The high costs of secondhand smoke exposure can be measured both by negative health outcomes and economic impact, as quantified in an article by Mason et al., "The Economic Burden of Exposure to Secondhand Smoke for Child and Adult Never Smokers Residing in U.S. Public Housing," in the May/June 2015 issue of Public Health Reports. In that article, the authors concluded that implementing smoke-free policies in all U.S. public housing would save both lives and money. 1 The New York City (NYC) Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) agrees that smoke-free housing is important to protect health and has long supported smoke-free housing for all, including those in public housing. Since 2009, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has repeatedly encouraged public housing authorities (PHAs) to voluntarily adopt smoke-free housing regulations for their buildings, including publishing a smoke-free housing toolkit to help both PHAs and owners/agents of subsidized or market-rate multiunit housing become smoke-free. 2-5 As of July 1, 2015, more than 250 PHAs had enacted smoke-free building policies. 6 Moreover, on November 12, 2015, HUD officially proposed rules that would require all PHAs to establish a smoke-free housing policy that prohibits lit tobacco products in all indoor areas of public housing. 7 It is worth noting that as of October 2015, no organization that had implemented smoke-free housing had faced a legal challenge. The absence of a legal challenge is no surprise, as the law does not confer smokers, as a group, with special legal rights or privileges. 8-10 Furthermore, nicotine dependence is not a disability recognized by law. 11 Consequently, to survive a legal challenge, a smoke-free policy must pass a relatively easy test; it must be rationally related to a legitimate government interest (e.g., protecting the health of its residents).