The bill would require buildings with three or more apartments — whether rental, condominium or cooperative units — to disclose whether smoking is allowed in all indoor and outdoor locations, including inside apartments, on balconies and rooftops and in courtyards.

Mr. Bloomberg said at a news conference on Wednesday that he was proposing the bill because New Yorkers wanted to be protected from secondhand smoke. He insisted that the disclosure requirement would be strictly informational, and not a backdoor attempt to pressure landlords and buildings to ban smoking.

“We protect people from hurting themselves if they’re trying to jump off a bridge, we restrain them,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “Should you really do it with smoking? We’re not going to do it with smoking, but we — this is purely an informational thing.”

The proposal, which calls for $100 fines for violators, received guarded but positive reviews on Wednesday from the real estate industry. Steven Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, said many rental buildings already had smoking policies, but that they usually applied to common areas like laundry rooms, not to apartments.

But Mr. Spinola said that by compelling buildings to come up with smoking policies, the bill raised issues that still had to be clarified, like who would be responsible for enforcing the rules and paying the fines, and whether the rules could be enforced.

“If somebody in management says to the person, ‘You’re not allowed to smoke here,’ and the person ignores it, what do you do?” Mr. Spinola wondered. “What is the role of the management of the building, or the owner or co-op board or condo association?”

Mr. Spinola said that preventing people from smoking in their own apartments would be particularly fraught. “I’m told there’s a gray legal issue as to whether or not you can impose that, and you probably can’t impose it on somebody who was already living in that apartment,” he said. “I’m told there’s never really been a precedent by a judge as to what you can and cannot do. There’s always been a legal settlement.”

The city’s 311 complaint hotline got 2,363 calls complaining about secondhand smoke in residences from July 15, 2011, through Sunday, city officials said. The draft bill says that more than 50 percent of adults living in apartment buildings in New York City have reported being exposed to secondhand smoke from neighboring apartments creeping through cracks and ventilation systems.

Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker, said Wednesday that she had not yet seen the bill, but that it would be sent to the appropriate committee for review.

The mayor’s statement compared the bill to laws already in effect requiring landlords to disclose lead paint hazards, or a history of bed bugs.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Wednesday plans to propose legislation that would require residential buildings to adopt written policies on where smoking is permitted or prohibited and disclose those rules to prospective tenants and owners, a move that officials predict could increase the number of smoke-free apartment buildings in New York City.

“We think that people ought to know whether they might be exposed to second-hand smoke in their apartment before they decide whether to rent or buy,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, commissioner of the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. “We know that second-smoke can go from one apartment to the other and that it can get at levels that are high enough to have health risks.”

The proposal marks the latest effort by Mr. Bloomberg to combat tobacco use in the city and around the globe.

The bill specifically does not dictate whether buildings should allow or disallow smoking. But it would require buildings to develop policies that address whether smoking is permitted in both indoor and outdoor locations, including lobbies, balconies, courtyards, laundry rooms and, most controversially, individual apartments.

A recent telephone survey commissioned by the city and conducted by Global Strategies Group found New Yorkers favor, by 64% to 30%, a law of this kind, officials said. The poll showed a majority of smokers, 51%, opposed the idea; nonsmokers favored it by 68% to 27%.

The penalty for violating the disclosure law would be $100 per violation. Buildings would be responsible for their own enforcement.

Roughly half of New York City adults living in multi-unit dwellings have reported they have been exposed to secondhand smoke from neighboring apartments, officials said.

Last summer, the city began compiling 311 complaints about secondhand smoke in residences separately from calls involving other smoking-related complaints. Between July 15 and April 15 of this year, there were 2,363 complaints about secondhand smoke in residences.

Asked if this is the first step toward prohibiting smoking in residential buildings, Dr. Farley said: “It’s just disclosure.”

Audrey Silk, founder of a city smokers’ rights group, said “there is nothing innocent” about the bill. She called it the first step toward prohibiting smoking in people’s homes.

“This is a crusade for a smoker-free society, just another way to make it impossible for somebody to have a cigarette,” she said.

Jamie McShane, a spokesman for Council Speaker Christine Quinn, a Manhattan Democrat who has been supportive of the mayor’s previous smoking policies, said Ms. Quinn has yet to take a position on this proposal.

