In June of 2014 the city council of Wichita Falls passed a smoking ban in almost all business with the exception of tobacco shops as long as 75% of the quarterly income was made up of tobacco sales.
In 2015 the Wichita Falls-Wichita County Public Health District is looking to expand the ordinance by proposing the measure to city official in Burkburnett, Electra and Iowa Park next year.
According to Lou Kreidler, Director of Health for WFWCPHD he doesn’t expect everyone will be supportive of the proposal. “Anytime that you talk about an item or an issue that’s as controversial as smoking and people feeling like they have the right to do that there’s always controversy involved with that and hopefully with education we can help people to see that it’s about protecting the community as a whole.“
The city Manager of Iowa Park believes the ordinance isn’t needed and said, “I’m sure there are those individuals out there that it aggravates their sinuses or whatever and it has a problem with most of people here in Iowa Park it seems are considerate of others.” He also added, “It’s never been an issue and I just don’t see right now the need to address it until it does become a problem.”
Wichita County is home to 132,000 residents over 633 square miles and was founded in 1858. It is located on the Oklahoma border.
