Media barber shop still planning to open Saturday
MEDIA » If there is to be a barber shop operating Saturday in Media, Bob McMahon will not be there with a ceremonial pair of grand-re-opening ribbon-cutting scissors.
McMahon, the mayor of Media since 1982, has made it clear that he is not in favor of Giovanni’s Media Barber Shop welcoming customers this weekend while Gov. Tom Wolf’s restrictions against non-essential businesses remain in place.
Though barber shops are not on the essential list, Giovanni’s owner Nichole Missino stressed Wednesday that she plans to welcome long-haired customers to join her effective protest, even as coronavirus concerns linger.
“As of right now,” Missino said, “we are still planning on opening if we can.”
A sign on the door of the shop at 18 S. Olive St., close to the Delaware County Courthouse, reads: “Our doors will open for business on May 9th and 8 a.m. Please schedule your appointments online at giovannismediabarbershop.com. We can’t wait to see you al!”
That scheduled opening, however, has been challenged, Missino said.
“So we’re being threatened with our occupancy certificate being pulled,” she said. “The state called me and told me they were going to revoke everyone’s license.”
Missino plans to meet with her staff Friday afternoon at 2 to make a final decision of whether to defy the governor’s orders. Already, though, she has proven able to create more than one kind of buzz during a week-long radio, TV, social-media and press mini-tour. While McMahon stopped short of saying he would order Giovanni’s to remain closed, he was less than enthused about the Giovanni’s plan.
“If you ask me, I would say I would like it not to be open right now because there’s too much unknown,” the mayor said. “We don’t know enough to know whether if people went to her barbershop if they’re safe. We just don’t know.
“If someone would say, ‘It’s perfectly safe at this point,’ yeah, then it would be fine. I want to see the economy in Media get back to normal, but not at the price of putting our residents at any danger. And there’s no answer yet.”
Missino has owned the shop for four years. She said she employs seven barbers.
Should the shop defy orders to remain closed, it faces the possibility of losing its license. McMahon, however, insisted he has not decided on the borough’s response should the hair start falling Saturday.
“We are going through all the sources, including the governor’s office, to try to make sure we do the right thing, whatever that might be,” he said. “So we’re looking at all the different options that we have on something like this. And then we’ll follow through.”
Stressing that sanitation is a major course in a barber school, Missino has said customers would be made to wait in their cars until called inside for their appointments. As of Wednesday, she said, workers were completing the process of partitioning each work station with shrink wrap. Ultra-violet lighting has been installed in the equipment drawers, allowing for all barbers’ equipment to be disinfected within two minutes. Customers will be offered masks and hand sanitizer. Missino has also said that the patrons’ temperatures will be monitored.
“We can keep one client in a chair away from another client, and also the barber behind the chair,” Missino said. “So we’re not anywhere near each other. They will be separated by a wall.”
Missino said Giovanni’s employs seven barbers, some of whom have not received stimulus money during the shutdown. Her motivation for reopening is for her employees and their families, she said.
“It’s insane,” Missino said of the restrictions. “It’s crazy. There’s so many other states that are open. I feel like the governor is treating us like New York. New York has a lot more numbers than we do.”
McMahon, a Democrat, has his concerns.
“Now in a situation like this, there’s so much ambiguity,” he said. “No one ever anticipated this. Lawmakers for the last hundred years never thought there would be this situation. So what we are trying to do is figure it out.”
To the mayor, there will be one overriding consideration.
“Everybody should have a right to walk around the streets of Media and feel safe from the virus,” he said. “And everybody ought to have the right to open stores and do what they want, also. There are conflicts there. And somebody has to figure out how to handle those conflicts.
“This is unprecedented.”