SENATE, No. 1218

SECTION 1. Chapter 29 of the General Laws, as appearing in the 2000 Official Edition is hereby amended by adding the following section:-

Section 2XX. 

(a)  In any year after 2007 when the state’s tobacco settlement payment receipts as of June 30 for the prior 12-month period are in excess of the total amount of settlement payments actually received by the state during fiscal year 2005 [$253.9 million], an amount equal to the excess shall be appropriated and directed to the Department of Public Health in the fiscal year beginning July 1^st solely for the purpose of increasing state efforts to prevent and reduce tobacco use and its harms.  These funds shall not be used to replace existing funding allocated to state tobacco prevention efforts but solely to increase the total amount of expenditures to prevent and reduce tobacco use and its harms in the state.

(b)  The funds directed to the Department of Public Health pursuant to paragraph (a) shall be allocated by the Department consistently with the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s, or its successor agency’s, best practices and guidelines for state tobacco control programs and as determined by the Department, in consultation with the Oversight committee created pursuant to paragraph (c), to be effective to prevent and reduce tobacco use, reduce the public’s exposure to secondhand smoke, and identify and eliminate disparities related to tobacco use and its effects among different population groups.

(c)    Within 90 days after this section goes into effect, an oversight committee of nine members shall be established to assist the Department of Public Health in developing, implementing, and maintaining a strategic plan for allocating the funds directed to the Department, pursuant to paragraph (a), in monitoring and evaluating the use of the funds and all other state expenditures to prevent and reduce tobacco use and its harms, and in assessing the efficacy of all such expenditures to prevent and reduce tobacco use and its harms.  Three members of the oversight committee shall be appointed by the governor, three by the majority leader of the senate, and three by the majority leader of the house of representatives.  The members of the oversight committee shall be persons with experience and expertise regarding public health, tobacco control policies and programs, public education and counter-marketing, and program oversight and evaluation.  NO member o the oversight committee shall, during the member’s tenure on the committee for three years before joining the committee, receive any salary, grants, or other payments or  support from any business that manufactures, distributes, markets, or sells cigarettes or other tobacco products or serve as a director, employee, or consultant of any organization that receives grants or contributions from any such business or that provides legal, lobbying, public relations, marketing, or advertising services to any such business.  Each member of the oversight committee shall also agree not to enter into any such financial or business relationships with the tobacco industry for a period of two years after that member’s tenure on the oversight committee ends.  The oversight committee shall annually provide a publicly available report on tobacco sue and its related harms, including but not limited to those appropriated pursuant to paragraph (a), the effectiveness of such funding allocations, and related surveillance and evaluation findings to the governor and the legislature.  This oversight committee shall work in concert with the Advisory Committee on Health Care and Tobacco Control as designated in Section 5 (a) and (b) of Chapter 29D of the Massachusetts General Laws.

(d)  The Department of Public Health shall have the authority to promulgate reasonable rules to implement this section.