Assemblyman Wants To Ban Smoking In Prisons
Assemblyman Tim Leslie says he wants to ban all tobacco products from California State prisons.
Health care cost savings to the state is the motivation behind the Republican assemblyman´s push.
Leslie says a recent study by the Department of Health Services reported each smoker costs California $3,500 a year in health care costs. With about 160,000 inmates in the state´s prisons, and roughly half of them smokers, the state spends close to $266-million in smoking-related health care costs for inmates each.
Leslie says it´s not a way to further punish prisoners but to help make the prison population healthier.