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PLEASANT GROVE, Utah (AP) -- The Pleasant Grove City Council has rejected a resolution that would have endorsed efforts of volunteers to get grocery stores to hide the covers of magazines that the volunteers consider salacious.
"I have a problem with volunteers going out and mistakenly (thinking) they represent the city," Councilman Mark Atwood said before joining the 5-0 vote to reject the "Child-Appropriate Standard" resolution.
"It's a great thing if they go out on their own and ... encourage that. But there's no guarantee that they'll do that without saying, 'the city sent me,' " he said.
The resolution crafted by Kristen Shumway of the Bountiful-based Citizens for Families calls for the city to, among other things, promote the protection of children from sexually explicit materials, including magazines.
Typically, managers who won't cover the magazines risk losing business, which those who comply get a "family-friendly" sign to display.
Other than the resolution's volunteer provisions, the measure is similar to ones passed by 20 Utah cities since the group's founding in 2000, Shumway said.
The resolution "gives me a tool," Shumway said. "It helps me to be able to say, 'Let's cover these magazines because our city wants it.' "
Most Pleasant Grove stores already cover up magazines.
But Shumway is concerned about new businesses cropping up. She cited lingerie posters in Orem's University Mall.
"They had heroic sizes of 8-foot-or-larger posters of ladies wearing Victoria's Secret-type things," she said. "Kids don't really need to be exposed to those things, and the stores don't have to advertise that way. We want to say to our mall, 'This is our city ... We want to go shopping with our kids and not to have them exposed to things like this.' "
Atwood said, "You don't want to handcuff Victoria's Secret. Because my 17- or 21-year-old daughter likes to see that lingerie. It attracts her."
McDade and Councilwoman Cindy Boyd volunteered to help Shumway craft a more acceptable resolution. But Councilman Lee Jensen saw no need for it.
Jensen told Shumway, "You as a citizen can go into any store you want and voice your concern about anything objectionable. ... I'm not so sure I want you out there representing me and the community saying, 'This is objectionable,' when maybe I don't find that objectionable."
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
