Championship Subdivision Football | FCS Football | Stadiums | Blogs | Forums

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio is butting in to what city residents do in their homes, by pressing landlords and developers to ban smoking inside apartments, according to a report.

The mayor's administration is planning to pay four health-advocacy groups $9,000 apiece to press landlords and developers to prohibit lighting up in their apartment complexes so neighboring tenants don’t breathe in secondhand smoke, according to the New York Post. The city has already banned smoking in bars and restaurants, workplaces, sports venues and parks, but has not moved against smokers who practice their habit in the privacy of their own homes.

City health officials emphasized the initiative is voluntary — at least for now.

“Everyone benefits from smoke-free housing. Residents enjoy breathing cleaner, healthier air in their homes . . . while owners see reductions in property damage and turnover costs,” a Health Department spokesman said.

Dozens of buildings containing hundreds of apartments have already kicked the habit, according to the Health Department. The de Blasio administration is actually accelerating an initiative started at the tail end of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s tenure.

Di Blasio said in his recently released long-term "sustainability blueprint" — “One New York: The Plan for a Strong and Just City” — that the city “will work to pass legislation requiring multi-unit housing to have a smoking policy and to disclose it to residents and prospective residents.”