Steve Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, said “overall we don’t have a problem with the objective.” Still, he voiced some concerns, most notably the provision calling for the legislation to take effect 90 days after enactment; that’s not enough time for many condo and co-op boards to develop a policies, he said.

Sheelah Feinberg, director of NYC Coalition for a Smoke-Free City, said the effort will help prospective buyers and tenants be informed, just as they are currently with lead paint and asbestos. “This is a good, logical step,” she said.

Two states, including Oregon and Maine, have already approved similar laws, as have other jurisdictions, such as Buffalo. In Oregon, the law has helped increase the number of smoke-free buildings, said Diane Laughter, a public-health consultant and who was an advocate for the law’s passage.

“It makes it clear to landlords that having a nonsmoking policy is legal and while they’re at it why not go ahead — there are so many benefits,” she said.

Officials in New York’s real-estate industry and city government said they did not have any data on the number of buildings in the five boroughs that are already smoke-free. While the vast majority of residential buildings do allow people to smoke in their apartments, some buildings are moving to prohibit any smoking on the premises.

Jeff Brodsky, president of Related Management, an arm of the Related Cos., said the company initiated in November 2009 a smoke-free policy at three market-rate buildings in Manhattan. All new residents were prohibited from smoking; a grandfather clause allowed existing residents to smoke.

This year, the company plans to begin construction on four buildings that will be market-rate and smoke-free from their first occupancy. “We certainly wouldn’t do it if we thought it was hurting us,” said Mr. Brodsky of the smoke-free policy.

At Ten23, a smoke-free residential building in Chelsea, residents view the policy as an advantage. “Living in a smoke-free building makes me more comfortable, knowing that no one has ever smoked here and isn’t going to,” said Stephanie Panepinto, an arts philanthropist and gallery owner.

The bill is the latest in the mayor’s efforts to curb smoking in the city. He sparked intense criticism when, beginning in 2003, the city banned smoking in bars and restaurants citywide. The measure has since gained widespread acceptance, and Mr. Bloomberg considers it to be one of his greatest achievements.

—

Maura R. O’Connor contributed to this article.

In a major policy move, the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) yesterday proposed guidelines for implementing no-smoking policies for inside co-op and condo apartments, and not just in common areas as city law already specifies. As well, a draft proposal for legislation mandating this very thing was recently submitted to the New York City Council.

Here, two nationally recognized condominium-law attorneys survey the fast-changing landscape regarding anti-smoking rules — with a practical guide on how co-op boards and condo associations can fairly and effectively implement bans.

April 13, 2012 — The battle between smokers and non-smokers may be reaching a tipping point in co-ops and condos. Boards are introducing proprietary lease or bylaw amendments prohibiting smoking completely — in individual units as well as in common areas. And those proposals are attracting considerably more support and considerably less opposition than they have in the past.

This is largely a reflection of changing attitudes toward smoking. Only 20 percent of the population nationally define themselves as smokers, and growing numbers of non-smokers are concerned about the health hazards of exposure to secondhand smoke. A 2006 Surgeon’s General report concluded that “there is no risk-free level of exposure to second-hand smoke,” and that message appears to have taken hold.

Condominium owners and co-op shareholders who a few years ago would have defended the right of their neighbors to smoke, even if they themselves did not, are now more inclined to support non-smoking neighbors concerned about the smoke that is seeping into their units.

We regularly field calls from boards that have adopted smoking bans or are looking for advice on that process. Some advertise their smoke-free status on their websites, suggesting that they view their smoking ban not as the sales impediment that many co-op shareholders and condominium unit-owners have traditionally feared, but as a marketing advantage.

Some co-op and condo boards remain concerned that a smoking ban will reduce the pool of prospective apartment buyers, but Chris Banthin ― an attorney working with the Public Health Advocacy Institute at Northeastern University School of Law to develop free-market strategies to reduce smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke ― points out that with non-smokers now significantly outnumbering smokers, smoking restrictions are likely to attract more buyers than they repel.

Projecting current trends, he suggests the non-smoker to smoker ratio will become even more lopsided, smoking bans will be more widespread, and with fewer options available to them, smokers will concentrate in the remaining buildings that allow smoking. So co-ops and condos that choose not to adopt smoking bans will be choosing, in effect, to become smokers’ buildings in the future, Banthin contends.

