Date: Fri 27-Nov-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: CURT

Quick Words:

edink-tobacco-settlement

Full Text:

ED INK: The Tobacco Money

The decision last week by Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal to

join a multi-state settlement with tobacco companies clears the way for $3.5

billion to flow into state coffers. (The deal could grow to $5.5 billion

through inflation over the 25 year term of its implementation.) The settlement

ends a lawsuit Mr Blumenthal filed against the tobacco industry in an attempt

to recover what the state has spent over the years on the medical treatment of

people with tobacco related illnesses.

Connecticut should get its first payment, $44.5 million, next April, and

annual payments of $100 million after that. Mr Blumenthal said he decided to

join with several other states in the settlement "to save lives now and begin

to fairly compensate Connecticut for the horrendous harm done by the tobacco

industry over the years." Implicit in these comments is the idea that the

money will be used for health programs and a campaign to help smokers quit the

habit and to keep young people from lighting up in the first place. This is

what anti-smoking groups have been pushing for. But that is not necessarily

what will happen with the money.

Technically state budgetmakers can do whatever they want with the windfall

from the tobacco settlement. Such a massive influx of cash could solve a lot

of problems for the state, and the temptation to view the $3.5 billion as

"free money" for special interest programs or for tax breaks in election years

will be great.

The governor and state legislators should remember, however, that this is not

free money. It has been paid for in the most painful way by generations of

smokers and their families who have faced suffering and death as a direct

result of the use of tobacco products -- products that have been aggressively

marketed to young and old alike for decades. It was their suffering that

inspired the lawsuits that forced the massive cash pay-outs the tobacco

companies must now make. It should be their suffering that inspires

Connecticut budgetmakers to direct the money coming from the settlement to

programs and causes directly related to the health of Connecticut's citizens.