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Parenting in the Screen Age - The Screenagers Podcast
How High Schoolers Took on Big Tobacco and Won
00:29:23
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- [00:04]
A
Hello, I'm Delaney Reston, primary care physician and creator with Lisa Tabb of the four screenagers movies. And this is Parenting in the Screen Age, a show about discovering the best ways to help our youth and ourselves navigate our rapidly changing digital world. Could we imagine a world where tobacco and nicotine products are no longer sold? Could that world be shaped by teens working together to make it happen? In today's episode, I talk with Raven Twilling, program coordinator for Bay Area community Resources in Marin County, California. Raven shares how she has organized teens to advocate for banning the sale of tobacco and nicotine products in two California towns, an important step toward limiting the influence of the global tobacco industry in local communities. She walks us through her journey from nicotine vaping trends on social media while she was in high school to studying public health, to working alongside youth in her current role. This is a great episode to listen to with kids and teens in your life. It highlights the real impact of civic engagement, the importance of standing up to industries that profit from harm, and why showing up to city council meetings can actually be a powerful and even fun thing to do. For this episode in particular, be sure to check out the show notes. They're packed with resources for anyone interested in getting involved in efforts to challenge big tobacco and protect community health. Okay, let's get started.
- [01:35]
B
Okay, Raven, go ahead and introduce yourself and the organization that you work with.
- [01:39]
C
My name is Raven Twilling, and I work with Bay Area Community Resources in partnership with the Marin County Tobacco Prevention Program, and I'm a program coordinator here in Marin County.
- [01:50]
B
Tell me a little bit about how you got interested in nicotine prevention. Did this start in high school and how old are you now?
- [01:58]
C
I am 25, almost 26 now. So I've been in this role for about three years. I certainly observed tobacco and nicotine use throughout high school. I think when I was in high school, it felt sort of like the start of vaping. That was when vaping was really taking off and juul had become really popular, and we were seeing other types of vapes enter the market, specifically flavored vapes entering the market. And then in my undergraduate education, I studied public health and human biology, and I have personal ties to addiction. There's a history of addiction in my family kind of on. On both sides of my family. And so once I graduated, I knew that that was something I was particularly interested in contributing to in terms of addiction prevention and quit support. And so that's when I started working with Bay Area Community resources, which I'll. I Also call BACR because it's kind of a long term.
- [03:01]
B
Wonderful. Tell me the work that you are doing now.
- [03:03]
C
My job sort of includes three different components. The is prevention education. So I work with parents, educators, caregivers, healthcare practitioners across Marin to provide prevention education around tobacco and nicotine use and make sure that folks in our community have the information they need to make informed decisions about their use. The second part of my job is quit support. So I promote Kick It California, which is the primary quit support available to people in California. Anyone over the age of 13 can access one on one quit support for free. And I promote that in the community. So tabling events, going to high schools and making sure that students know that's available, wellness centers, just trying to promote that as widely as possible. And then the third component of my job is policy advocacy. So I work with a group of high school interns from across Marin county and we lead policy advocacy initiatives in local jurisdictions to advocate for for health promoting policies, specifically around the tobacco retail environment.
- [04:07]
B
And that's particularly why I wanted to have you on the podcast today to talk about some of the wins that you guys have seen happen. Can you speak to that?
- [04:17]
C
Absolutely. We've had a couple of really exciting wins in the recent months. The first was in a very small town called Ross in Marin. Ross became the first community in the United States to adopt a policy that completely ends the sale of all commercial tobacco and nicotine products without any exemptions. So that means that no business can or will ever be able to sell nicotine containing products in Ross other than FDA approved quit support products. So that includes things like nicotine gum or patches. Those can still be sold.
- [04:53]
B
What was the argument that the proponents of this new lawn Ross made? Because we want to inspire other people who are listening to think about their communities. Because it's pretty big deal to not allow any nicotine products.