Condominium owners who are willing to tolerate a few smoking neighbors today may feel differently if they find themselves a few years from now in a small minority, vastly outnumbered by residents who smoke. And as the ranks of smokers continue to decline, the pool of potential buyers and tenants interested in smokers’ buildings will shrink as well, giving communities another strong economic argument for going smoke-free.

Going Beyond “Nuisance”

It is possible to prohibit smoking by claiming it to be a “nuisance,” in violation of the proprietary lease or other governing documents. But this is not an approach we recommend, for several reasons. First, while the board’s authority to regulate activities in common areas is clear, its authority to restrict activities in individual units is both less clear and more restricted.

Second is the difficulty of defining precisely what a nuisance is. Think of noise as an example. Some people are more sensitive to noise or less tolerant of it than others. The same is true of smoke. Some people are more concerned about second-hand smoke than others. Some find even a trace of smoke intolerable, while others barely notice the odor in a smoke-filled room.

Courts in some jurisdictions have found that second-hand smoke rises to the level of a nuisance or a “trespass” if it exacerbates an underlying health condition (asthma, for example) of those exposed to it. But other courts have noted a distinction between an annoyance and a nuisance, finding that because a neighbor is annoyed or offended by smoke is not in itself sufficient grounds for prohibiting residents from engaging in a legal activity (smoking) inside their homes.

The Supermajority Speaks

So nuisance is simply not a strong enough peg on which to hang a cooperative or condominium association’s no-smoking policy. Boards that want to prohibit smoking in individual units should amend the co-op proprietary lease or condo governing documents, securing the supermajority vote of owners required to do so..

While the courts remain reluctant to restrict what individuals can do within their own homes, they are less likely to challenge a policy approved by a supermajority of owners than one imposed by the community’s elected board. Moreover, courts have recognized that a condo or co-op board has the right to change its governing documents and to make those changes retroactive.

In what may be the first court decision addressing the questions raised by a community association’s smoking ban, a Colorado court upheld the policy, rejecting the ‘my-home-is-my-castle’ argument of smokers, who said the ban interfered unfairly and unreasonably with their right to the full use and enjoyment of the unit they owned. In Heritage Hill Condo Owners v. Sauve(2006), the court was influenced strongly by evidence that the board had gone to great lengths to find other solutions, short of a ban, that would address the concerns of non-smoking neighbors. A well-drafted ban, properly enacted (with the required owners’ vote), should stand on its own.

“Nice people, quiet,” Shanahan recalled. “But they chain-smoked constantly.”

The smoke wafted into his apartment and got so bad that Shanahan, a nonsmoker, said he couldn’t even open his windows without more fumes coming in.

He moved out as a result months later, but not before he got a guarantee — in writing — from his new landlord that the apartments next to his would not be rented to a smoker.

“Do they really have the right to smoke in their apartment when their smoke finds its way into my space?” Shanahan said.

With smoking now forbidden in bars, restaurants, stores, schools and many parks and beaches throughout the Lower Hudson Valley, housing has become the latest battleground between people who smoke and those who don’t.

Rockland is one of the first municipalities in the state to tackle the issue of smoking in apartments, condominiums and co-ops.

A new law has gone into effect requiring owners of properties with three or more units to have a policy stating where smoking is allowed and where it isn’t.

The law requires that all tenants be provided with a copy of the policy, that prospective tenants be informed of the policy during lease or rental negotiations and that copies of the policy be posted in public areas of the multiple dwelling.

“It’s not a smoking ban,” said Judi Hunderfund, director of environmental health for the Rockland Health Department. “The intent is to empower tenants so they know what the policy is and what they are getting themselves into.”

Owners of rental properties with more than five units must file a copy of the policy with the Health Department, which can fine a property owner who doesn’t comply.

“It helps incoming tenants make an informed decision,” said Maureen Kenney, director of POW’R Against Tobacco, a White Plains-based anti-smoking coalition that worked with Rockland legislators to help draft the bill.

The results join a widening body of research. A 2011 Massachusetts General Hospital study also found that children living with smokers miss more days of school than classmates who live in smoke-free households. Respiratory illness most often kept the students home.

