Posted on 05/21/2008 5:59:19 PM PDT by TornadoAlley3
HOUMA,Louisiana -- Shortly after 2 p.m. Monday, a Houma Police officer handed 32-year-old Clyde Scott a ticket.
Scott was on Main Street, smack in the middle of downtown Houma, but he wasn’t in a speeding car, parked illegally or even jaywalking.
Rather, Scott was inside his barbershop cutting hair, trimming up a few students readying for their Monday-night high-school graduation ceremony when officer Michael Toups walked in.
"He said he’s giving me a citation for opening on a Monday," Scott said, who has owned Clippas barbershop for about two years.
Little did Scott know, a decades-old city law forbids barbers from plying their trade on Mondays -- or Sundays for that matter.
"I was just open to cut those guys’ hair," Scott said. "I do cut some Mondays or Sundays."
The law also bans barbershops within the city limits from opening on New Year’s Day, the day after New Year’s, Mardi Gras, Good Friday, the Fourth of July, Labor Day, the day after Labor Day, All Saints’ Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas and the day after Christmas.
"I didn’t know it existed," Scott said. "It’s crazy."
Parish Council Clerk Paul Labat said the city ordinance dates to the years before the parish and city governments merged in 1981, though he could not say exactly when the Board of Aldermen that used to govern Houma passed the measure.
"It was probably on the books before 1979," Labat said, adding that the law only applies to barbershops within the city limits. "It’s still an active law."
Toups was sent to write the ticket following several complaints called in to the Police Department about people loitering outside the barbershop, at 7813 Main St. between Luckey’s Jewelers and JuJu’s accessories boutique, Houma Police spokesman Lt. Todd Duplantis said.
Duplantis said neighboring business owners had complained about the barbershop, alleging people loitered outside Clippas at "various odd hours."
Sgt. Daniel Belanger reviewed local codes and noticed there was an ordinance on the books regarding barbershop hours, Duplantis said.
"He instructed Michael Toups to issue the barbershop a summons for the ordinance," Duplantis said.
Enforcing barbershop hours is not a regular part of police patrols, Duplantis said. In fact, in his 23 years with the department, the police spokesman said he has never heard of such a ticket being written.
"This is the first. I don’t anyone recall anyone charged with this in my career," Duplantis said.
But since the law exists, officers are obliged to enforce its provisions, he said.
Belanger "found the law and went on and enforced it," Duplantis said.
Scott said he is consulting a lawyer about the ticket, which could result in a fine of up to $500.
"I think they’ve got other things they can be doing than harassing me," Scott said.
And he may have a case, according to James Adams, a former barber and president of the Louisiana Board of Barber Examiners, the state licensing agency for barbers and their shops.
"I’ve never heard of anybody having a law like that," Adams said.
The law is likely a vestige of "strong-arm union tactics" employed in the 1950s and 1960s by the Louisiana State Association of Barbers, Cosmetologists and Allied Industries, Adams said.
The union formerly set hours and prices and picketed barbers who wouldn’t get with the program.
Given the similarities between the wording of the law and the union’s old policies, a group of local barbers "probably took that language down to City Hall and asked them to make it a city ordinance or a parish ordinance," Adams said, calling the law flatly "unconstitutional."
"I’m surprised such a law is still on the books," he added. "It’s against federal law to conspire to fix prices and hours. … You can’t do it. It’s against the law."
In decades past, black-owned barber shops like Scott’s were generally barred from joining the union, Adams said.
Accordingly, such shops didn’t follow the union rules.
"Most African-American barbers were not in the union," he said. "They (probably) weren’t aware such a rule even existed."
One such barber is 74-year-old John Boykin, who has been cutting hair at his shop on Goode Street, also within the city limits, for almost 51 years.
Even after black barbers were allowed to join the union, Boykin said he had little use for the organization or its rules.
"If they didn’t let me join then, why would I want to join now?" he said.
Semi-retired, Boykin only takes customers a couple of days a week, he said.
But in his younger days, he opened his shop six days a week, including Mondays.
A city police officer writing a barber a ticket for working on a Monday, or any other day of the week, is unbelievable, Boykin said.
"I’ve never heard of that before in my life," he said.
Scott is not oblivious to the grumblings and complaints other business owners have made about his customers, who he said often go out front to smoke because smoking is banned inside the shop.
But he insisted the barbershop is a positive place, especially for the teenagers and younger children who come to get haircuts and hang out after school.
"When I was in school, we didn’t have a place to come to with a barber we could relate to," Scott said, adding that sagging pants and foul language are not tolerated.
Dorian Harris, a 21-year-old Nicholls State University student, said Scott’s hours are part of the attraction.
"I’m a weekly customer," Harris said Tuesday. "He’s dependable, and his hours are flexible. … And he’s a good barber."
Next door to the barbershop, Luckey’s owner Spencer Weaks said the jewelry store has not had problems with the shop’s owner, employees or clientele.
"For them to be targeted is not really fair," added sales associate Julie Ellender. "It’s silly."
Her co-worker, sales associate Alyson Domangue, said when an elderly driver’s car broke down in the middle of Main Street a few months ago, a group of men from the barber shop leapt up from the shop’s cushioned chairs to help push the car out of the path of traffic.
"They’re really sweet guys, very genuine," she said. "We have no problems with them."
Let me inform you all regarding this poor misunderstood black man. Mr. Scott got a citation and he did deserve that citation. Mr. Scott in all of the years that he has been in a shop cutting hair, he has never once worked on a Sunday nor a Monday. Mr. Scott has stated the reason for him not working on those days was due to the fact that he was not supposed to open his shop. If he did cut someones hair, he either went to their home or had them come to his home and he got paid extra for performing this service. Ask me how do I know this?
Mr. Scott has had his shop opened at odd hours doing the night, mainly around 11pm and sometimes until 1am in the wee hours of the mornings. So the neighboring bussinesses aren’t making false alligations.
Ma’am, you have my deepest sympathies.
I can think of nothing lower than a man not supporting his children. There ARE avenues you and the legal system can take to get the money owed your children. Don’t give up!
However, that doesn’t change the basic fact that keeping barbershops closed on Mondays is an insane intrusion of the government into business, and that this ordnance should be struck down.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.