Where there’s smoke, there’s more regulation. Or at least there soon will be.

The Capital Regional District’s expanded Clean Air Bylaw governing smoking in open spaces officially kicks in April 1.

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As of that date, it will be illegal to spark up a cigarette at any park, playing field, bus stop, beach or public square anywhere in the Capital Regional District.

The bylaw also extends the buffer zones around doorways, windows, air intakes and bus shelters to seven metres from the existing three metres.

Anyone who violates the bylaw is subject to fines of up to $2,000. But don’t expect the SWAT team to show up if you phone in a scofflaw you spot puffing away while sitting on a bench in Beacon Hill Park or waiting for a bus on Douglas Street.

Island Health, which enforces the CRD bylaw, will be relying on public education for compliance.

Since the bylaw was passed in September, Island Health has launched an “I (heart) clean air” campaign. Tobacco enforcement officers have been attending community events and visiting recreation centres to explain the new regulations.

“You can also remind your neighbour if you’re at a bus stop that this is a no-smoking zone now,” said Island Health spokesman Eric Berndt.

“One of the key tenets [of the campaign] is ensuring that there’s proper signage, ensuring that we’ve educated people and that sort of peer compliance, for lack of a better word.”

One of the new provisions is the seven-metre buffer zone against smoking around bus stops. Previously, there was only a prohibition against smoking in bus shelters, he said.

“When smoking was banned in restaurants many years ago, that required a culture shift for people and there was a lot of uproar at that time about that. Over the years, we’ve come to accept you can’t smoke inside at restaurants anymore, and I think through this same bylaw, a culture shift is also required.”

Island Health has the equivalent of 1.5 full-time tobacco-control officers in the CRD and there is no plan to boost that number, Berndt said.

“We’ve found that this sort of progressive education, progressive enforcement model has worked in the past and worked in other jurisdictions. When there’s proper signage, proper education, people are compliant,” he said.

Still, the new seven-metre buffer zones around doorways, air intakes and windows will essentially make it illegal to have a cigarette on the sidewalk just about anywhere downtown.

Most local politicians predict the shift in attitudes toward outdoor smoking will come slowly.

“It will be about folks hopefully reminding — politely — their friends who do smoke that this isn’t an area for it,” said Victoria Coun. Chris Coleman. “The difficulty will be finding an area where it is allowed.”

Coleman said the new rules may be seen in some circles as draconian.

“There are other circles who say it’s a health concern and we need to address it properly.”

CRD chairman Nils Jensen, a lawyer, doesn’t expect there will be much immediate impact after April 1.

“For the most part, what people will see will be new signs and signs that help educate,” he said.

“There’s stuff on our website. There will be stuff in public but, other than that, there won’t be many visible changes.”

Jensen said compliance with the new provisions may take a little longer, but he expects it will come.

“With bylaws in general, it’s not always an expectation that every bylaw will be enforced at every breach,” Jensen said.

“These bylaws are meant, in essence, to set social norms. Using the example of smoking in the pubs, there’s no enforcement on that these days because there’s no people smoking in pubs these days.”

Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps said enforcing the expanded bylaw will be challenging in areas such as Centennial Square or near the Our Place drop-in shelter, where many street-entrenched people have little in the way of options.

“I think that’s the complicated piece for me and I don’t know what to do about it,” Helps said.

bcleverley@timescolonist.com