This lower attendance can translate into reduced graduation rates.

Head Start surveyed parents from 26 Head Start programs around the state about their smoking habits. The federally funded agency provides education and health and nutrition services to low-income families.

Children ages 3-5 years enrolled in Umatilla Morrow Head Start and who were exposed to secondhand smoke in their home or car had attendance rates of 82 percent. Students in non-smoking environments attended 86 percent of the time. Umatilla Morrow Head Start serves 580 children in seven counties in northeastern Oregon.

“In looking at absenteeism, we found that there is a relationship,” said Cathy Wamsley, executive director of Umatilla Morrow Head Start, Hermiston.

Wamsley said attendance is a good predictor of drop-out rate and low achievement. “You have to go to school to learn,” she said.

Wamsley isn’t just blowing smoke. The link between lower attendance and reduced graduation rates is getting clearer, which spells trouble for children exposed to secondhand smoke.

The Head Start study found that 36 percent of Head Start households in Oregon had at least one smoker. About 18 percent of parents allowed smoking in the house or car. Of the households it served by Umatilla Morrow Head Start, 35 percent include smokers and 8 percent allow smoking in the car.

Janet Jones, educator with the Umatilla County Health Department, would like to see those numbers drop.

“There is no safe level of secondhand smoke,” she said. “Children are especially vulnerable.”

Jones said exposure can trigger asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia, ear infections and put babies at risk of sudden infant death syndrome. She lauded Head Start for creating a cessation manual for smoking parents.

“Head Start has been a real champion around this issue,” she said.

Jones said cigarette smoke is an insidious invader that can even creep into apartments of non-smoking neighbors.

“Secondhand smoke will creep through the plumbing,” Jones said. “Little particles you don’t see come through the ventilation.”

The tiny particles may not have any odor, she said.

Bob Clark, a licensed sociologist in Pendleton who teaches smoking cessation classes, said some of his students quit because of their children. Clark urges other parents to follow suit.

“Children exposed to secondhand smoke are inhaling the same dangerous chemicals as smokers,” he said.

He advised smoking parents, if they can’t quit, to smoke outside of house and car and to wash their hands.

The American Legacy Foundation, which financed the study, hopes to target low-income smokers and convince them to quit. The foundation was created in 1998 with tobacco settlement money.

“Their mission is to reduce tobacco rates across the nation,” Wamsley said. “They found there has been a decrease in tobacco use, except for the lower socioeconomic sector.”

Head Start was a good fit, she said, since the agency works with low-income families. It plans an identical survey next year to determine if education efforts have lowered smoking rates among Head Start parents.

Smoking by the numbers

45 million — Number of adult smokers in U.S.

126 million — Number of non-smoking Americans exposed to secondhand smoke

50 — Percent of children who show signs in their blood of secondhand smoke

1 billion — Smokers worldwide

600,000 — Number killed annually worldwide by secondhand smoke

165,000 — Number of children who die each year from lower respiratory infections caused by secondhand smoke

40 — Percent of children exposed to secondhand smoke

Sources: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; World Health Organization

In a survey of 1,000 New Yorkers commissioned by the New York City Coalition for a Smoke-Free City, 58 percent said they would pay more to live in smoke-free housing.

But whether buyers are paying more for smoke-free environments hasn’t been proven yet.

“I am not aware of any compelling studies that provide empirical evidence proving a smoking ban impacts values one way or another,” says Jonathan Miller, president and CEO of Miller Samuel, a real estate appraisal and consulting firm. “Personally, I would think such a ban would be slightly more of a help to values than a hindrance since the number of smokers are on the decline and the idea of selling the health benefits of a lack of secondhand smoke would be a plus.”

Brokers say buyers tend to be more focused on things besides smoke–such as sublet policies, flip taxes, transfer fees and common charges–but smoke can, at times, make or break a sale.

“I’ve had two clients in the past two years absolutely disregard apartments because either the hall smelled like smoke or the apartment itself smelled like smoke,” says Kelly Killian, an agent at Bond New York Properties. “I’m sure this influenced repeat traffic to these apartments, no matter how much someone likes the apartment.”

Besides breathing cleaner, co-op and condo boards believe that keeping smokers out is smart business, as “a smoke-free building is almost always a ‘value added’ for savvy buyers,” says Takk Yamaguchi of TOWN Residential.