- [05:09]
C
One of the key arguments has to do with the framework with which we look at this issue. And it's about stepping back and actually questioning this assumed norm that we have in our world, right? That's like we just sell these products and they've always been sold and people have a right to smoke. And it's not the government's job to regulate or control any of that. And I think when you step back and you actually look at the history of the tobacco industry and the impact that it's had on public health, you start to realize this industry is profiting off of addiction. And so I think the first main argument is do we want to live In a community where we're okay with that, where we are okay with a business coming in that's going to profit off of addiction and profit off of causing drastic public health inequities and public health costs, that argument definitely landed pretty well, I think, with policymakers and community members, particularly in Ross, where I think a lot of people are pretty health conscientious. A few other arguments that were used included the environmental argument. So we know that cigarettes are the most littered form of waste on earth. And in Ross, there is a ton of land that is, you know, public outdoor space. There's green space and mountainous spaces, hiking trails, water reservoirs, things like that. And so I think it was important to educate people about the environmental impacts of tobacco and nicotine use as well and fire danger, because cigarettes are one of the leading causes of fire.
- [06:49]
B
Right. And given this is California, that's a really hot topic.
- [06:52]
C
Yes.
- [06:52]
B
No pun intended. When you say the most littered, I would imagine you mean that it's the most common item to be a source of litter in a community.
- [07:03]
C
Yes.
- [07:04]
B
Okay. And then any others that were offered?
- [07:08]
C
Yes, I should have led with this one. But, you know, arguably the most important one is that nicotine addiction is affecting young people in Marin county and really across the US In a way that I don't think we've seen before. It has become so normalized in schools, and it's been identified as one of the primary concerns that many high schools have around student well being is that they're seeing outrageous numbers of students becoming addicted to these products, and they really don't know how to help or what to do. We hear a lot of anecdotes from students in Marin and elsewhere about bathrooms that have been really kind of overtaken by students who are vaping or using other nicotine products. And schools have implemented pretty strict monitoring systems. It's just. It seems like it's really gotten out of hand. And this is not unintentional. The tobacco industry has knowingly targeted young people for decades, and they're continuing to do so because they need to hook a new generation on their products, because smoking rates, as we've seen, have been decreasing over time. And smoking kills up to half of its users when used as intended. And so there are consumers who are dying, and the industry needs replacement smokers. And that is young people. The earlier they can get them hooked, the easier it is to get them addicted and the longer they'll use. And so we feel that in Marin, and that was a really important perspective to bring to the council
- [08:39]
B
how did this become law then? What was the input from young people? Did it start with a referendum? How did it begin?
- [08:47]
C
Yeah, it's a good question. So, as of now, two different jurisdictions in Marin have passed laws of this nature that end the sale of commercial tobacco and nicotine. And that's Ross. And then Tiburon. In those two communities, they did not have any tobacco retailers at the time that these laws were passed. And so the impact on local businesses was minimal, if at all. And in many ways, those policies have been symbolic and meant to inspire other neighboring communities to reconsider their regulations around the sale of tobacco and nicotine. I should mention as well that two other communities in California that did have tobacco retailers at the time of these policies being adopted include Beverly Hills and Manhattan Beach. So they did have a number of retailers when they adopted laws to end the sale of commercial tobacco.
- [09:39]
B
Okay, so you two were the first. But now those two have also passed.
- [09:43]
C
So it began with Beverly Hills and then Manhattan beach, but in both of those jurisdictions, they had exemptions, exceptions that they made for. I think in Beverly Hills, it was. There was a cigar lounge that was allowed to stay in business. And in Manhattan beach, they had a rule that after two years, any local business could. Could petition sort of to sell, to continue selling if their profit had been dramatically impacted. And no businesses did petition. It's just. It's not as quite as comprehensive. There were exceptions, but the point was,
- [10:19]
B
in a little town, very wealthy, I should add. Yes, Ross. There was not a gas station that was selling a tobacco product. There was no gas station then.
- [10:28]
C
No.
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B
Okay, so that's how small the area is.
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C
But it's so small. Yes. Okay, Baby steps.
- [10:33]
B
But it's a huge. The concept is very innovative, and people in the public health world have been talking about this for a long time, because with alcohol, there are many people who can drink alcohol and don't develop an addiction. And yet for nicotine, there's very few cases of people who don't end up wanting more and more. There's very few casual nicotine users. And the risk of particularly young people enjoying that dopamine hit and then building up tolerance and wanting. Needing more and more is so significant that it's a very reasonable argument to make that really, why do we condone the ongoing sale of nicotine products?
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C
Absolutely. And we know that the vast majority of current smokers want to quit. A lot of people who are using don't want to be using. And they actually cite the retail environment as one of the key factors in Determining whether they continue to use or not. Which makes sense, right? If you enter a store and you're inundated with advertisements and discounts and it's right in your face, and it's right one block down the road, it's much easier to continue to use. Whereas if you have to go out of your way, if it's more expensive, if there aren't advertisements, people tend to be less likely to purchase.
