Mayor John Street stood before hundreds of people outside City Hall yesterday and delivered the following prediction:
"Before I leave the mayor's office, we will be a smoke-free city," he proclaimed to a cheering crowd.
The rally, sponsored by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, was held to support smoking-ban legislation that is presently before City Council.
The currently proposed smoking ban is the third in the past two years.
Proposed by Councilwoman Marian Tasco, the bill aims to ban smoking in all workplaces, including bars and restaurants.
"We have in front of City Council right now a number of different bills that will ban cigarette smoking in public places," Street said, adding, "I believe that a majority of the members of City Council will vote for a responsible bill."
Evan Fieldston, a pediatrician at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and a 2003 graduate of Wharton and the School of Medicine, also spoke in favor of the ban.
Fieldston addressed the medical dangers of secondhand smoke and assailed City Council for allowing Philadelphia to remain one of the last major American cities to allow public smoking.
"Every major American city besides Philly is now smoke-free," Fieldston said. "That is not only an impetus for us to change -- that is an embarrassment."
College junior Matt Lambach, who has bartended on campus at MarBar and Goodfellas, also spoke to the crowd about working 12-hour shifts in a smoke-filled environment.
"I'll come home; my body will feel irritated from the cigarette smoke that is in the air," Lambach said. "My clothes, my bed, my room -- they all smell like the cloud of smoke that follows me home. And it shouldn't be like that."
Dozens of students from Fairhill Elementary School attended the rally, where they presented the mayor with an anti-smoking banner.
Fifteen members of the Tobacco Awareness at Penn organization were also on hand at the rally as volunteers.
Amanda Feldman, founder and president of the group, said she feels the smoking ban is important for Penn students.
"I think students are very aware about this indoor [smoking ban], about how important and great it would be in Philadelphia for that pass."
Previous legislation spearheaded by Councilman Michael Nutter targeted smoking in bars and restaurants specifically and narrowly missed being passed.
Nutter's proposal had originally taken a wider focus, but subsequently underwent a number of revisions and amendments in an attempt to gain wider appeal.
