There’s a Facebook campaign urging Gov. Gary Herbert to veto House Bill 363, the state’s latest attempt to get Utah children to quit having sex by not telling them anything about sex except not to do it.
Don’t do what? Can’t say.
The Facebook campaign is nice, but Herbert says he doesn’t pay attention to social media petitions, and I tend to agree. It’s way too easy to hit “like” and move on.
Want to have impact? Telephone, or mail, your comment. Politicians know people are miffed when they take the time to find pen and paper and invest 44 cents in a stamp. Phone calls are great, too. They keep the governor’s receptionist busy, and the governor listens to his receptionist.
Herbert should veto the bill, which says kids should only learn about sex from Mom and Dad. It’s scary how often Mom and Dad either don’t know or never tell their kids.
My younger son, Ben, has a very good take on this.
Ben supervises Boys & Girls Clubs in Midvale and West Jordan, dealing with 500 kids a day. Kids who’ve learned about sex poorly, or not at all, are a constant problem.
Ben posted his thoughts on Facebook. Because the governor does read the paper, I thought I’d help Ben get his excellent message heard:
“Governor, I’ve been working with at-risk youth for eight years now, many of whom live in areas with the highest teen pregnancy rates in the state. These are youth who come from families that do not have adequate knowledge of what they should be teaching their kids.
“If a woman is impregnated when she is 15, the odds are dramatically increased for her own children to become pregnant before they reach adulthood. Schools are one of the only options for our youth to receive accurate knowledge with regards to sex education.
“There is currently a system in place where parents are able to choose to opt out of their children attending sex education classes. I fear that HB363 will only deprive the youth who need this information the most of an opportunity to make informed decisions for their own bodies.
“HB363 will be negligent and irresponsible and will do nothing but put our youth at greater risk.”
In case your father doesn’t work for a newspaper, the governor’s mailing address is:
Gov. Gary Herbert
350 State Capitol Building, Suite E220
Salt Lake City, UT 84114
You can also e-mail constituentservices@utah.gov or call 801-538-1000.
• Top of Utah is losing two of the sort of people I wish we had more of. Weber State University President F. Ann Millner and Ogden Assistant Police Chief Marcy Korgenski announced last week they are retiring.
I cannot stress how much I admire these great leaders.
Millner led WSU through a tumultuous decade of severe budget constraints and massive student growth. She has built business, educational and economic ties between WSU and Top of Utah. She kept WSU at least adequately funded in a time when the Legislature was slashing budgets everywhere.
Korgenski’s an amazing officer who cares so much about her community that she let me browbeat her into giving a talk on gangs for the first Weber Reads series on “Beowulf.”
I was rooting for her to make chief, but she wants to help local agencies help people in her community.
Such as? Friday night, I saw her waiting tables at the Youth Impact fundraising gala.
Thank you, Millner and Korgenski, for long and wonderful service.
The Wasatch Rambler is the opinion of Charles Trentelman. He can be reached at 801-625-4232 or ctrentelman@standard.net. He also blogs at www.standard.net.
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