Utah Moms for Clean Air met Wednesday for the first time to plot a strategy to cut the pollution that is putting their children at risk and making them sick.

"We have to be grizzly bear mamas and say nothing is going to get between us and the health of our kids," Cherise Udell told her parent-packed audience.

Udell, a mother of two small children, said she began organizing the group after hearing about the Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, an advocacy group of local doctors who, like her, were alarmed by the pollution spikes northern Utah suffered through last winter. She was shocked to learn that living with northern Utah's pollution can cut two years off a resident's life, and decided to take action.

The idea has resonated. Hundreds of like-minded mothers have contacted her to offer support and to participate in the group's education and political activities. About 50 of them attended the inaugural meeting at a Salt Lake City library.

Earlier on Wednesday, the doctors also pressed forward with their agenda.

During an hour-long presentation on how air pollution causes illness and death, the doctors asked the state Air Quality Board for a formal hearing on overhauling Utah's air regulations to ensure the public's health is better protected from air pollution.

"We're killing people on these days with bad air," said Tom Kennedy, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Utah School of Medicine.

In addition, the doctors, who also want a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants that will add to pollution, asked to take part in the ongoing fight over licenses the state has issued for new plants in Sigurd and Delta.

Salt Lake City mother Cameron Cova urged the panel to heed the doctors' warnings about air pollution and to take immediate steps to address it. She told how, during a spike in particle pollution in January, doctors advised her to take her daughter, Aviana, out of the valley after the 5-month-old developed a lung infection.

"This is an especially important issue in the state," she said, Aviana wriggling in her lap, "especially to moms and kids."

Later, at the mothers meeting, Cova and others told heart-wrenching stories about how pollution already affects their kids.

Brian Moench, founder of the doctors group, told them they will be a force to be reckoned with at the Utah Legislature.

"State legislators love mothers, and they love children," he said. "There is tremendous political power in what you've started."

Several politicians who attended echoed this thought. Utah House Minority Leader Ralph Becker, a Democrat who is also a candidate for Salt Lake City mayor, urged the mothers forward, as did mayoral candidate Jenny Wilson.

State Rep. Christine Johnson, D-Salt Lake City, said she had also started work on two bills, one to limit idling vehicles and another to cut the speed limit to 55 miles per hour during high-pollution days.

The mothers group's Web site is www.utahmomsforcleanair.org.

fahys@sltrib.com