Clay County Commission

Dan Haglund

Clay County commissioners voted 4-1 on Tuesday to ban the sale of all flavored and unflavored vaping products and e-cigarettes at stores licensed by the county.
The ban, which will affect about a dozen retail outlets, will take effect on June 1 after a public hearing in March bumped the initial April 1 effective date.
Newest Commissioner Ezra Baer, who joined the board early this year, was the only dissenting vote.
Even though the ordinance bans the sale of vaping products, it still allows the sale of many flavored tobacco products, including flavored cigars, menthol cigarettes, flavored chewing tobacco and flavored nicotine pouches.
The chronology of this law began last year when Commissioner Jenny Mongeau, Dist. 3, introduced the idea. A Dec. 17 ban on flavored tobacco was passed by a 3-2 vote, but after Baer joined the board the following month, he requested for the pending ban to get another look.
In the public hearings since, the vast majority of public voices, including those of high school and college students, education and medical professionals, advocated for the ban on flavored vapes especially.
To get the issue moving, Commissioner Paul Krabbenhoft, Dist. 1, proposed that the county keep the flavored tobacco ordinance as written, which failed on a 2-3 vote.
Then Baer made a motion to abolish the entire tobacco ordinance, but no other commissioner would give him a second.
Krabbenhoft said the board heard from 27 voices in the public hearing, and indicated there could have been even more, in support of the flavored tobacco ban.
“The whole issue here is about the flavors,” Krabbenhoft said. “It’s about kid products, which would include vaping products and nicotine pouches. And with the detriment to brain development that is scientifically known, these are the two problem areas.”
Commissioner David Ebinger, Dist. 5, backed up Krabbenhoft’s testimony.
“We’ve had two public hearings for this,” Ebinger said. “Overwhelmingly, people that came forward were opposed to the flavored tobacco products and nicotine pouches.”
Ebinger said the reason so many members of the public testified against these products is the health consequences, especially to students as young as middle school.
“These things contain the equivalent of four to eight cigarettes,” Ebinger said. “We are programming adolescent children to addiction with these products. These things are being specifically marketed to children.”
Commissioner Jenny Mongeau, Dist. 3, supports the countywide ban, but said she’s concerned that as a border county, the youth will still have access to such products across the river in North Dakota.
“What’s frustrating to me is really, (the ban) in my eyes not going to make a difference,” Mongeau said. “Because of the fact that we are a border city. This is an accessible, far less cheaper option on the North Dakota side that is not far away from us.”
According to Clay County Tobacco Prevention Coordinator Jason McCoy, nearly all students who use tobacco use vaping products.
Individual cities in Clay County have already had specific bans on the books.
Moorhead bans the sale of flavored tobacco products, while Dilworth has banned the sale of electronic devices containing flavored products, like e-cigarettes and vapes.