When Massachusetts voters approved a 25-cent tax on cigarettes to fund anti-smoking programs 20 years ago, the state became a leader in efforts to reduce tobacco use among all its residents, especially youth.

And in 1998, when the historic $246 billion settlement with tobacco companies started pouring money into states’ coffers, Massachusetts once again lighted the way by using a hefty portion of the settlement funds to keep teens and low-income residents – the most vulnerable consumers of tobacco marketing – off their butts.

A tight economy and distaste for taxes, though, has spurred the state’s elected officials to raid the tobacco money to the point Massachusetts now ranks 36th in using tobacco-related revenue on anti-smoking programs, according to a new report due out today.

In the last five years, Massachusetts spending on tobacco-prevention has fallen by more than two-thirds, from $12.8 million to just $4.2 million this fiscal year. Meanwhile, revenues from tobacco continue to climb, with the state getting an estimated $821 million this fiscal year including $562 million from excise taxes and $259 million from the tobacco settlement fund, which will continue to come in for the next 11 years.

Conversely, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated more than 9,000 deaths in the state are caused by tobacco use every year, and the state spends $3.54 billion in tobacco-related health costs, putting the Bay State 8th on that spending chart.

Based on excise taxes, settlement money, population, and tobacco use, the CDC makes recommendations for minimum expenditures on anti-smoking programs, including marketing and enforcement. For Massachusetts, that target is $90 million. The state’s $4.2 million budget puts us at less than 5 percent of the recommendation, and ranks us behind even tobacco-producing states such as Virginia and South Carolina.

Massachusetts is one of 22 states that spend less than 10 percent of tobacco-related revenues on smoking prevention and only Alaska budgets up to the full amount, spending 102 percent of the CDC recommended minimum. If it makes you breathe any better, New Hampshire, which lures Bay State smokers with its no-tax packs, spends nothing on anti-smoking programs.

It’s a long way from the days of the state’s anti-smoking bulldog Dr. Gregory Connolly, a dentist who headed up the pioneering Massachusetts Tobacco Control Program, and Ed Sweda, the lawyer-lobbyist for GASP (Group Against Smoking Pollution), who would roam the State House hallways in a Grim Reaper costume while legislators, officials, court officers, other lobbyists – even reporters – would light up wherever they wanted inside the building.

But as the report being issued today shows, anti-smoking programs are effective, especially to counter marketing by tobacco companies that many say are designed to lure young smokers back into the pack and grab hold of lifelong customers, for however short that life is. Despite a ban on radio and television advertising, tobacco companies spent $123.7 million on marketing last year in Massachusetts, nearly 30 times what the state spent to prevent tobacco use.

The numbers show spending on smoking prevention is a wise investment for the state. When it was a leader in spending – a high of $58 million in the mid-1990’s, more than 136 percent of the CDC recommendation at the time – Massachusetts led the nation in the number of adults who quit and teens who stopped or didn’t start. The state also had one of the lowest rates of adult smokers in the country.

Since the budget began declining in 2003, the rate of teen smoking has increased, the number of illegal sales to minors has skyrocketed, and the per capita consumption has increased in Massachusetts while it has declined nationwide.

The bottom line is the bottom line matters and any gains in getting people to quit using tobacco can go up in smoke if the effort isn’t maintained.

–JACK SULLIVAN

BEACON HILL

State GOP chairman Robert Maginn, a close Mitt Romney ally, won’t seek reelection next month.

Bill Weld tells the Herald that Tim Cahill shouldn’t have been prosecuted on criminal ethics charges. The former US attorney is also no fan of Carmen Ortiz’s Probation Department investigation, which he labels “not good for business.” Politics, Weld explains “requires a certain amount of Mazola oil. That’s what troubles me about these criminal cases. It’s like they’re criminalizing the Mazola oil.” Weld is leaving the door open to a possible run for Senate.

The city of Gloucester and Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr are pushing for state funds to repair the seawall in that city and others, the Gloucester Times reports.

MUNICIPAL MATTERS

Bridgewater officials signed a renegotiated contract with firefighters after determining changes in the original contract would cause a shortfall of between $400,000 to $600,000. The new contract will still leave a budget gap of at least $150,000 for the cash-strapped town.

Bicycle-sharing service Hubway is expanding southward from downtown Boston, into Dorchester and Roxbury, but the timing of Hubway’s expansion into Mattapan conflicts with what City Councilor Charles Yancey thinks it should be, so Yancey is holding up $1.3 million in Hubway funds.

NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON

In the Weekly Standard, William Kristol is the latest conservative to urge Republicans to abandon Grover Norquist and his no-tax pledge to avert going over the fiscal cliff and inflicting permanent damage to the party. The White House is now insisting that a debt limit vote come independent of fiscal cliff negotiations, which are going un-swell enough that Rep. Eric Cantor is telling House lawmakers they may not get the week-and-a-half pre-holiday vacation they were counting on. Instead, Cantor says, the House is in business until a deal gets done. Cantor’s boss, House Speaker John Boehner, is consolidating his hold over the House. Karl Rove floats some internal House GOP leadership poll numbers that can be spun in the favor of the House GOP leadership.

In a new twist, the Oklahoma attorney general has filed suit against the federal government challenging the IRS’s authority to impose fees on employers and individuals who do not buy health insurance under the Affordable Care Act mandate.

Republican Sen. Tom Coburn has issued his annual report on wasteful government spending, including $1,000 spent by the Department of Homeland Security for a demonstration on how to fight off the zombie apocalypse. Hello? Hasn’t he ever seen “The Walking Dead?”

Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is being circled by federal anti-corruption investigators.

The Justice Department warns Washington state, where it is now legal to smoke marijuana, that the drug is still illegal under federal law.

ELECTION 2012

Elizabeth Warren raised more money than any congressional candidate in the country, but ended her successful Senate campaign with $400,000 in debt, prompting a fundraising appeal this week that cited unanticipated costs for pizza and coffee due to the outpouring of volunteers eager to support her cause.  In other words, her problem is that her campaign became too popular.

BUSINESS/ECONOMY

Fiscal cliff worries have eroded business confidence in Massachusetts. Meanwhile, a new report predicts continued sluggish growth in Massachusetts and New England, WBUR reports.

A film financier outlines plans to build a movie production studio at the old Westboro State Hospital, the Telegram & Gazette reports. It would be the state’s second studio. A facility is currently under construction in Devens.

A Worcester City Council committee questions whether a company deserves a 10-year property tax break in return for creating 10 jobs, the Telegram & Gazette reports.

EDUCATION

The University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees has asked Beacon Hill for $840 million for its fiscal 2014 budget, an 8 percent increase. Meanwhile, UMass President Robert Caret warned that the system will effectively become privatized, with higher tuition and fees and fewer students, if its government funding continues to slide.

Beginning next fall, Bishop Stang High School in Dartmouth will require incoming freshman to purchase iPads, whose cost school officials say will be offset by reductions in textbook purchases.

The head of the Boston Archdiocese schools and a charter leader come together to find ways of working together but they remain far apart on charters buying or leasing empty church school buildings, CommonWealth reports.

HEALTH CARE

The Globe reports that researchers at Boston Children’s Hospital are working on a genetic screening test that shows promise in detecting autism, which would allow for very early treatment in young children.

TRANSPORTATION

The MBTA fires a driver who was involved in a Green Line crash. The driver allegedly was tired after working a second job, WBUR reports.

Boston police are stepping up patrols at MBTA stations in Dorchester after several women are robbed, NECN reports.

The mayors of Quincy, Braintree, and Weymouth joined forces to support the Patrick administration’s plan to significantly increase spending on infrastructure and public transit and find new revenues over the next three years.

ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT

A new government study supports the export of US natural gas, the New York Times reports. University activists, meanwhile, are fighting climate change by pressuring college endowments to divest stocks in oil, natural gas, and coal companies, WBUR reports.

The Berkshire Eagle heralds Gov. Deval Patrick’s trip to the Berkshires to mark the (near) completion of the Hoosac wind farm. Florida and Monroe, where the facility is situated,  will take in $7 million in revenues from the project.

A man is fined $2,100 after being caught with 21 undersized lobsters, the Gloucester Times reports.

Fall River city councilors drafted a set of harbor regulations that include changes in boat mooring distributions after some councilors complained about mooring distribution, waiting lists, and waterfront access for residents. CommonWealth looked at the haphazard enforcement of mooring access in its Summer 2011 issue.

The city of New Bedford today will install six new charging stations in a downtown parking lot for electric cars even though there are no electric vehicles registered in the Whaling City.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled that police do not need a search warrant to check recent calls made and received on the cellphone of someone they arrest.

The Commission on Judicial Conduct has dismissed a complaint brought by Suffolk DA Dan Conley against Boston Municipal Court Judge Raymond Dougan that accused the jurist of bias against police and prosecutors.

MEDIA

A news photographer defends himself after taking a shot of a man about to be hit by a New York City subway train, Poynter reports.  Globe columnist Joan Vennochi ponders the matter, drawing on some Boston photojournalism history.