Amherst

Decision

Adopted unanimously

Date

December 4, 2025

Decided by

Board of Health

Birthdate cutoff

January 1, 2005

What the records show

• The Board was told not to engage with the public it heard from. The script for the October 30, 2025 hearing reads: “Board members only need to listen to the public testimony. No BOH member will comment or ask any questions.” And at the vote meeting, “no further written or oral testimony will be accepted.”
• The regulation was chosen from a state-issued menu. Amherst used the Commonwealth’s “FY 2025 Sample Regulation Restricting the Sale of Nicotine Products,” whose “Checklist for Policy Decisions” lists the birthdate provision as one option. The adopted text follows it.
• Preparation began three months before the hearing, at the Board’s August 7, 2025 meeting.
• The town held three other towns’ adopted regulations while drafting — Belchertown, Hopkinton and Pelham — substantially the same language.
• Amherst produced no email with outside advocates at all, though the request sought it. No other production here is silent that way.

Document Library

The complete public-records production, as released by the custodian.

Every document opens as a PDF. Files produced in other formats — Word, Excel, Outlook messages — were converted for readability, with the original one click away behind a grey tag (.DOCX). Nothing has been withheld, compressed or edited: the count above is every file the custodian released. A few archives and calendar files cannot be rendered as PDF and appear in their original format.