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Zion Park District worker Ed Nielsen prepares to install no-smoking signs in Shiloh Park. (Tribune photo by Stacey Wescott / June 18, 2009)
By Tara Malone~Chicago Tribune
The steady march to rid parks and playgrounds of cigarette butts spread to Zion this summer after a group of students surveyed residents and then pushed the Park District to enact the ban that most supported.
The 752 acres of parkland went smoke-free in mid-June, although the ban ends at the fairways of the two golf courses and carries no penalties.
Park District officials are betting smokers will heed the signs and police themselves.
“We’re just going to take it real slow,” said Rich Walker, Zion’s director of parks and recreation. “We’re certainly not interested in disrupting family picnics.”
And Austin Sears, 18, of Healthy Youth, the student organization at Zion-Benton Township High School, also is hopeful about cooperation.
“It’s kind of a self-enforcement thing, kind of like signs not to feed the ducks or signs posting the speed limit,” Sears said. “People follow those.”
Zion joins the ranks of Deerfield, Lake Forest, Oak Park and a half-dozen other towns with smoke-free parks, taking a step further the statewide ban that snuffed out cigarettes in virtually all public places in January 2008.
Chicago was among the first to ban smoking along the beachfront and in parks with playgrounds and playlots two years ago. But smokers still can light up in green spaces without playgrounds, a Chicago Park District spokeswoman said.
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