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B
Yeah, but realistically, anyone can order it through mail too. But still, you're not having the visual stimuli if you go in to pay for your gas.
- [12:07]
C
Absolutely. It started with a group of students from the Branson High School, which is. There's only one high school in Ross. It's a private school. And there were a few students there that sort of had this idea of preserving the Ross community as is, which is a message you'll see through. So much of the work that's done in Ross is about preserving the community and maintaining these historic buildings or preserving the land and the nature that people have access to. And so there was a group of students interested in using that same sort of philosophy and applying it to tobacco and nicotine, the sale of tobacco, nicotine. And so it was a youth led initiative. The Youth Advocacy Committee is the group of students from across Marin that I work with. And some of those Branson students were involved in the Youth Advocacy Committee. And so we all worked together in partnership with the Public Health Law center, which is an organization that provides technical assistance and legal support for issues like this. So they're able to draft full ordinances that we can just hand off to a city attorney so that the community doesn't have to draft legal language on their own.
- [13:18]
B
Is that available to anyone anywhere in
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C
the US That's a really good question. I'm not sure. I know that it's available to all local lead agencies in California, groups in California that are focused on tobacco and nicotine prevention. But I don't know if it's available to everyone.
- [13:34]
B
Well, I'll put the link for that in the show notes. And people should reach out to them as a starting point. If they're in a different state. State, they would be a great resource because they care about these issues and would want to help another state as well.
- [13:45]
C
I'm sure they also have a ton of resources available online. So you can access model ordinances just through their website, educational materials, materials for policymakers. There's a lot of good content on their website.
- [13:58]
B
So then once they had the language for the ordinance, then did they get the community to sign, or what was the next step.
- [14:05]
C
So there were a few things happening simultaneously. One was that the students were conducting public opinion polls, so they were going out into the community and surveying residents to see if this was something residents would even support or be open to. They were also meeting with the different city council members to educate them about what this initiative is, what their goal is, why they think this is important, and getting feedback from council members on do they need to change their approach, or are there certain organizations they need to meet with before this will move forward? And then eventually, there was a council member, Terry Dowling, who wanted to champion this policy. So she was really excited about it. She's an environmental researcher at UCSF and cares deeply about the impacts of tobacco and nicotine on her local community and on teens across Marin. And so she championed this and brought it forward to the council, along with the mayor of. Of Ross and the youth, then gave a presentation to the whole city council where they outlined, you know, the various arguments I've mentioned and exactly what their ask was, and provided the model ordinance from the public health law center.
- [15:19]
B
And then at that point, how does it get turned into law?
- [15:22]
C
Typically, the process, it looks similar in most jurisdictions, but it can vary from place to place. So as I described this, just keep that in mind. But in Ross, what happens is a council member can put something on the agenda, such as reviewing a change to a section of their code, their regulations. So that was sort of what happened with this. We had a council member who decided to champion this, and they asked their staff, hey, we want to put this on the agenda to review some changes to our language around the sale of. Around regulating the sale of tobacco and nicotine products. So that's the first step in this community. They invited the students to come speak at what we call the first reading or the first vote of this ordinance. So the students came, they gave a presentation, the council members heard their arguments, and then they reviewed the language of this ordinance, and they voted whether they want to support it or not support it. And I believe in Ross, it was a unanimous vote. Everyone was in support. And so that's very exciting and really good news.
- [16:32]
B
And the community is invited to attend these. Is that right? And I think that's an important point because we should all bring our children now and then to a city council meeting.
- [16:42]
C
I cannot encourage it enough. It has been so inspiring for the students that I work with to come to these meetings and see what it's like and to be engaged in it. I think it's just like so I certainly never went when I was in high school, but it's so empowering to see people engaging in local democracy and engaging in local government, shaping, you know, the community that they want to live in. And yeah, yeah, I encourage it.
- [17:08]
D
Before we dive back in, I wanted to let you know about our four Screenagers documentaries, which focus on helping kids and teens navigate the challenges of this digital age. We created these films to be screened in schools and at community events. Over 20,000 hosts have shown them thus far. Along with the movies, we provide discussion guides, promotional materials, and other tools so that you can easily organize a truly impactful event for your community. And if your school wants to use the movies in the classroom, we have options for that too, along with a full curriculum of lesson plans designed for various grade levels. To learn more about the movies or inquire about becoming a host, visit screenagersmovie.com there's a link in the show notes. Now back to the show.
