According to a national survey conducted by the Center for Disease Control’s Office of Smoking and Health conducted in Nov. 2013, 34 percent of high school students nation wide use tobacco products.

In most states, the legal age for purchasing tobacco products is 18, but this CDC survey finds that many of these laws are ineffective–58 percent of high school students reported they were not asked for an ID when buying tobacco.

To combat underage tobacco purchases, the Barnstable County Department of Health and Environment administers a grant to conduct compliance checks to all places that sell tobacco. The compliance checks, administered by the Cape Cod Regional Tobacco Control Program, to make sure stores are in ordinance with state regulations to ask for proper identification.

The organization, which has sponsored compliance checks since 1997,  employs underage buyers to check to make sure convenience stores are following the laws.

That’s where a Barnstable High School 17-year-old junior girl steps in. It’s her job to walk into convenience stores across Cape Cod and ask for a carton of cigarettes, even though she’s underage. Insight is not publishing her name at the request of the CCRTCP to ensure the success of future compliance checks.

“It’s not illegal for us to ask [for cigarettes], but it is illegal for them to sell to us,” she said.

She got the job from a family friend whom she was babysitting for, and took a training course in Barnstable that had her practice asking for cigarettes. The training  also explained the regulations she had to follow when doing compliance checks.

She has to go to each store with an adult who drives her there, and park down the street. If any place makes her feel uncomfortable, she said she can leave and move on to the next store.

“I can’t ask in my own town. If we see someone we know or a police officer, we have to walk out. I can’t lie about my age, and if they ask for my ID I tell them I left it in the car,” she said.

One of the first times she ever went into a store to do a compliance check, the cashier yelled at her and told her to get out, even going as far as to follow her outside the store.

“It was a little creepy,” she said, “but it’s not that bad.” She said that the first couple times she was apprehensive, but after the next few stores, asking for cigarettes became “a routine, and got much easier.”

Regardless if the cashier sells to her, the 17-year-old must fill out a form describing the encounter. If she is sold to, she has to fill out another form describing the cashier, along with the address, price, date and time of the event.

If a store is caught selling to a minor, they are then contacted by the Board of Health for a hearing that can lead to a suspension of the retailer’s tobacco license, and fines of up to several hundred dollars, says Robert Collett,  director of the CCRTCP.

According to the student, it’s uncommon for stores to sell cigarettes to her without an ID.

“We check stores three times a year. I’ve only gotten five packs from maybe 100 stores,” she said.

Collett said these numbers are exactly what the CCRTCP and the local Board of Health want to see.

“We’ve had very good compliance among local retailers,” Collett said.

Retailers know that they will be checked not only by the local program, but also by the FDA. Many convenience store chains also do in house compliance checks, Collett said.

Compliance checks are only one of the steps that the CCRTCP have taken to keep tobacco out of minors’ hands.   The organization  was key in helping to place a ban on cigarette self-service displays, and increasing taxes on tobacco products.

But, Collett still feels compliance checks are extremely beneficial. He said that on the Cape and Islands the smoking rate in teens has dropped from 35 percent to 14 percent.

“Compliance checks are an effective way of controlling access to tobacco products,” Collett   said. “It is not a full solution to underage smoking, but it forces the adult parties involved to practice responsible behavior.”