Members of the UW-Platteville community will be able to cast their vote on the proposed smoking ban for the academic sector of campus.

The online poll is scheduled to run from midnight March 6 until 6 p.m. March 7. Members of the student body, faculty, academic staff and classified staff are all eligible to vote, Rich Egley, dean of students, said in an e-mail. According to the UW-P voting booth Web site, in order to participate, voters must have a UW-P user name and password. The online ballot can be found at uwplatt.edu/vote.

Photograph by Brady Terry
Former UW-P student and OIT employee Corey Nechkash finds cover during a snowstorm while smoking a cigarette outside Russell Hall. A campus-wide vote on a potential smoking ban is scheduled for March 6 and 7.

The committee has been publicizing the poll through the use of posters, notices on the Student Senate bulletin board, and a campus-wide e-mail sent by Egley. A second e-mail reminder will be sent on Thursday morning, Jeffrey Schwan, ad hoc committee chair, said.

The poll is also marked as an event on Facebook. As of March 4, 723 people have been invited to participate. Those invited can discuss the poll on the event’s wall and invite others to participate.

After presenting the Student Senate smoking policy ad hoc committee’s report and proposal to the campus governance bodies the date for the poll was set, Schwan said.

“After I got confirmation from the Provost [Carol Sue Butts], that it was authorized, we wanted to get started,” Schwan said. The wording of the vote was changed from a referendum to a poll at the suggestion of Butts to emphasize that the results are non-binding. The use of a non-binding poll means the campus governance bodies do not have to base their proposals to Chancellor David Markee on the poll results.

Since the poll is being conducted online, the results should be totaled quickly.

“The results should be publicized at the March 10 [Student Senate] meeting,” Schwan said.

A final decision on a smoking ban would be made by Markee, who hopes to make his decision “a couple of weeks” after the results are in.

“I’ll probably want to spend a little time checking all the results and seeing if everyone is on the same page,” Markee said. Markee also said he may go back to the campus governance groups if there is not a clear consensus from the poll.

Egley, who smokes nearly two packs of cigarettes a day, is in favor of the proposed ban.

“I think it’s a great idea and inevitable,” Egley said. “We might as well get in front of it.”

Egley plans to vote yes, and he believes that smokers should get used to the idea of a ban.

“Quit being weenies and suck it up,” Egley said. “I think it’s more of a plus than it is a negative.”

Schwan is encouraging all campus members to take part in the poll.

“Vote,” Schwan said. “Please educate yourself and cast a ballot.”