As New York Indian Nation leaders battle in courtrooms to preserve their tax-free cigarette market, tensions are rising on reservations, where the state’s renewed efforts to tax sales to non-Native customers is viewed as yet another attack on Native American rights. “For 200 years, we have been dealing with efforts to take our land, efforts to take our resources, efforts to take our jurisdiction,” said Robert Odawi Porter, senior policy adviser and counsel for the 7,800-member Seneca nation in western New York, which says its cigarette business is a $100 million-a-year indust ... Jump to full article >>

Seneca Nation leaders have renounced violence, urged calm and tried to dampen the emotion in the buildup to the state’s attempt to collect taxes on cigarettes. Even so, some emotion — mostly frustration — has bubbled up from the Cattaraugus Reservation. With questions about potential economic harm from a successful attempt at tax collection, sometimes it sounds like a people’s attempt at survival. While two public, “peaceful” rallies are planned on the reservation this morning, tensions had been climbing, and the raw emotion has still shown its head. The Sen ... Jump to full article >>

Seneca Indians may have lost another court battle Monday in their attempts to keep state taxes from being collected on cigarettes sold to non-Indians on Native American land, but they say their legal battle is not complete. Not only will Senecas head to the state’s Appellate Division seeking to overturn a decision made Monday by state Supreme Court Judge Donna Siwek that will allow for tax collections, but the nation also plans to head back to U.S. Federal District Court in hopes of convincing Judge Richard Arcara to block the way the state plans to collect the taxes. On Monday, Judge Si ... Jump to full article >>

Scores of tobacco retailers in the U.S. are taking advantage of a federal tax loophole to offer deep discounts on roll-your-own cigarettes. But the practice is attracting scrutiny from regulators and cigarette manufacturers. At Smoke Zone, a store in this Chicago suburb, customers one recent afternoon flocked to two high-speed rolling machines that produce a carton of cigarettes in eight minutes. The price: $21—less than half the cost of a carton of Marlboro cigarettes. “People have waited an hour for these some days,” said Taren DeNicolo, the store’s manager. About 150 tob ... Jump to full article >>

As legal and political battles continue over whether New York will ever collect taxes from the sale of cigarettes on Indian land, the Oneida Indian Nation is taking steps to strengthen its own position. The nation announced today it will move its Buffalo-based cigarette manufacturing plant to Oneida to take advantage of a federal law protecting products tribes manufacture on their own reservations from state tax laws. According to a press release from the nation, the federal law preempts state efforts to tax products manufactured on reservation land. The nation purchased cigarette manufacturer ... Jump to full article >>

Even as the Smoke-Free Mumbai Campaign shifts gear by targeting taxis and BEST buses, a survey has found that tobacco companies have found a glitzy way of advertising their wares. Display boards-commissioned and maintained by tobacco companies-have multiplied across the city. Worse, they either blatantly or subtly violate the stringent regulations laid down in the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition) Act of 2003, reveals a survey by the Cancer Patient Aid Association (CPAA) conducted between May and July. There are 125 displays in five South Mumbai wards. “About 65% of th ... Jump to full article >>

Today’s sanctuary for and one of the last bastions of camaraderie, friendship and sociability – the corner cigar store – could become history along with many other businesses in Savannah if City Council has its way, says the International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers Association. The current proposal would eliminate exemptions in the Georgia state law by making all workplaces smoke-free. This includes all indoor and outdoor areas of bars, restaurants, private clubs and other businesses, including cigar stores and within 20 feet from the entrance to any such workplace. Today’s san ... Jump to full article >>

A meeting today in Henrietta was historic. The six nations making up the Iroquois Confederacy say it was the first time they’ve all met together in more than 200 years. At stake are options in the wake of New York State taxing Native American cigarette shipments. The Seneca Nation of Indians and the others say New York State does not have the authority to impose its laws on them. That they are sovereign nations — just as the United States of America is and they said that message is meant for Gov. Paterson and Andrew Cuomo. The Six Nations said they are considering what their option ... Jump to full article >>

A Boston judge delayed ruling Monday on Lorillard Tobacco Co.’s request to reject a lawsuit that accuses the nation’s third-largest tobacco company of targeting black youth in its cigarette marketing. Judge Linda Giles of Suffolk Superior Court told lawyers for both sides she wanted to review the case filings as well as previous court cases before ruling on Lorillard’s request for a favorable decision without going to trial. “I have reviewed your submissions,” Giles told the lawyers. “I have not digested them.” The 2004 lawsuit was filed by Will Evans, ... Jump to full article >>

Uganda’s tobacco industry is spawning an environmental disaster, as farmers turn to fruit trees for wood fuel to cure the tobacco leaves. Driving through tobacco growing areas, outside the Murchison Falls National Park one barely encounters natural forests. The native trees have been cut down and no efforts have been made to replace them. Occasionally, one sees smaller manmade forests of eucalyptus trees that belong to a few individuals who, after growing food crops still have land to spare. Larger manmade forests belong to the leading tobacco company British American Tobacco Uganda Ltd. The ... Jump to full article >>

Chicago’s budget is in dire straits. The city will face a massive budget deficit — at least $655 million, and likely more — in the coming year, and it ended last year with only $2.7 million in the bank. Many city services are already cut to the bone, and there probably won’t be much appetite for new revenues, either: according to a report released Tuesday, Chicago is tied with Los Angeles for the highest sales tax rate of any major city in the nation. When the 6.25 percent Illinois sales tax, plus county taxes, city taxes and mass transit levies are taken together, Chi ... Jump to full article >>