“Since 86 percent of New Yorkers are non-smokers, many appreciate the fact that they won’t have to worry about smelling other residents’ smoke wafting through the building, nor do they have to worry about the health effects of secondhand smoke,” agrees Gary Malin, president of Citi Habitats. “This issue may have special significance for those clients with young children.”

On the negative side, a smoke ban could scare off buyers who “prefer buildings with a more liberal hands-off management style,” says Malin. “For these buyers, a building’s ‘no-smoking’ policy may be a red flag that they are dealing with a potentially difficult board.”

Smoke bans could also be a tipoff of “shoddy construction or poor building design,” says Malin.

Potential buyers in non-smoking buildings should research the overall construction of any building they’re interested in.

“In some cases, buildings with no-smoking rules have instituted such policies because of issues with air flow/ventilation, which allows the smell of smoke to travel more easily from unit to unit,” Malin says.

Though the experts agree we’re likely to see more non-smoking buildings in the future, it remains a rather complex legal issue.

“Real estate attorneys are facing the desire on the part of an increasing number of buildings to become non-smoking, and [are trying to figure out] how best to accomplish this goal,” says Eva Talel, a partner at Stroock & Stroock & Lavan’s Real Estate Group, a law firm that represents more than 200 co-ops and condos in the city.

“There are invariably some smokers in such buildings and whether to phase-in a non-smoking requirement instead of an absolute ban is a challenge, as well as dealing with the smokers’ concerns,” she says.

No matter what, the smoking issue is unlikely to burn out anytime soon. “Many new residential rental buildings are being built as non-smoking buildings and we know that a number of co-ops and condominiums are in the process of attempting to convert their buildings to non-smoking,” Talel says. “There appears to be a market and an appetite for non-smoking buildings in New York City.”

Brabant and Ahlswede were on the committee which worked out the ordinance with city staff and representatives of Project TRUST, part of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health’s tobacco control and prevention program, which provides education on the dangers of second-hand smoke.

Final action on the ordinance is expected at the March 5 council meeting. It would take effect 30 days later.

Senior Planner Albert Fontanez said the city’s code enforcement division will enforce the ban, with fines of $100 to $1,000 to violators. He noted that the fines would be levied on the smoker and there would be no liability to landlords as long as they make provisions of the ban known to tenants and insert them in rental lease agreements.

He said he will asks the City Council Monday to remove one provision, which would allow a condominium homeowners group to vote on whether smoking in 20 percent of a complex might be allowed if the ban limits tenants of the other 80 percent.

Fontanez and several speakers urged the council to require a 100 percent ban in all units.

In a written report to the council, Fontanez said the ordinance would affect all apartment and condominium complexes of two or more units except for hotels, motels and single-family homes with attached units for relatives.

A common area includes such places as hallways, laundry rooms, lobbies, play areas including swimming pools, patios, balconies, decks and walkways.

Ten percent of a common area may be designated for smoking as long as it is an open area and at least 25 feet from a building.

It is the first city law dealing with private property. Smoking in municipal buildings, parks, public rights-of-way and at city-sponsored events was banned last year.

“Landlords will benefit from the ban as they will not have to spend as much getting a unit ready for a new tenant if they don’t have to get the smoke odor out of draperies, stuffed furniture and carpets,” Ahlswede said, adding “it’s impossible to handle drifting smoke.”

David Reynoso of Project TRUST said drifting smoke is thought by many medical experts to affect the health of neighbors.

It can come in through cracks in the wall, vents, under doorways and through windows, he said.

He acknowledged that citing someone for smoking inside their apartment or condo would require neighbors and residents of the complex to complain to the city.

However, one resident said she was sure the neighbors would make such complaints.

Esther Schiller of Smoke-Free Air for Everyone said the ban is a good business decision for landlords as it  would make it easier to fill vacancies. And some insurance companies may offer a discount if smoking is not allowed in a complex, she said.

“Many landlords have had fewer vacancies with no-smoking apartments,” she added.

Second-hand smoke is responsible for as many as 73,000 deaths among non-smokers each year, the ordinance states.

