• Replace inflammatory rhetoric, stereotyping, and automatic enmity in favor of civil, problem solving dialogue;
• Understand each others' needs, values and concerns;
• Identify areas of common ground and even interdependence, while acknowledging areas of difference; and, finally,
• Work together to create realistic, sensible and sustainable options for communities and families facing pressures associated with transition.

Greetings participants in the Southern Tobacco Communities
Project listserve.

The several weeks have again seen important activity
concerning tobacco and tobacco communities.  Here is a
summary current as of Jan. 17 of some of the key items
based on news reports and personal conversations with
people in tobacco-producing states.  As always, please feel
free to forward me items of interest.

Regards,

Frank Dukes

REGIONAL AND NATIONAL NEWS

Some youth smoking decline: A new Monitoring the Future
Study on "Cigarette Smoking Among Teens" suggests a slight
decline in teen smoking: 8th grade "past month" smoking
dropped from 19.4 percent in 1997 to 17.5 percent in 1999;
10th graders past month smoking dropped from 29.8 percent
in 1997 to 25.7 percent in 1999.  High school seniors
dropped from 36.5 percent in the peak year of 1997 to 34.6
percent in 1999.

However, that decline occurs in a context where through
1997 the number of adult smokers rose 2 percent since 1991,
the number of teen-age smokers, including those who smoke
as little as once a month, rose nearly 50 percent, and the
number of regular teen smokers, those who smoked at least
20 cigarettes a month, rose nearly 50 percent.  At the same
time, the number of cigarettes an average smoker consumes
daily is down 13 percent, to about 21, just over a pack a
day.
 

Internet sales of tobacco products increasing: Some 70
web-based tobacco product sales sites sell cheaper
cigarettes and deliver them to the home.  Estimates suggest
that such sales could account for 20% of the retail market
eventually. Prices can be lower than at retail stores in
part because these discounters may operate from low
tobacco-tax states such as North Carolina or Virginia or
from American Indian reservations.  Besides the concern
that lower prices will increase the rate of smoking, there
are concerns about access to the sites from youth and about
declining tax revenues for localities.  Some states have
taken advantage of federal law that requires web retailers
to provide the names of people who have purchased products,
and have billed peesville, VA 22903
Phone: 804-924-2041
Fax 804-924-0231
E-mail: ed7k@virginia.edu
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University;
* $2 and-a-half million to turn an abandoned hospital
facility into classrooms and a tec
manufacturers have in low tobacco-specific nitrosamines.
The Raleigh "Tobacco Leadership Group" meeting was attended
by about 100 manufacturers, leaf dealers, leaders of
tobacco grower organizations, extension agents and
university researchers.

Growers say that R.J. Reynolds has been offering them
contracts guaranteeing to buy part of their 2000 harvest if
they modify their barns, but they wonder where funding will
come for the modifications.  RJR claims that modifications
to prevent heaters from blowing exhaust gas across the
tobacco can reduce nitrosamine levels in flue-cured leaf to
one part per million or less.

Burley purchasing intentions down - Purchase intentions for
the 2000 burley quota are 242.5 million pounds, down from
291 million announced for the 1999 quota.  2000 quota will
be announced on Feb. 1 but is expected to be significantly
cut.  The USDA press release is at :

http://www.fsa.usda.gov/pas/news/releases/2000/01/1411.htm

Philip Morris and RJReynolds increase prices again: The two
biggest tobacco companies (PM with about 50% of market
share, RJR with about 20%) have boosted wholesale
cigarette prices by about 7.5 percent. That price hike
comes two weeks after the 10 cent per pack increase in the
federal excise tax on cigarettes went into effect.

KENTUCKY -
Gov. Paul Patton proposed devoting $179 million of the
settlement's next 3 years to agriculture and $5.5 million
to tobacco control efforts.  Public health advocates are
dismayed at the amount devoted to tobacco control.  Farm
leaders were pleased at the support for agriculture, which
included a substantial amount of direct payments to
producers for compensation for quota loss.  Kentucky public
health advocates and farm leaders had endorsed 15%, or $21
million/year, of the funding to go for youth tobacco
control and are extremely disappointed at the governor's
proposal.  The tobacco farm leaders and legislators who
have been working with health groups pledged to continue to
seek the full requested funding for prevention of tobacco
use.

 
SOUTH CAROLINA -
The statewide health coalition is seeking legislation with
Rep. Gilda Hunter as sponsor that would create 2 funding
sources, with 15% of the national settlement for 2001 and
40% for recurring annual monies going into health-related
activities, and 80% in 2001 and 55% for following years to
be put into a health-related Foundation.  5% would go to
compensate tobacco growers and support rural development.
The farm community has already endorsed legislation
providing 50% for compensation of growers.

The Governor proposes a first-year allocation of 60% for
health care with a portion for prevention and education,
20% for state infrastructure, and 20% for farm communities.
JJThe health coalition will seek more leeway than the
governor's emphasis on prevention and education only.

GEORGIA -

Governor Barnes has proposed a split of 2/3 of settlement
moneys for health and 1/3 for rural communities, including
tobacco-producers.  CHARGE, the statewide tobacco control
coalition, is seeking 33% for tobacco prevention; the
Coalition for a Healthy Georgia, started by the Medical
Association of Georgia and the Georgia Hospital Association
is seeking a significant proportion for their interests.
The two health coalitions are meeting to discuss possible
cooperation.

VIRGINIA -
40,000 people who grow tobacco or own quota in Virginia
will get $21.6 million in Phase II payments early in 2000.
That means an average payment of $540 per producer or quota
holder.

In a move that will be of interest to other states,
Virginia has altered its benefits plan so that growers do
not have to keep producing tobacco to be entitled to
benefits in the years to come.
These Phase II payments totaling $340 million over the next
12 years will go to producers and quota owners active in
1998 even if they retire or sell the quota. Virginia's
trust fund board decided that payments should go 1998
producers and quota holders because they were the ones
affected by the national settlement and that it would not
be fair to pay people purchasing quota after that date.
This decision will remove an economic disincentive that
would keep farmers producing tobacco even if they wanted to
require.

 
NORTH CAROLINA -

The foundation set up to receive 1/2 of the state's Phase I
money has begun planning, but is receiving contradictory
advice about how to spend its funds.  Several members and
state elected leaders urge preservation of the principal
and use only of the interest.  Some want immediate relief
for farmers, others suggest investment in programs ranging
from rural internet access to biotechnological uses of
tobacco - AG Mike Easley was quoted in the Winston-Salem
News Leader as saying ''With a little investment, North
Carolina will be growing more tobacco for non-smoking than
Phone: 804-924-2041
Fax 804-924-0231
E-mail: ed7k@virginia.edu
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University;
* $2 and-a-half million to turn an abandoned hospital
facility into classrooms and a tec size=+1>tobacco settlement money, with legislative attention
focused on a proposed state income tax.  Major concerns
continue for funding of Tennessee's "TennCare" m