While the new ordinance could reduce tobacco use among teens in Redding, proponents of the ordinance who spoke at the meeting, including former council member Kristen Schreder, are concerned that the city still hasn’t implemented any enforcement to back up the new law. 

Student commenters expressed similar concerns, voicing worries about the responsibility of addressing tobacco use among their classmates in the absence of strong enforcement by the city. 

“Students should not have to be responsible for monitoring their peers’ behavior, and schools should not have to stand alone in the enforcement,” said Olivia Racki, a senior at Shasta High School. “What we need from you is the enforcement of your ordinance in order to create change.” 

Program fees derived from the new ordinance, which are likely to total over $117,000 annually, were originally intended to hire a full-time neighborhood preservation officer to enforce the ordinance and a half-time administrative assistant to manage the Tobacco Retail License Program, including collecting fees from businesses, according to Jeremy Pagan, the director of Redding’s Development Services Department.

While the program has advertised and interviewed candidates for those positions, funding to pay for them is the missing piece, Pagan said, adding that the City of Redding has yet to hire for either position leaving revenue on the table and enforcement by the wayside.

“We have not issued [tobacco licenses] to date without adequate staffing, and of course, there’s been very little to no enforcement,” he said. 

Pagan called on the council to draft a budget resolution to establish the officer and assistant positions, and authorize recruitment and employment. The council approved the plan, contingent on receiving grant funding from the Department of Justice Tobacco Grant Program. Council member Tenessa Audette, whose state assembly campaign received funding from tobacco retailers as reported by Shasta Scout last year, opposed the decision. 

The city has not yet received the tobacco grant funding but should know within about 30 days if it will, Pagan said. Assuming the grant comes through, it will take about six to 12 months for enough licensing fees to come in to allow for enforcement to begin taking place. 

“You’re looking at having to get 100-plus businesses signed up and their licenses applied for and issued,” Pagan explained. “It takes some time. Multiple letters, outreach, and so forth, so it will take some time.”

OCt. 22, 6:55 p.m.: We’ve updated the story to correct a name spelling.

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