From Deseret News archives:
Davis changes tanning rules
Parents must sign permission slip for minors once a year
On Tuesday, the Davis County Board of Health brought its ordinance into compliance with state law that will take effect July 1.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Pat Jones, D-Holladay, requires parents to sign a permission slip at a tanning salon in person once a year for their minor children to use tanning salons.
"I think this is not quite as good as what we had," said Davis County Health Department director Lewis Garrett. "It's still good enough."
Davis County's ordinance, enacted in September, required parents to accompany minors to tanning facilities for each session.
Fewer minors tanned in Davis County after that. Instead, they drove north to Weber County, which has no tanning regulations, or south to Salt Lake County, where regulations aren't as strict as those in Davis.
Martin Harder, owner of Harder's Hairport in Sunset, saw a steep drop in tanning clientele after the Davis ordinance was enacted. Many of his clients simply drove a few minutes north to Roy to use other facilities.
Jones' bill, in essence, leveled the playing field so that Davis tanning operators wouldn't lose their shirts over waning clientele.
"I feel real good about how it's all turned out," Harder said.
Originally, Jones' bill required parents across the state to attend all tanning sessions, but other legislators began to argue for parental consent via once-a-year permission slips.
Harder credits his representative, Rep. Paul Ray, R-Clinton, for helping to guide the bill to its eventual outcome. Ray said Wednesday that Jones had originally asked him to sponsor her bill in the House, but Ray said he was concerned that the bill didn't preempt Davis County's ordinance, which he had opposed.
When Jones began to run the bill, Ray said, he was one of the first to corner her to get it changed to the annual permission-slip requirement.
E-mail: jdougherty@desnews.com
