TRENTON, N.J. -- It took years to rip the money from tobacco companies and it came with the promise of cutting health care costs and paying for ways to prevent people from smoking.

Now the state's money from the national tobacco settlement is nearly gone, promised to pay off loans needed to balance New Jersey's budget. And those anti-smoking programs? They may be going, too. "If the public had the notion that the state was saving its budget by selling off hundreds of millions of bonds from the tobacco settlement and not using the money to pay to stop smoking, and it's just been used all up, I think they would think it's a scandal," said Jonathan Foulds, who heads an anti-smoking program at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Anti-smoking activists and public health experts insist government-funded programs to help people quit smoking do work. They point to studies showing smoking rates for teens and adults have dropped and to surveys detailing the high cost for medical treatment to the state. But Gov. James E. McGreevey has scuttled any hope for more money, saying years of government overspending and a sagging economy left him no choice but to cut nearly all state programs. His proposed budget gives anti-smoking efforts the least amount of money in six years. The $30 million to fund Web sites, training programs, advertising efforts and other incentives has been cut to $10 million. More troubling, opponents claim, are the higher taxes on tobacco products and the efforts to use all of the national settlement money to balance the budget. Both tactics earned praise in other years because at least some of the money went to fund the anti-tobacco work. "We're cognizant and appreciative of the budget problem, but when you have dedicated resources for a public health issue and you fail to pay for the vaccine to cure that problem, it really is amazing," said Larry Downs, executive director of New Jersey Breathes, an anti-tobacco education group. In 1998, tobacco companies agreed to pay $206 billion over 25 years to 46 states to settle lawsuits. Four states later settled separately for a total of $40 billion. By August of last year, only 5 percent of tobacco settlement money was being used on smoking prevention, according to a report by the National Conference of State Legislatures. Now more than half of the states have borrowed against some, if not all, of the incoming money from the settlement. New Jersey's share is gone, all of it borrowed to help avoid tax increases and more cuts, officials said. Exactly what will be left of New Jersey's public anti-smoking program is still being determined. McGreevey is committed to efforts that target children, spokeswoman Ellen Mellody said. Activists worry successful programs like the state's interactive Internet site will be gone. They also fear that money for advertising and other public education efforts will be threatened. The key to quitting, experts say, is having a range of options for people. "Different programs work for different people who have different learning styles: cold turkey for people who can go alone, support programs for people who need that and magic pills for people who believe that will work for them," said Dr. Josephine Hines, a psychologist who uses a state-sponsored program in her private practice. State money is not being spent to persuade people to quit because nearly all smokers say they want to stop, Foulds said. "The answer is not a question of trying to motivate people. They already made that decision. They are addicted to tobacco and you need to give them all the help they need," he said. But the state does have access to all the money it needs to fund a successful program, Downs said. In his first budget, McGreevey raised taxes on tobacco products, moving the cigarette tax up 70 cents to $1.50 a pack. He has proposed another 40-cent increase in the budget now under consideration. That first increase, however, had some of the money directed to pay for the anti-smoking programs, Downs said. No such plan is in place for the new tax. "An extra dime on that raises $32 million. It would basically fund the program," Downs said. "It's the difference between a dime and denying people treatment programs."

<< Prev	CIGoutlet.NET News Home	Next >>