FORT WORTH -- Without coming before the City Council for a vote, the controversial suggestion that the city stop hiring smokers appeared to be officially dead Tuesday.
During a presentation on managing long-term healthcare expenses, Karen Marshall, the city's human resources director, said the city would instead use incentives and surcharges to promote healthy lifestyles rather than prohibit the hiring of smokers.Marshall laid out how changes in the city's insurance plan will be phased in through 2015. The city will continue to look at establishing smoke-free campuses and smoke-free perimeters around buildings, but no timetable was set.The incentive-based approach will take effect on Jan. 1, 2014.The city's research found few public or private employers that won't hire smokers, Marshall said.Offering incentives won't easily change behavior, Councilman Dennis Shingleton said."If I'm a smoker and I'm overweight, what's the incentive?" Shingleton said. "We need to think this through a little more. We're not there yet."In response, City Manager Tom Higgins said the city is still working through those issues.The suggestion to not hire smokers came from a city employee during Mayor Betsy Price's Big Idea Challenge, which encouraged employees to submit ideas that would save the city money.In North Texas, the 19,000-employee Baylor Health Care System's policy of not hiring smokers took effect Jan. 1. The city employee who submitted the no-smokers idea said the Baylor policy was partly the inspiration.Bill Hanna, 817-390-7698Twitter: @fwhanna
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