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"If the public health response only occurred in Denver, we would not be able to properly address the public health impact of youth tobacco use," Hancock said.

The office of Mayor Michael Hancock announced on Friday that he had vetoed a bill banning the sale of most flavored tobacco products in the city.

The Denver City Council voted 8 to 3 to pass the bill on Monday, after adjusting the original bill introduced in October. Committee members Kendra Black, President Stasi Gilmore and Paul Cashman voted against, while committee members Kevin Flynn and Chris Herndon were absent on Monday and did not vote.

The bill will ban the sale of products including flavored cigarettes, chewing tobacco, menthol cigarettes and e-cigarette liquid, but exempts waterpipe products, pipe tobacco and cigars.

City council members Amanda Sawyer and Debbie Ortega, who co-sponsored the bill, stated that the main purpose of the bill is to curb the use of tobacco among youth in the city. Even before the pandemic, youth e-cigarette smoking was a high-profile public health problem in the state. A 2018 study by the Centers for Disease Control found that high school students in Colorado used e-cigarettes more often than other 37 states Young people.

Hancock said in a statement that he agreed with the legislators’ goal of reducing nicotine use by young people in the city, increasing the age of tobacco product purchase to 21, and creating new tobacco retail store licenses as a solution to this The steps of the problem. In a letter to city council members, Hancock stated that he would prefer to ban flavored tobacco products statewide and even in metropolitan areas.

He said that although the bill is well-intentioned, it still has shortcomings.

Hancock wrote in a letter to city council members: "If the public health response only occurred in Denver, we would not be able to properly address the public health impact of youth tobacco use."

Hancock added that "a significant portion" of the convenience store's revenue comes from selling such products. He pointed out that the ban will affect these companies, and he pointed out that these companies are usually small and owned by ethnic minorities.

The statement said: "If the mayor believes that strengthening law enforcement can effectively deal with this epidemic, then these changes may happen at any time." "So far, he has chosen to do nothing, but we thank him for his cooperation in the continuing discussions."

City Councillor Black believes that banning the sale of flavored tobacco will not have much effect in curbing the use of young people, but will lead to the closure of local companies that sell e-cigarette products. At the previous meeting, Flynn agreed with Black’s point of view and said that the bill affected adult over-expansion.

Local e-cigarette business owners celebrated the veto, including Monica Vondruska, owner of Denver Cignot Vaping.

"Our work is not finished yet," Vondroska said in a press release on Friday. "We are committed to working with Mayor Hancock and the entire Denver City Council to pass common-sense legislation in 2022, which will reduce the use of e-cigarettes among young people while still allowing responsible adults to purchase flavored e-cigarette products in age-restricted stores. To quit smoking."

In a statement called Hancock's veto, Jodi Radke, the regional director of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Children, said, "...not good for public health and our children."

This is Hancock's second use of veto power. Last year, he used it to reject a bill passed by city councilors that effectively ended the city's ban on bulldogs. A similar measure to legalize bulldogs has been sent to voters, who approved it in last year’s election.

All members of the city council will consider the veto at a meeting on Monday. They can overturn the mayor's veto with nine votes. Based on the number of votes this week, it seems that there are not enough votes to do this; the two MPs Flynn and Herndon who did not vote this week have previously expressed opposition to the bill.

This story is constantly being updated. 

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