INTRODUCTION

            The Massachusetts Restaurant Association (MRA), a non-profit trade association for the food and beverage industry in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, USA, was incorporated in February 1934.[1]  What was soon to become the MRA was first established in 1931, when a group of restaurant owners gathered in opposition to Boston's restaurant price-cutting wars, which threatened the continued existence of their businesses.1  The MRA received Federal tax-exempt status in July 1942, and is currently exempt under section 501(c)(6) of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code.[2]

The Association states that it advocates for the interests of its members at the state and local levels; organizes annual trade shows; supports "food recycling" programs to supply edible food from restaurants and colleges to needy and homeless persons in participating communities; helps to sponsor "school-to career" programs that provide interested high school students with paid internships and trained food service industry worksite mentors; and engages in various other activities that allow it to fulfill its mission, which is "to protect and improve the food and beverage industry."[3]  According to the MRA, its present-day membership exceeds 2000, and it represents "over 7000 restaurants and all phases of the food service industry" throughout Massachusetts.3

            Based on information collected from archives of tobacco industry documents (resulting from various state class action lawsuits) the MRA has also been a close ally of the tobacco industry for at least the past two decades, while the two groups have worked together to defeat regulations to restrict smoking in public places.  An early example of this collaboration between the MRA and the tobacco industry was their effort to defeat a non-binding vote on the ballots of towns scattered throughout Massachusetts in 1978.[4]  This ballot question asked if district representatives should vote for legislation "assuring citizens of clean air by restricting smoking to separate and clearly posted areas in enclosed places used by the public, with fines for noncompliance."4  In a memo from the Tobacco Institute (TI) about this ballot initiative, the TI indicated that they must maintain low industry visibility, and that "any public approach should be directed through locally based allies, such as the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, and not through either the Tobacco Institute or the member companies."4  The tobacco industry and the Massachusetts Restaurant Association had a well-established alliance by the time the TI called upon the MRA to help fight this non-binding ballot initiative in October 1978.

            The MRA is an advocate for the tobacco industry at the state and local levels today, where they still lobby against the passage of smoking restrictions in public places, workplaces, restaurants, and bars.  However, the MRA has downplayed its relationship with Big Tobacco.  The Boston Globe published an article about the relationship between the MRA and the tobacco industry on May 3, 1999, and a connection was admitted by Bruce Potter, the MRA's director of membership services, but only in so far as the tobacco industry "might sponsor an event, but that's all."[5]  However, according to the Boston Globe, Potter also acknowledged that "Philip Morris and RJ Reynolds Tobacco,” the nation's top two cigarette makers, “are dues-paying members, but … their role is entirely passive."5  The publicly available tobacco industry documents reveal a very different history of collaboration between the MRA and the tobacco industry than one of simply "passive" interest. 

            The MRA has also publicly attacked the Massachusetts Tobacco Control Program (MTCP).  In July 1999, the MRA Legislative Coordinator, Andrea Bolton, spoke against the proposed adoption of a workplace smoking ban by the Northampton (Massachusetts) Board of Health.  The smoking ban would have extended to all workplaces, including bars.  She stated that, "For us to even be here tonight is ludicrous … this kind of ban will wreak havoc.  It will negatively affect these bars.  And on another issue, the Massachusetts Tobacco Control Programs are in this for the money … if anyone is funded by Big Tobacco, it's the Massachusetts Tobacco Control [Program].  For every pack of cigarettes that are sold, they are benefiting, so it only makes sense that they can have all these people here tonight."[6] 

The universal opposition of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association to smoking bans in food and beverage establishments, and to the MTCP, is a result of its historic relationship with the tobacco industry.  This is contrary to public statements made by the MRA that it is working independently of the interests of the tobacco industry.  State and local lawmakers, as well as local boards of health, must realize that when the MRA opposes state and local smoke-free legislation, it does so primarily because it has been and continues to be a close political ally of the tobacco industry.

REFERENCES