WESTFIELD — The Westfield Regional Health Department has drawn a hard line in the sand when it comes to underage tobacco sales. So far, health officials say, local efforts to keep kids away from age-restricted products has been paying off.
WESTFIELD — The Westfield Regional Health Department has drawn a hard line in the sand when it comes to underage tobacco sales. So far, health officials say, local efforts to keep kids away from age-restricted products has been paying off.
Westfield’s Tobacco Age of Sale Enforcement (TASE) program is designed to keep cigarettes and vape products out of the hands of kids who are too young to purchase them, Health Officer Megan Avallone said.
“We work with a group of individuals who are younger than 21. We try to work with high-school students who are about 16 or 17, and we have them go out to the establishments where these products are sold and try to buy them.
“We’re not looking to trick anyone,” Ms. Avallone said, speaking during a recent meeting of the Westfield Board of Health. “The children that we work with always look very age appropriate. We have found that this really is the best way to monitor which venues are breaking the rules.”
The TASE program has been active in Westfield for “almost two decades,” Ms. Avallone said.
“This started out as a state-level initiative, but about 15 years ago, the state dissolved the program,” Ms. Avallone said, adding that the program is now funded at the local level through tax appropriations.
“I think it’s great that we are still able to carry on with this,” she said, adding that the Westfield Regional Health Department — which services Cranford, Westfield, Chatham, Fanwood, Garwood, Mountainside, New Providence, Roselle Park and Summit — is one of the only such departments in the area to have kept the local watchdog project alive.
Two Westfield vendors — Divine Cigar on West Board Street and ShopRite Wines & Spirits — have been caught selling tobacco products (which include cigarettes, chewing tobacco or vaping devices) to minors this year as a direct result of this program.
“We know that’s not great, but in a broader sense, we have seven establishments here in town that have been cited two or more times for selling to minors, and none of those establishments were willing to sell to the students this time around,” Ms.Avallone said. “I think the store owners and operators are starting to understand how serious we are about this. We’re also actively trying to make sure that each of the vendors has proper signage in place and that none of them are selling flavored vaping products.”
Flavored e-cigarettes were outlawed in the state of New Jersey in 2020 after lawmakers found that tobacco companies were disproportionately marketing these products — which have names like Root Beer Float, Sno Cone and Gummy Bears — towards minors and children.
These types of products were discovered by the TASE program at Westfield Tobacco earlier this year.
“We are actually being contacted by other regional health departments about our standard operating procedures, so it seems as though our approach to this program is starting to become a best practice statewide,” Ms.Avallone said. “We’re very proud of what we have been able to do here in Westfield, and we are actively looking to expand the program.”
The next meeting of the Westfield Board of Health is scheduled to be held at 5 p.m. on Monday, September 9, in the town hall.
