MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — Parents, school districts and law enforcement have been grappling with what to do with teenagers who take sexually explicit photos of themselves with their cell phone cameras and send them to friends.

Vermont legislators are moving to get rid of one option: child pornography counts that result in lifetime listings on the state’s Internet sex offender registry.

Legislation passed by the Vermont Senate and pending in the House would remove the most serious legal consequences for teenagers who engage in “sexting.”

The bill would carve out an exemption from prosecution for child pornography for 13- to 18-year-olds on either the sending or receiving end of sexting messages, so long as the sender voluntarily transmits an image of himself or herself.

The bill, however, would not legalize the conduct. Legislators believe prosecutors could still use laws against lewd and lascivious conduct and against disseminating indecent materials to a minor.

State legislatures, including Vermont’s, have been cracking down on sexual predators in recent years, but lawmakers here say they don’t want increasingly tough penalties applied to those caught up in what many regard as a youthful fad.

“We felt that it’s poor behavior and it’s not something we want to give our OK to,” said Sen. Richard Sears, D-Bennington and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Sexting appears to be widespread among teens. A December survey of 1,400 young people for the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy found that one-fifth of girls had sent nude or seminude pictures of themselves electronically and that a third of boys had received such pictures, said Marisa Nightingale, senior adviser with the group.

Prosecutors around the country have tried various approaches against teenagers who used cell phones, e-mail or social networking Web sites to transmit naughty pictures of themselves.

• Lori Higgins