Goals

Problem statement:

Smoking in public buildings is a big problem in Georgia.

In places where it is illegal, security guards monitor the area, but people still hide and smoke in the elevators and empty rooms.

Elevators in particular are a small shared space: Children and pregnant women use these spaces everyday and are especially vulnerable to secondhand smoke. One person smoking in an elevator makes it a miserable gas chamber, as especially in Georgia, elevators do not have an air circulation system.

Proposed Solution:

I want to raise awareness of the issue and campaign against smoking in elevators.

I want smokers to wait a few seconds for the sake of common courtesy, and become more apologetic and emphatic to non-smokers' needs.

I started this campaign in my apartment, and posted a colored sticker reading "Thank You for Not Smoking Here" in the elevator. It began working. I did it to my mother's building, and it worked too.

I think, posting such kind of stickers (showing a pregnant woman or baby) in the lifts around the city ,will start working.

We will give out the stickers, and local residents can put them up. We will recruit volunteers to cover lots of houses this way. We will print 500 stickers and post them in the elevators. One person will be given one sticker, which means that 500 people will be involved in posting the stickers.

The stickers will be combine with a Facebook campaign, as each person will be expected to take a photo and post it on online to challenge others. The most active FB user will post updates whether the sticker worked and will challenge others. This campaign will become viral on FB and will likely provoke people to think of the issue and potentially change the habit of some smokers.

Sustainability:

It will help to raise self-consciousness among smokers and may inform the law-makers to include the elevator cars in the law on non-smoking. It will also help the health of those affected by second-hand smoke.

Equal gender opportunity:

Our volunteers will be many and women, and everyone will benefit.