“Exposure to second-hand smoke increases the risk of coronary heart disease by about 30 percent. Second-hand smoke exposure causes lower respiratory tract infections, such as pneumonia and bronchitis in as many as 300,000 children in the United States under 18 months each year and exacerbates childhood asthma.”

Council members did not comment on the issue other then voting to approve the ban, which had also been approved by the Planning Commission.

Some residents in the Washington area are challenging that notion, arguing that secondhand smoke seeps through the walls and affects their health. In some recent cases, residents have taken steps to prevent their neighbors from smoking in their own units, following the lead of other condo associations and groups of residents across the country.

The issue has pitted neighbor against neighbor, taken over homeowner association agendas and led to a major legal debate over public health and the rights of homeowners. Federal incentives have led cities from Austin to Boston to prohibit smoking in public housing. In 2006, a Manhattan judge ruled that secondhand smoke could be a breach of “warranty of habitability” under New York law. And six California cities and counties have banned smoking in all condo units.

Last year at the Promenade Towers in Bethesda, a co-op with more than 1,000 units, neighbors on the first floor complained about a resident chain smoker. The building’s management took steps to contain the smoke by sealing gaps in the walls and issuing a “cease and desist” order to the smoker, who installed a second air filtration system. But the smoke, according to some residents, was still unbearable. “I leave doors and windows open, even as I sleep,” said Ximena Marquez-Dagan, whose young daughter has asthma. “I’ve moved to sleep in my daughter’s room now because the other side of the apartment is full of smoke.”

For years, smoking at home wasn’t much of a dilemma. In 1965, 42 percent of Americans smoked, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and those who didn’t were used to secondhand smoke in offices, stores and other people’s homes. Several decades ago, smoking was even advertised as healthful.

But since the U.S. surgeon general’s landmark 1964 report on smoking’s risks, Americans have slowly turned against “the evil weed”; barely 20 percent smoke today, fewer around Washington. “There is no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke,” the surgeon general’s Web site emphasizes. Smoking has been banned in most workplaces for decades. More jurisdictions, including many in the Washington area, now ban smoking in restaurants, and some extend that to parks and play areas.

“If you’re a homeowner, you should retain the right to smoke. It’s your property, and it’s a legal product,” said Jolyn Tenn, spokesperson for Forces International, a libertarian nonprofit founded to fight nonsmoking laws.

Although public opinion and habits might be changing, the law isn’t always very clear.

When indoor smokers Darko and Svetlana Popovic moved into a Greenbelt townhouse next door to non-smoker David S. Schuman in 1996, they shared smoke as well as an attic.

Schuman complained to the building’s management company, Greenbelt Homes, about the smoke seeping into his unit. The company caulked around baseboards, plumbing and electrical outlets in both homes in an effort to eliminate the issue. The problem lessened, though Schuman said that this was because the Popovics had begun smoking only outside — not because the caulking had worked.

Schuman eventually sued Greenbelt Homes in Prince George’s County Circuit Court on the grounds that secondhand smoke violated the “nuisance clause” of his mutual ownership contract. Darko Popovic acknowledged that cigarette smoke had migrated into his neighbors’ units, but he told the court that walking 75 feet to an outdoor common area to smoke was too much of an imposition and that “the whole thing is overblown.” Citing his wife’s illness, Darko Popovic declined to comment for this article.

In November 2011, the court ruled in favor of Greenbelt Homes.

“It is a decision, in my view, that’s going to have to be made by the legislature. . . . I cannot find that there is an actionable nuisance in this case,” said Judge Albert Northrop, noting that he didn’t want to set a precedent and that Schuman’s health did not appear to have been harmed.

Schuman appealed, but he has put his house on the market. “I don’t want to move,” he said, “but my fiancee and I want to have children, and we won’t subject them to secondhand smoke.” He has already spent more than $70,000 on the case, he said. “I’m pursuing this because we’ve come so far and because this will affect a great many people.

“Perhaps Judge Northrop was saying that he doesn’t want to get out ahead of any pending legislation,” Schuman added.

Maryland Del. Benjamin F. Kramer, who represents east-central Montgomery County, plans to introduce a bill this session to modify the “nuisance statute” so that it clearly includes secondhand smoke.

