News from the Noteworthy from Tobacco Free Communities: Delaware, Otsego and Schoharie

Making Progress Despite the Challenges

This has been a tough year for those of us working on reducing tobacco use. The current administration’s steep funding cuts—which eliminated the U.S. Centers for Disease Control’s Office of Smoking and Health and nearly eliminated the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products—have impacted that work at the national, statewide, and local levels. Both programs have helped prevent hundreds of thousands of kids from becoming addicted to tobacco and helped hundreds of thousands of adults quit smoking.

The OSH funded numerous state and territorial tobacco control programs, including New York State’s. The New York State TCP lost 13 staff members last summer because of funding cuts, people dedicated to saving lives in New York, especially in rural areas, often because they had lost loved ones to tobacco addiction.

We know that, comparatively speaking, we are lucky. Our loss of TCP staff has slowed down our work, but not stopped it. A recent article reported that West Virginia had to close a youth-led tobacco prevention program. West Virginia “received 73% of funding for its anti-tobacco efforts from OSH,” the highest of all U.S. states. It has the highest tobacco rate among high-school students in the country at 27 percent. The New York State rate is 17 percent.

Despite all that, the NYS TCP—which includes our organization, Tobacco-Free Communities: Delaware, Otsego and Schoharie—continues to work to reduce tobacco use and make public health a priority. TFC-DOS and our many wonderful community partners, local governments, and caring DOS citizens have made some inroads and scored some successes this year in reducing tobacco use and improving our area’s public health and environment.

One achievement is the Village of Sharon Springs passing a policy that makes all its municipal property tobacco-free. The village’s long-time beloved mayor, Doug Plummer, who tragically passed on Dec. 23, 2023 after battling brain cancer courageously for years, strongly supported having tobacco-free communities. His mother had died from lung cancer when Doug was only 21. When Doug and his partner, Garth Roberts, opened the nationally renowned American Hotel in Sharon Springs in 2001, they made the outdoor area smoke-free, a rare move at the time. I think Doug would have liked Sharon Springs’ new TF policy.

Another accomplishment is the City of Oneonta’s Community Wellness Committee’s diligent work developing a tobacco retail policy that aims to cap the number of tobacco retailers in the city. If the Common Council passes it, the new law will help prevent youth from ever initiating tobacco use and ultimately help reduce tobacco litter and build a tobacco-free norm. We at TFC-DOS have been impressed and grateful for the CWC members’ gathering and analyzing of data on tobacco retailer policies and thoughtful discussions around it. Shout out to them!

In addition, and somewhat ironically, the NYS TCP’s 25th anniversary is this year! It was established via the New York State Public Health Law in 2000, which led to the development of “a comprehensive, effective public health infrastructure to prevent tobacco use, reduce exposure to secondhand smoke, and support New Yorkers in quitting tobacco.” Key achievements include:

• The creation of the New York State Quitline, which has supported more than 1 million New Yorkers in quitting!
• Adult cigarette smoking down from 23 percent in 2000 to 9 percent in 2023!
• Youth cigarette smoking was at 2 percent in 2024, with youth use of any form of tobacco continuing to fall!

• A nearly 50 percent decrease in the lung cancer death rate in the state!
• Thousands of lives and billions of dollars saved in healthcare costs associated with smoking!
• A return on investment that has New York seeing a $15 return for every dollar spent on the program!

The TCP also created the Advancing Tobacco-Free Communities program, with 20 chapter organizations, including TFC-DOS, which work to create TF spaces in our county catchment areas. The creation of ATFC came from research and analysis showing that changing our environments and building a tobacco-free norm through community-wide engagement and policy led to significant reductions in tobacco use. Each ATFC includes a youth-led Reality Check program that educates communities on the tobacco/e-cigarette marketing exposure to children and preventing children from ever initiating tobacco use.

On November 20, TFC-DOS celebrated TCP’s “Illuminating 25 Years of Landmark Progress” at SUNY Oneonta’s Great American Smoke Out event. SUNY Oneonta’s Student Counseling Center, which offers nicotine replacement therapy to students who want to quit tobacco use, coordinated and hosted the event that included decorating our tables with purple lights, the chosen color spotlighting our achievements. Thank you, SUNY Oneonta!

TFC-DOS is expecting to face challenges in 2026 in anticipation of more cuts to federal funding. But with our incredible community partners and DOS residents, we know we can overcome them. We can’t thank you all enough for your work, dedication, and support to save lives and improve public health!

Jennifer Hill is the community engagement coordinator for Tobacco Free Communities: Delaware, Otsego and Schoharie, writing on behalf of Nicole Schuck, youth engagement coordinator, and Kristen Richardson, director.