Date: Fri 27-Nov-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: CURT

Quick Words:

tobacco-settlement-Blumenthal

Full Text:

State Joins National Tobacco Pact; Connecticut To Get $3.5 Billion

By Diane Scarponi

Associated Press

HARTFORD -- Connecticut has joined a multistate settlement with tobacco

companies that will put $3.5 billion in state coffers and restrict the

marketing and advertising of tobacco products.

The payout -- estimated to grow through inflation to $5.5 billion over the 25

years of the deal -- can be spent as state leaders choose, although

anti-smoking groups say much of the money should be used to boost medical care

and anti-smoking campaigns.

The decision by Attorney General Richard Blumenthal ends a lawsuit he filed

against the tobacco companies to recover money the state has spent treating

sick smokers.

"We decided to accept the settlement because it will help to save lives now

and begin to fairly compensate Connecticut for the horrendous harm done by the

tobacco industry over the years," Blumenthal said. "This settlement will give

us public health protections and amounts of money that would have been

virtually unimaginable when we filed this lawsuit some two and a half years

ago."

If Connecticut were to reject the deal and continue its lawsuit, Blumenthal

said the effort would have taken at least five years and would have meant

"thousands of lives lost and dollars wasted."

The agreement also will allow people to continue to sue tobacco companies --

something that a failed June 1997 agreement would have barred.

A Connecticut lobbyist for tobacco companies said his clients are pleased that

lawyers drafted an acceptable settlement.

"We've resolved what would have been a long, expensive trial with an uncertain

result, and the only sure thing is that someone would have filed an appeal,"

said Bourke Spellacy, a lobbyist for the Tobacco Institute, an industry trade

group.

The American Lung Association said it "mistrusts" the settlement, fearing

lawyers have crafted loopholes to get tobacco companies out of the agreement,

but the Connecticut chapter said it supported Blumenthal's decision.

"In light of the reality that so many other states have joined, I think the

attorney general probably had to decide for those reasons, and it would be

years before Connecticut could bring its own case before the court, if ever,"

said Richard Straub, vice president for government relations for the lung

association.

Under the settlement, tobacco companies cannot advertise on billboards, buses

and merchandise and cannot target teenagers. The settlement also bars tobacco

companies from some kinds of licensing agreements, such as naming rights for a

stadium.

Eight state attorneys general reached the $206 billion deal with tobacco

companies Monday. Other states unanimously endorsed the deal by Friday, the

deadline to accept the settlement.

Connecticut will get $44.5 million by April and over $100 million annually

thereafter.

The governor and the legislature will decide how to spend the money.

Blumenthal and anti-smoking groups pushed for funding of health care and

programs to help people quit smoking and stop children from lighting up.

"Unless this money goes towards tobacco prevention and cessation programs

targeted towards our children, we will lose yet another generation of our kids

to this industry and their tactics," said David Woodmansee, vice president of

communications for the Connecticut chapter of the American Cancer Society.

The governor's office could not comment late last week on specifics of how the

money would be spent.

"Remember, Connecticut got this money because tobacco made people ill," Straub

said.

Blumenthal and anti-smoking groups said Congress now should allow the US Food

and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco as a drug.