OSAGE BEACH – The Osage Beach Board of Alderman will consider whether to increase the legal age – from 18 to 21 – to purchase tobacco products in city limits, something at least 10 other cities or counties in Missouri have already done.
Near the end of the Thursday, April 6 board meeting, Alderman Jeff Bethurem raised the issue. He said he’s discussed changing the city ordinance with City Attorney Ed Rucker but he wanted to gauge support for the change from other board members. Aldermen unanimously agreed to ask Rucker to draft a new tobacco ordinance for the board to consider at a future meeting.
“It’s very easy to fix our ordinance, but I told (City Attorney Rucker) I didn’t want to waste his time doing it to bring it forward, unless it was the consensus of the board,” Bethurem said.
He said he hopes raising the age to legally purchase tobacco might keep some younger people from ever starting to use tobacco. Bethurem said he quit chewing tobacco last fall after using it for more than 30 years.
“I started when I was 17 and nobody really questioned me,” he said. “I wished I’d never started.”
Bethurem said raising the age to legally buy tobacco might postpone the decision whether to use cigarettes or chewing tobacco for young people “until they have a little more thought process.”
Also at Thursday’s meeting was Jean Horrall, a former school nurse at School of the Osage and Camdenton school districts. Bethurem said Horrall worked with Jefferson City, Columbia, Springfield and Branson to change those cities’ laws regarding tobacco sales.
Horrall was a middle school nurse, the age when many young people experiment with tobacco.
“I was very concerned with the 7th and 8th graders who were smoking, and when I asked those kids where they were getting their cigarettes they told me, for the most part, they were getting them from the older high school kids – 18-year-old kids who can legally buy them,” Horrall said.
She said those communities that have raised the age to purchase tobacco have seen a decline in younger kids getting cigarettes and starting to smoke. Horrall said she’s particularly concerned about “vaping” products, which deliver nicotine through an electronic cigarette that produces vapor the “smoker” inhales. She said many of the vaping products are flavored to appeal to children with flavors like bubble gum, watermelon or cotton candy.
“They’re really targeting the younger people, who are yet again getting them from the older kids,” she said. “Statistics show that 95 percent of adults who smoke started when they were very young. If we can do anything to reduce these younger children from getting those cigarettes, and if they can wait until they’re 21 to make those decisions, that would be so much healthier for them and healthier for our communities.”
