Are Reds and Far Niente, the financial district happy hour hotspots, playing fast and loose with Ontario’s smoking ban? The two restaurants, both operated by SIR Corp., do booming patio business in summer, in part because both patios boast an increasingly rare asset: generous smoking sections. Problem is the province’s strict anti-smoking bylaw, brought into effect last summer, forbids outdoor smoking where there’s an awning or overhang. Reds and Far Niente both have overhangs over part of their patios, but argue that, as most of the space isn’t covered, smoking should be allowed wherever there’s open air. Michael Steh, Reds’ chef, said recently that his restaurant is intentionally defying the ban in hopes of challenging it in court. But Misty Beazley, VP of the Signature Group of restaurants at SIR Corp., insists the company is doing no such thing. She added that they consulted with city inspectors, though she declined to name names. “We were proactive with the city about the smoking issue,” she maintains, “and are in full compliance.” All of which comes as news to Rob Colvin, who enforces the bylaw as manager of Healthy Environments for Toronto Public Health. Colvin says he’s told SIR Corp that Reds can’t allow smoking (fines for contravening the ban start at $365). He didn’t know about Far Niente’s outdoor smoking section, he said, but didn’t like the sound of it. Just a few steps away from the two SIR Corp. hangs, Joe Alberti, a managing partner in Vertical, says his customers don’t understand why they can’t smoke on Vertical’s patio when they can smoke at other similar patios around town: “It’s difficult to tell a customer that they have to put out their cigarette when they’re 20 feet beyond the edge of the roof with nothing but open air above them.” Expect a showdown any day now.