Noting that “Utah’s done something similar,” he said that Marylanders would “be welcome to smoke in their own home unless there’s a legitimate complaint. This would put the burden of mitigating such a complaint on the creator of the nuisance, not on those adversely affected.”

Among Kramer’s constituents is Harriet Hershman of Silver Spring, who said she asked a neighbor to smoke outdoors because secondhand smoke had seeped into her unit. It caused eye irritation and a cough and forced her to spend nights with friends and relatives, and even in her own car, to avoid the fumes. “He said he has a right to smoke in his own home,” she said of her neighbor’s response. The Wintergate at Longmead Condo Association issued a cease-and-desist order, which the smoker appears to be obeying, according to Hershman’s lawyer, J.P. Szymkowicz.

“I might be able to move,” she said before hearing of the smoker’s decision, “but where can I go that I won’t end up in the same situation?”

Hershman approached Kramer about nuisance legislation because, she said, “Maybe I can help make a change.”

Legal experts say the local courts have ruled on both sides of the issue.

Some state courts have held that substantial amounts of smoke flowing between units constitute a nuisance. But others have determined that the cigarette smoke is like an odor intrusion — a condition of living in a community that residents have to put up with, according to the Public Health Law Center at Minnesota’s William Mitchell College of Law.

Although four-fifths of Americans don’t smoke, circulating a petition or even openly complaining about secondhand condo smoke can incur others’ wrath. At the Promenade Towers and elsewhere, several smokers’ neighbors were worried about about a backlash if their comments were made public.

When Promenade Towers’ owners took the smoking ban up for a vote last July, the measure did not pass.

“Instead of trying to solve their problem with the individual neighbor, they tried to get the whole building involved,” resident Keith Feldman said of the petitioners. A smoker, he voted against the ban. “If people are thinking of moving into a building, they should ask if smoking is allowed. If you’re allergic, maybe you shouldn’t move in.”

The Promenade Towers residents who pushed for a smoking ban then asked the board to enact a house rule instead, but the board unanimously refused. “The bylaws give authority to make rules on use on parking or use of the common areas, but restrictions on uses of the unit are more specific” and therefore legally harder to make “a mere rule” on, said attorney Jason Fisher, speaking for the co-op .

Although smoking ban efforts failed at the Promenade, Marquez-Dugan she said she believes a more health-conscious public will eventually prevail. “Change won’t happen anytime soon, but when it comes to health, eventually it does get there.”

“My neighbor is on oxygen,” said Ms. Cushman, 53, who is on disability herself. “And I can’t quit. I tried. I get too worked up without smoking. So I come out here.”

In 2004, the Auburn Housing Authority became the first authority in Maine and one of the first in the country to ban smoking in public housing, and it has served as a model. On Jan. 1, Maine will become the first state in the country in which all of its public housing authorities are smoke free, affecting about 12,000 tenants.

Similar policies are being adopted with increasing frequency across the country as cities move aggressively to restrict smoking in more public places, from bars and restaurants to parks, beaches and vehicles. Come September, Boston will become the biggest city to ban smoking in its public housing, which serves about 25,000 tenants. Detroit, San Antonio and Portland, Ore., already have similar restrictions in place.

The bans are largely a response to the risks posed to nonsmokers by secondhand smoke. In addition, property managers say smokeless apartments are cheaper to clean, especially if there is carpeting, and reduce the risk of fire.

Depending on who is asked, banning smoking in public housing is either an effective way to promote healthier living, as many officials and nonsmokers contend, or a violation of individual liberties, as some tenants argue. But after several years of such bans, the objections have gained no legal traction. Smokers are not perceived as a protected class, and civil liberties groups and legal aid societies say they tend not to defend such cases.

“On a personal level, you sympathize with people who want to do whatever they want in their own homes,” said Matt Dyer, a staff attorney in the Lewiston, Me., office of Pine Tree Legal Assistance, which provides free legal aid for people at or below the poverty level. “But legally, bans are O.K. There are so many legitimate issues that landlords can raise.”

Housing officials point out that they do not require tenants to quit, only to smoke outside, and they often provide shelters for smokers. They also offer smoking-cessation programs, although they say few people attend.

Many smokers just violate the ban and hope they avoid getting caught.

