Or maybe it's because his friends were late picking him up.

While Hansen waited around in his Sunset home, his parents were hosting a neighborhood meeting to select a Republican delegate.

That was when his former Little League football coach and Sunset's then-Mayor Chuck Bailey called Hansen into the room, put his arm around his shoulder and declared the 18-year-old "the future of America."

The neighbors nominated Hansen as their delegate, and his reaction: "Well, that's kind of cool. What does that mean?"

It meant being courted by Republican candidates, or rather, just one candidate.

Sen. Haven Barlow took the time to talk one-on-one with "a little 18-year-old," Hansen recalled. "He was the only legislator that got my vote."

Maybe he was brushed off by most people, but he still "fell in love with the process," said Hansen, now 53, who will be retiring from the commission at the end of the year.

That love affair lasted from his parents' living room to a few more conventions. Hansen traded a political career to get into the business world. He worked at family-run Pinnacle Marketing until his interest in politics was rekindled.

His approach was to use what worked for Barlow 35 years ago: Talk with people and bring government down to a personal level.

He was a planning commissioner for Clearfield and then a City Council member from 2000 to 2004. Six years ago, he saw the controversy surrounding the Davis County Commission when it proposed a 138 percent tax increase to pay for a county jail expansion.

Two years later, he ran and was voted onto the commission, then telling The Salt Lake Tribune: "I saw what happened and wondered, 'How did we get to that point and how can we fix it?' "

But the controversy from the proposed 138 percent tax lingered.

In late 2006, Hansen and two departing commissioners, Carol Page and Dan McConkie, approved a 37 percent property tax increase to pay for the jail's new employees, county senior care and a storm drain system upgrade.

That tax increase also drew a lot of criticism, including from citizensfortaxfairness.org co-founder Ron Mortensen, who dubbed it the "Hansen tax hike."

Faced with running for re-election that year, Page bowed out and McConkie was defeated at the Republican convention. Mortensen, now a GOP candidate for Utah Senate District 23, said if Hansen had run for a second term, that most recent tax increase would have nailed him, too.

"And I like him, I really do," Mortensen said, "but I just see it as a continuation of the tax-and-spend policies of the Republican county commissioners."

Hansen defends the tax jump. That is the only way the county could meet its obligations.

Being the target of verbal pot shots "goes with the territory," Hansen said.

He lamented the commission's role as "tax collector for the state." As an arm of state government, he said, the commission "really can't do much."

And while he'll always be involved in public service in some way, Hansen said the high-stress, high-energy environment of public office gave him a reason not to seek a second term: his battle with diabetes.

For about 42 years, he has kept his condition under control. And while it wasn't a problem through his first term, Hansen said he wants to make sure he's "there for the grandkids."

"He will be missed," said Commission Chairwoman Louenda Downs, who said she and Hansen's co-commissioner, Bret Millburn, have drawn on his knowledge and his positive attitude.

"He takes a challenge, and he smiles his way through that."

While Hansen hasn't made any definitive plans on what to do after this term ends at the end of 2008, he might go back to the private sector.

"Working full time, probably even 50 hours a week, will feel like a breath of fresh air."

mariav@sltrib.com

A campaign promise kept

When he ran for Davis County commissioner in 2004, Alan Hansen said he would give $10,000 from his salary to a scholarship.

He now earns $100,000 as a commissioner, and has given $10,000 in each of the past three years to the Davis Applied Technology Center. The scholarship, now self-sustaining, is designed for the children of fallen soldiers or firefighters. If no one fits that criteria, single mothers can apply.