Program helps men explore reasons for cruising

"Just because you have an attraction to men doesn't mean you have to be a slave to those attractions," he says. "As a therapist I try to encourage people to be honest with themselves."

Buie says the program made in-roads toward curbing public sex in its early years, but more recently the vice squad focus has shifted away from targeting cruising.

That means Buie has seen fewer men through Healthy Self-Expressions. At one point, he says, he'd work with two groups of 12 people each week. Now it's declined to smaller groups, every other month.

A recent television report said police have made 70 arrests so far this year but that cruising is much more endemic than those numbers suggest.

Capt. Kyle Jones of the Salt Lake Police Department is a member of the LGBTQ Liaison Committee, which continues to address the issue. Jones says the problem seems to be relatively consistent.

"There are a lot of men who are involved in this conduct," he says. "I don't think the problem is huge to the extent that you can't go to the public park bathroom."

In addition to participating in public sex, many of the men don't use condoms, making it a public health risk, as well.

Jones says there's not much that can be done by police to prevent public sex, short of education and being clear that those who have sex in public will be arrested. But he says Healthy Self-Expressions has seemed to curb repeat offenses.

During the years that he worked directly with the issue, Jones says, roughly 350 men entered the program, and fewer than 5 percent offended again.

"The people we're arresting in restrooms are not criminals, they're not pedophiles," he says. "They're generally the guy next door. They're decent people who are struggling with a problem that is very complex to deal with."

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E-mail: dbulkeley@desnews.com