‘Everyone Has Every Right to Reopen’ : But a South-Central businessman says liquor store owners should be sensitive to the community’s concerns and be agents of change.

I grew up in St. Louis with the same kind of madness that we have here in South-Central. There were gangs, alcohol and drugs back then, but what we have now is just a lot more blatant.

When I started my own business, I had several opportunities to go elsewhere, but I wanted to come to South-Central and do something for the community. I didn’t know what, but I just knew I had to do something.

A lot of blacks run away from the inner city and nobody comes up with a solution. We become more productive, get better jobs and decide to move to the other side of town. Nobody wants to stay here and tackle the problems.

Yes, we’ve been discriminated against and cut out on the short end. But that’s no reason to stop striving to do better and to keep working.

We can blame white people, Hispanics and the Koreans. Who are you going to blame next?

There are no more liquor stores here now than there were back when the blacks owned them and the Jews and now the Koreans. I don’t believe we should tell people they can’t reopen their stores.

Once a person has been in business, I can’t sit and make judgments on who can come back and who can’t. Legally, everyone has every right to reopen their store.

But just the same, you can’t open up a business anywhere and not be concerned about what’s going on in the area.

You don’t allow people to purchase liquor and then sit in front of your store and drink it.

You don’t allow people to sell drugs there.

You don’t let people loiter.

You cannot let trash pile up in your parking lot or have derelicts coming in and out and standing in front of your business bumming nickels and dimes.

At my place of business, we post a sign that lists the rules.

If people are not following them, I physically go out there and with all due respect I tell them to move.

I have done that from Day One. You can’t let problems get started and then allow them to fester.

From the day you open that business, that’s when you administer the rules and you be consistent in it.

You don’t smoke in my store, you do not drink, you do not sit with open containers in my parking lot.

We’re not the toughest guys in the world, but somebody has to draw the line.

The confrontations we have had are minimal because of how we approach the people. I speak to them with respect and I explain why we have the rules we have.

I think if there was documentation on stores that were here before--if they knew certain stores were bad apples--then the city should put conditions on them.

They should ensure that they are well-lighted and have security guards.

The attitude of the owners has to be that they are going to be concerned about the community.

You can’t stop liquor store owners from reopening, but they should come back with a new attitude. Not just that they are going to be making money. Everybody’s in business to do that.

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Alcohol is a drug. It’s legal, but it is a drug and it does tear the fiber of our community. I feel if I’m going to sell it, I should counterbalance that by doing some good.

That’s the way it used to be. If you ask people around here, they’ll tell you that the liquor store owners used to sponsor baseball teams and basketball teams and do good things for the community.

I am involved in the community. Totally involved, probably to the detriment of my business. We put on talent shows, we have contests, raffles, we try to motivate the kids and help and enhance the adults.

After the riots, we were badly hurt financially because our power was out for 10 days and we lost most of our stock and a lot of customers. But we were not looted or burned out.

The looters left us alone mainly because we stood guard outside and kept them away.

Some of the people who came over here to help us guard the place were gang members. This business is something positive for their community and they didn’t want to lose it. They didn’t want it destroyed.

It wasn’t because I am African American. The people who were looting just wanted to do as much damage as possible. They didn’t know who owned this store and they didn’t care. It could have been their brother’s store and they still would have destroyed it if they could have.

The people in this community know we’re here and they respect us and our consistency. The kids call me Pop and they call my partner Pop. The problem with the community today is that we as black adults have failed our black youth. You can’t get around that.

I can remember when I was young, the next-door neighbor would punish me if I did something wrong. And by the time I got home, I knew I was going to get it from my mother too.

The same thing happened in school. If you did wrong, there would be consequences.

Now, it’s just total disrespect. But it’s our fault--the adults who grew up in that era. We forgot, or didn’t choose to pass on our history, morals and values. There’s no sense to it.