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B
And then so once the ordinance passed, is that by definition a law? It doesn't have to go to the state legislation.
- [18:04]
C
It does not. So in California, it varies from state to state. In California, local jurisdictions have the authority to regulate the sale of tobacco products in a more stringent way than the state does. So, for example, the state can say, you cannot sell any flavored tobacco products, but a local jurisdiction can say you can't sell flavored tobacco products and you also can't sell vapes, so you're allowed to have more stronger protections in local jurisdictions. So after it passes the second reading, it becomes law. And typically they put laws into effect maybe 30 days, you know, from, from the point at which they it goes into law, it'll actually go into effect 30 days down the line or a year down the line.
- [18:52]
D
Wonderful.
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B
Now, if you could tell me the second big win you guys had.
- [18:56]
C
Yes, the more recent win is with the Marin County Board of Supervisors. And so the Board of Supervisors is sort of like the city council for Marin Unincorporated. So if you were to look at a map of Marin county, there's all the different jurisdictions, and then there's kind of like gray space in between the jurisdictions and in some of the more rural communities that for some reason don't fit into a specific jurisdiction. So Marin County Unincorporated is all across Marin, and it's governed by the Marin County Board of Supervisors in Marin. Something we've seen in the past is that the Marin County Board of Supervisors often leads with countywide initiatives. For example, there was an E bike ordinance adopted I Think the middle of 2025, it was an E bike public health related policy. And it started with the board of supervisors. And then all the other local jurisdictions followed suit and adopted the same language. So that's something that we see happen in Marin quite often. And we're seeing that with this tobacco and nicotine policy as well. So the ordinance that was adopted by the board of supervisors is a policy that ends the sale of vapes and heated nicotine products. It increases the minimum price of tobacco products. So essentially making these products more expensive. It ends the use of coupons and discounts which are provided by the tobacco industry. It's actually one of their largest categories in their marketing budget is to discount their own products. So no more discounts or coupons. Buy one, get one free, nothing like that. And then minimum pack sizing. So there are certain nicotine products that are sold at a very low price point in a pack of one or two. They're nicknamed kitty packs because they're often the product that young people start with because it's cheap and there's only one or two. It's not the same as buying a whole pack of cigarettes or a pack of loose leaf tobacco. It's a very small quantity. And so the minimum pack size says that you cannot sell, you know, just one or two of these products. You have to sell them in a pack of eight or 10 or something like that.
- [21:13]
B
So you're saying that you can't have heated nicotine so you can't have vapes?
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C
No, vape cigarettes can still be sold at a higher price point.
- [21:24]
B
Got it.
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C
Yes.
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B
And the idea is that vapes are too seductive to young people for all sorts of reasons. We go into in the film screen ages under the influence and I've written a lot about that. And therefore it's really. That's a lot about onboarding young people. We thought it was going to be a wonderful tool to help people get off. There's some data, but it's not one and done. Many people, my patients included teens and adults. If they're using cigarettes, they so often say no, I tried the vape, I didn't like it or I don't want it and they want my help trying to stop using nicotine, but they don't on their own. Very few of them. No one, in fact one patient that I can ever remember said I went to a vape in purpose to stop and that helped me to stop. I have yet to hear that as a story.
- [22:13]
C
Yeah, I mean, I think there's two really important Things you just said. One is that vapes are not an effective tool to quit nicotine. And we actually see with youth that students who vape are more likely to end up using cigarettes, zyn other tobacco and nicotine products. The other thing I think that you've kind of shared is that these are not effective cessation tools. And if they were, then these companies would go through the process that it that is required to demonstrate through clinical research that their products can be used to help people quit nicotine. And then those vapes would be considered FDA approved for cessation and they could be sold just like nicotine pouches or nicotine gum. But that hasn't been done because that's not what the research indicates. So they really are not effective tools to decrease nicotine consumption.
- [23:06]
B
And so while they were saying that at the get go, when you, when you talk about the founders of Juul and whatnot, basically the big thing was they had a major financial incentive to just get these out to people. And they knew that getting FDA approval would take a lot of time.
