Pleasant Grove High School students who unsuccessfully lobbied the Utah Legislature on a bill requiring merchants to put tobacco products behind counters are now pushing the measure at the city level.
Members of the Pleasant Grove City Youth Council are crafting an ordinance they intend to present to the City Council March 21.They don't want teenagers to have easy access to cigarettes and chewing tobacco. The law, which parallels the failed state bill, would require tobacco to be placed or displayed in ways that only allows store employees to have access. Utah law already bans tobacco sales in vending machines.
"We're just concerned with the number of minors that are getting ahold of cigarettes," said student Natalie Chatterton.
The students figure fewer underage smokers will be able to buy cigarettes if they have to ask for them. Putting cans of chewing tobacco and packs of cigarettes behind the counter would also curtail shoplifting, students said.
"The people that I know steal it, they don't buy it," Chatterton said.
Pleasant Grove students aren't alone in wanting to make tobacco harder for teenagers to get. Hundreds of high school students, including nine busloads from Pleasant Grove, rallied at the Capitol in January to support Rep. Jordan Tanner's bill which would have restricted minors' ability to get cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco, chewing tobacco and snuff.
During that demonstration, students said buying cigarettes is almost as easy as stealing them. Students trying to look their age for an informal survey found they could buy a pack 83 percent of the time without being asked for identification.
Pleasant Grove students plan to use information like that and facts about cigarette use to make their case before the City Council.
According to data students collected, 90 percent of all smokers start by age 18 and 60 percent start by age 14. Nearly all first-time use of tobacco occurs before high school graduation.
A surgeon general's report shows the availability of cigarettes is a perceived signal that smoking is the norm.
Students believe if Pleasant Grove City approves their proposed ordinance, other cities will follow.
A movement in northern California called Stop Tobacco Access to Minors Project (STAMP) resulted in five counties and 24 cities prohibiting self-service tobacco sales.