In 2005, when Chancellor Steve Jones first tried to ban cigarette sales in the Wood Center, he announced his intentions in November. The fall announcement allowed the university community to weigh in. Students cried foul, with three-fourths of ASUAF election voters voicing their displeasure at the idea. University governance groups including the Faculty Senate and Staff Council passed resolutions against the proposal.

By the following January, Jones had abandoned his plan. "If I had it to do over again," Jones told the Sun Star at the time, "I would have done away with the tobacco quietly in the summer, but at this point it would be disingenuous of me to do so considering the response."

Now, for round two in the fight, Jones appears to be doing just that. Up until this week's Sun Star, there had been no public notice that cigarettes would disappear from the Wood Center after June 30. There were no e-mails or no widely-dispersed memos. No advertisements can be seen anywhere in the Wood Center or newspapers. The student government is curiously quiet on the issue, perhaps because it didn't know Jones had resurrected his plan.

Cigarettes are unhealthy, and UAF should not be in the business of selling them, in this writer's opinion. Jones is right in saying that it is hypocritical for UAF to promote smoking while at the same time spending millions on health and wellness for its students and employees.

But by choosing to ban cigarettes without any formal announcement and during the summer when most students are gone, Jones is doing the university community a disservice. In attempting to ban cigarette sales "quietly" during the summer, Jones in effect was robbing them of their chance to contest his will a second time.

The summer sneak is nothing new. Jones himself was hired during summer 2004, with his candidacy for chancellor only being announced a week before school got out. Last summer saw the quiet disappearance of the Saturday shuttle service, which allowed students to use UAF shuttles to go grocery shopping.

University administrators say this has nothing to do with keeping things quiet and everything to do with the fiscal year ending June 30. But if that's the case, why wasn't the community told? The Sun Star only found out about this through reporting an unrelated story. When was the announcement ever going to be made?

More notice is necessary when controversial changes are coming. At other universities, changes in services are not done with a whisper but are shouted to students via mass e-mail and press releases. ASUAF should be notified, but the administration needs to realize that student government meetings are not venues the average student attends (no students, for example, were guests at the ASUAF Senate's Jan. 28 meeting, according to the minutes).

Let's not snuff out debate with the smokes.