A state lawmaker says the time has come to ban smoking at all workplaces in Pennsylvania, including bars and restaurants.

State Sen. Stewart Greenleaf, R-Montgomery County, says he will push for legislation simlar to that of California, New York, Maine, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida and Massachusetts, where the law is already in place.

"It's not a question of if it will happen, it's a question of when," Greg Hartley, assistant director of Smokefree Pennsylvania, told reporter Kelly Frey in a Channel 4 Action News report from October 2003. "We think it will happen soon."

Secondhand smoke causes 53,000 deaths a year in the United States, according to the National Cancer Institute.

Rumblings surfaced early last year about a possible smoking ban at Allegheny County bars and restuarants. The noise was quieted by the state's Clean Indoor Air Act, passed in 1998, which establishes no-smoking sections in restaurants but prohibits most local governments from further restricting smokers.

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Some eateries have voluntarily extinguished smoking. A Web site, NoSmokeDining.org, lists about 100 smoke-free restaurants in Allegheny and surrounding counties.