- [23:21]
C
And in fact, we see that in a single vape there's often the equivalent of over 500 cigarettes in one vape. The vapes that teens are using right now have dramatically more nicotine in them than cigarettes do.
- [23:35]
B
Yeah. And to not have a clear stopping point, like at least a sense of, okay, I had a cigarette, okay, I'm on another one. But just a really, this ongoing source that some teens tell me they use in the middle of the night because they get jittery, use it in the classroom, like you mentioned, bathroom, exhale the smoke into their closet to hide it from parents, much less of the odor in general. All of these things make it really hard for young people who do get kind of a buzz at first, but then the withdrawal that they're not even experiencing, that withdrawal is just an anxiousness that you can't even really pinpoint, but we know is related to this ongoing use by many young people.
- [24:19]
C
Yeah. And it's all intentional, you know, like the design of these products. It's not by accident that they have more nicotine, that they come in candied flavors, that they don't smell, that they're easy to hide, that they look like a flash drive. It's all like, all of that is intentional from the industry.
- [24:37]
B
And can you catch us up now? What's happening in California in terms of flavored tobacco products, nicotine products?
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C
California has already passed a law that prohibits the sale of flavored tobacco and nicotine products, which is was a really big win. The industry responded to that law by designing new products that weren't technically flavored products. So things like ice flavored or breeze flavored products, but of course, they wouldn't say flavored. It would just be breeze flavor, Zinn or something like that. And so what we did see that just recently happened on the state level in California was redefining what a flavored product is to include these. A broader definition to include these newer products that the industry launched in an effort to avoid the statewide legislation.
- [25:35]
B
And Raven, do you ever go in, not just in these communities in Marin, but in San Francisco and other places where they're not supposed to now have flavored products and see if that's actually the case? A big issue has been enforcement.
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C
I'm curious what you see in my role, we do not do any enforcement, but we do store surveys. And so we want, you know, we want to have a sense of what is being sold and how much do these products cost and what does the retail environment look like, et cetera, et cetera. And I can speak from my own personal experience and from the experiences of my friends who I know who. Who use nicotine, and also the students I work with who have friends that use nicotine. It is still widely available. Flavored products are still widely available. And that's a really big issue that certainly needs more attention.
- [26:27]
B
Even in Marin, where this.
- [26:29]
C
Yeah, yeah, even in Marin.
- [26:30]
B
It's smaller communities, big cities. I understand you just have so many little stores and gas stations. And it's not the people that work behind the cash register. They're not the ones responsible for what is being sold. Final thing I want to talk about here is young people. What would you encourage them to do if they're interested in getting involved?
- [26:53]
C
I would say learning about local organizations that are doing this work, because it's already being done across the US and so it's only a matter of identifying who is doing this work in your community, whether that's TUPI groups at high schools, the tobacco use prevention education groups at your local high school, or your county public health department or another public health organization. This work is being done. And so just knowing who's doing it so that you can get involved with them is a really positive step. I also think educating yourself about the industry is really important. A multibillion dollar industry is selling, and they're targeting young people. It's not the fault of consumers for becoming addicted to something that is highly addictive. They're being targeted with advertisements and marketing and. And discounts to use these products and it's like any other addiction. Like people need support. You know, they don't need judgment, they need support. Yeah.
- [27:58]
B
Wonderful. Thank you so much, Raven. It's been fantastic to have you with us today.
- [28:03]
C
Thank you so much for having me.
- [28:08]
E
What a gift that you tuned into the show today. The screenagers podcast and movement is all about learning together how we can best help our youth of all ages, our communities and ourselves best navigate our rapidly changing digital world. Make sure to follow subscribe to the podcast to get each episode automatically and the more subscribers, the easier it is for others to find us. And if you give it a like and write a review, even just one sentence, that helps even more. Check out screenagersmovie.com to get resources for each episode and loads of other resources. Learn about our 4 Screenagers films and find my weekly parenting blog Tech Talk Tuesdays. And be sure to use the search bar to find many topics you might be wondering about among hundreds of my past blogs. Finally, I love hearing from you, so email me@delaneygreenagersmovie.com what ideas do you want
- [29:04]
B
to hear for future episodes?
- [29:07]
E
Today's show was produced by the following people Me, your host Delaney Rustin, Lisa Tabb and sound editing was done by Alan Gofins.
- [29:16]
C
Skill.