At Franklin Towers, a public housing high-rise in Portland, Me., Kevin Crocker, 55, said he was annoyed when a neighbor reported him for smoking in his apartment. “They told me not to do it again,” he said. “But I don’t like to go outside, especially at night, because I’m afraid of getting mugged and there are no security cameras.”

Officials recognize that a ban can be a burden for tenants, particularly because many are elderly or disabled. At Franklin Towers, where the elevators lumber slowly up 16 floors, Mark Adelson, the executive director of the Portland Housing Authority, half-joked that by the time smokers go outside and get back in, they need to go out again for another cigarette.

But secondhand smoke, Mr. Adelson said, is “an overwhelming public policy issue.” Officials at various housing authorities, including the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, say they hear far more complaints from nonsmokers about their neighbors who smoke than from smokers claiming the right to light up.

Susan Morin, 59, a former smoker who lives in Franklin Towers, said she appreciated the ban. “Cigarettes will kill you,” she said.

In 2005, only 32 housing authorities had smoking bans in effect, according to Jim Bergman, director of the Smoke-Free Environments Law Project in Michigan; by the end of this year, he said, 285, or about 9 percent of the total, will have enacted bans, affecting hundreds of thousands of tenants.

The federal housing department says it is planning to gather information next year on how various cities have carried out their bans and will publish a report of best practices, in the hope of encouraging more housing authorities to enact their own.

In Los Angeles, a spokeswoman said the Housing Authority was conducting a review and might consider a ban. In New York City, a Housing Authority spokeswoman said it had “no position” on a ban, but Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has been one of the most aggressive advocates of ridding smoke from public spaces and clamping down on other health-related menaces like trans fats. A spokeswoman at the city’s health department said officials were “reviewing the experiences of other municipalities.”

The rapid adoption of smoking bans in public housing was spurred by the federal department, which issued a memorandum in July 2009 saying it “strongly encourages” housing authorities to enact them.

The federal department cited reports that secondhand smoke caused the deaths of 50,000 nonsmokers nationwide each year. In 2006, it said, smoking was responsible for more than 18,000 apartment fires that resulted in the deaths of 700 people, excluding firefighters, and caused almost $500 million in property damage.

It issued a second memorandum in September 2010 extending its recommendation to other types of public housing, including Section 8, which provides housing vouchers to low-income families. And last year, The New England Journal of Medicine called for a complete smoking ban in any housing complex receiving public money.

But HUD is not likely to require a ban nationwide anytime soon. Shauna Sorrells, director of public housing programs for the agency, said a mandate could result in evicting entire families, even if just one person smoked. Most housing authorities have long waiting lists, she said, and evictions would increase homelessness, especially in a sour economy.

The experience in Maine suggests that evictions solely for smoking violations are unusual.

“We’ve had a handful of cases where the person agreed to leave,” said David Chamberlain, a lawyer who represents the Portland Housing Authority and other landlords. “But we haven’t taken any to trial, because they settle in some fashion or other.”

Rick Whiting, the longtime executive director of the Auburn Housing Authority, said he had seen a cultural change here during the seven years the ban has been in place.

Initially, Mr. Whiting said, there had been concern about fairness to smokers who were already in public housing apartments, and they were grandfathered in. But over time, he said, concern shifted to fairness to nonsmokers, and the dispensation for smokers was revoked, prompting some to quit the habit and some to move out.

Still, questions of fairness persist because those below the poverty line tend to smoke more than those above it. Studies show that, on average, 30 percent of people in public housing are smokers, compared with 20 percent of the general population.

“It’s discrimination against the poor,” said Nikki McLean, 66, a smoker who lives in public housing in Portland, Me.

Mrs. McLean, who has diabetes, arthritis, bad knees and other chronic conditions, was sitting in a wheelchair the other day inside her tiny home. It took her 10 minutes to get outside, transfer to a walker and make her way down a ramp and across the lawn so she could stand 25 feet from her doorway and have a cigarette.

“I’ve heard them say, ‘We’re doing it for their own good,’ ” Mrs. McLean said. “Like we’re little idiots and we don’t know what we’re doing when we put a cigarette in our mouths.”

She said she had tried to quit but was addicted, and given the other challenges in her life, quitting smoking has not been a priority. But she is having knee surgery soon and said she hoped she would be in the hospital long enough to go through withdrawal and stop for good.