Adrienne Beaudoin, Program Coordinator for the Massachusetts Department of Fire Services, spoke about the implementation of the fire-safe cigarette law in Massachusetts, including new data collection forms, how cigarette-related fires are tracked, and testing and enforcement issues.
Implementing Fire-Safe Cigarette Laws in Massachusetts
1. Implementing M.G.L. c64C, § 2A-2F in Massachusetts Adrienne M. Beaudoin Program Coordinator Department of Fire Services
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3. MA Cigarette Fire Investigation Checklist http://www.mass.gov/Eeops/docs/dfs/osfm/forms/fp38.dot Fire Date: _________ Fire Time: ________ FDID #: ________ Incident #: _________ Fire Location: _________________________ Casualties: #, Street, Town Civilian Fire Service Injuries _______ __________ Deaths _______ __________ Brand Type FSC? How Involved in Ignition Marlboro Light Yes Fell Asleep Camel Menthol No Improper Disposal Winston Non Filter Unknown Smoking on O2 Kool Regular Other__________ Newport 100s Other _____ Store location where cigarettes purchased? ___________________ Store name / Town FIU Case #: _______________________ Report by: ______________________________ Rank, Name, Department or Agency
7. Testing & Enforcement Testing 1 st lot (100 styles) complete; 2 nd lot to be completed next week; started purchasing 3 rd lot Enforcement Procedures/ Issues In-state / Out-of-state Distributors Sell-through Unauthorized Product Compliance Officer : Retailer Ratio
Looking through the slideshow from last year’s presentation, and we were in the hiring process FF a yr & a half, and we’ve hired 2 add’l FTEs, entered a contract w/ a laboratory here in MA, & had product seizures Can safely say we’ve ironed out our procedures; post forms to web, continue to educate 1 st responders & general public alike; work towards full-state coverage
Enforcement staff of 3 FTEs + legal – initially sought 2 COs and PT legal/ pubEd Forms = COC & cigarette-related fire form Website – listing of authorized for sale (not until also cleared for sale thru AGs office)
*Fire Investigative Unit State Police Commander and Local Fire Departments adopted Investigation Checklist – preferably sent with MFIRS data *Data collected by DFS – MFIRS Annual Reports allow us to compare %s pre-FSC law to %s post-FSC law To track compliance and to see if these new types of cigarettes are reducing the number of smoking fires and fire deaths, the State Fire Marshal asked the heads of all local fire departments to make it dept policy to determine, whenever possible, if cigarettes involved in fires were or were not fire standard compliant. The Marshal has also tasked the State Police commander of the Fire Investigation Unit attached to the Office of the State Fire Marshal to make it unit policy. This information is considered to be most probable based on the initial results of the investigation. This checklist is in addition to and not a replacement for a fire dept’s mandatory reporting of fires via the Massachusetts Fire Incident Reporting System (MFIRS).
BEFORE THE ENACTMENT & IMPLEMENTATION OF MA’S FSC LAW… Slide demonstrates fatalities due to smoking-related fires steadily rising prior to enacting FSC Law 2007 MA percentages based on 64 (3 FF, 61 civilians) residential fire deaths – data correct +/- 1% (early #s) 8 of 52 (2004) deaths due to smoking (16%) 11 of 52 (2005) deaths due to smoking (21%) 14 of 44 (2006) deaths due to smoking (32%) 17 of 40 (2007) deaths due to smoking (43%)
08: 14 of 49 fatalities due to smoking-materials-related fires (>28%) all were civilians; (1 FF death-auto accident) 09: 6 of 30 fatalities (preliminary #s) attributed to smoking materials (20%)
PRELIMINARY NUMBERS 49 fatalities (08) + 30 fatalities thus far 09 4 of 25 residential fire fatalities attributed to FSC cigarettes (several unknown) from 08-09 14 smoking materials in 08; 6 in 09 = 20 out of 79 (25%)
Testing : We spent more time drafting a solicitation, receiving bids, selecting our lab and formatting the report style we would like to see than we have testing! Our 1 st lot testing began this summer; we have results hard-pressed to conduct trend analysis on one lot Enforcement : Started with visits to all in-state distributors 4 educational purposes NECSA rep (for the retailer side). Sell-through provision : likely our biggest challenge tax stamp b4 1/1/08 is ok on the shelf indefinitely Unauthorized product: no markings, mis-marked; 1 instance of not-yet-certified(?) have been able to iron out without going to an official hearing 1 CO : - pgm initially slated for 2; MA is far from the largest state; however, over 7,500 retailers auth to sell cigs, 2 COs would allow better coverage/ more inspections