CSUN Associated Students further solidified its stance on providing a smoke and tobacco-free campus when it unanimously voted on Monday morning, to rescind a contradictory 2011 smoking policy.

The 2011 policy prohibited smoking within 25 feet of entrances, exits, operable windows and ground level intake structures, as well as on-campus stadium facilities and recreational areas, according to documents provided by Associated Students.

With the approval of a campus-wide policy completely prohibiting cigarette and tobacco use on campus this fall, Associated Students senators felt the four-year-old policy was no longer needed.

“It just conflicted with what the policy that the university established,” said Associated Students Senator Christian Rubalcava. “We rescinded this one because we support the smoking policy that stands now.”

Rescinding the 2011 policy, Rubalcava said, “solidifies Associated Students’ support of a smoke and tobacco-free campus and eliminates older policies from contradicting with new policies.”

“The 2011 resolution reflected campus-wide tobacco use rules at the time and was a compromise between having a completely tobacco-free campus and allowing people to freely use tobacco on campus”, said Associated Students President Jorge Reyes.

“It shows that we’re committed to having a smoke-free campus,” Reyes said of rescinding the 2011 policy. “We are aware of the resolutions that we write and we take our stances very seriously.”

The new policy, which went into effect in March, is part of a wider effort by the California State University system to ban tobacco use on all of its 23 campuses.

Associated Students senators approved a resolution in March support the CSUN administration’s decision to prohibit tobacco use on campus.

Rubalcava said that as a result of the new policy, he has seen less smokers on campus.

Reyes, a CSUN grad student, has also seen less smokers on campus and noticed cleaner air.

“I’m happy that students are respecting the decisions of the CSU as well as the decisions of a lot of CSUN students,” Reyes said.

Reyes has no authority to cite violators of the smoking policy, but he says that, as a student, he may feel obligated to approach a smoker to let them know that CSUN does not allow tobacco use.

“As a student, that’s what I would do,” Reyes said. “But as president, I have no power to say, ‘You get a $5 ticket!’”

Students who may come to Associated Students looking for resources to help them quit smoking are referred to the Klotz Student Health Center, said Reyes.