Staff of the SouthCoast Healthy Housing and Workplace Initiative (SCHHWI) Leadership team were joined by several statewide experts in tobacco law and regulations for a presentation to local landlords at the Southcoast YMCA headquarters on Water Street in New Bedford on September 11, 2013. Attorneys Chris Banthin from the Public Health Advocacy Institute and Mass. Association of Health Boards Senior Staff Attorney Cheryl Sbarra presented on the advantages of landlords moving to a smoke-free policy. Landlords had the opportunity to ask question about the process and ways they can deal with some of the challenges to moving in that direction. Click here for the PowerPoint presentation. SCHHWI was created in 2012 when members of Voices for a Healthy SouthCoast were granted a $1 million Community Transformation Grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to develop smoke-free housing and worksites in the South Coast, Click here for a eight-minute video of the first part of the meeting. For more about the program, contact Alice Rebelo at 508-996-9622.

(Top row, left) Patricia Midurski and Joanne Correia of Olympia Towers listen as Dorothy Cabral of the Greater New Bedford Community Health Center talks with them before the meeting begins. (Top row, center) Project Director Alice Rebelo talks with Bob Collett of the Cape Cod Regional Tobacco Control Program and YMCA Southcoast Vice President of Operations Nancy Bonell. (Top row, right) New Bedford Mass in Motion Coordinaor Kim Ferreira talks with Jamie Buccheri of Coastline Elderly Services . (Middle row, left) Joanne Correia and Katrina Ribeiro of Olympia Towers enjoy a healthy lunch prior to the presentation. (Middle row, right) Judith Coykendall, director of Partners for Clean Air, a program of Seven Hills Behavioral HealthSeven Hills, talks with Cheryl Sbarra of Mass. Association of Health Boards. (Bottom row) YMCA Southcoast COO/VP Operations Nancy Bonell introduces Chris Banthin from the Public Health Advocacy Institute to begin the presentation.