Alderman Should Apologize To Barber For Mass Email: Group

CHICAGO, IL — A mass email from 19th Ward Ald. Matt O'Shea last week indicating a "cease & desist" order had been issued against a neighborhood barber who fliers suggested was hosting a late-night party at his Morgan Park business over the Labor Day weekend has caused both alarm and confusion in the neighborhood in recent days, with one local activist group calling for an apology from the second-term alderman.

Tony Moore, owner of Mr. Tony & Co. VIP at 116th and Western, says he had nothing to do with the distribution of the fliers, which included images of unclothed and barely clothed women, and that he has never planned such a party. Instead, he and other adults were out at the location over the weekend providing free haircuts, backpacks and school supplies to dozens of neighborhood kids heading back to school for the year.

The situation elicited a response from the Southwest Chicago Diversity Collaborative, a group of neighborhood residents who work to preserve diversity and fair business practices in and around the 19th Ward. A statement released by the group on Tuesday indicated that they were "deeply disappointed" in how O'Shea handled the situation, namely that he never reached out to Moore - whose owned the barber shop for more than a decade - before sending an email to the community alleging illegal activity on his part and urging residents to call 911 if there was any "late night activity" noticed at the location.

"The Southwest Chicago Diversity Collaborative is deeply disappointed in Alderman O’Shea’s efforts and believes the best course of action would be an apology to Mr. Moore via the alderman’s email list and in-person," the statement read, in part. It further asked O'Shea to request that the City of Chicago’s Business Affairs and Consumer Protection department cancel a hearing scheduled for later this year involving the cease & desist order issued to Moore's business.

A spokesman for the group said that one of its members has personally reached out to O'Shea requesting the apology.

Read the full statement released by the SCDC below:

O'Shea responded to multiple Patch inquiries about the matter a week after the mass email was sent. He said he received "several phone calls and text messages" from residents about the party the fliers referred to and immediately contacted the BACP, the office that handles licensing matters, investigation and enforcement.

"This is standard practice I have done when any complaints are received about local businesses," O'Shea said in an email. "The most recent example came when residents were complaining about live entertainment and cover charges at Brewbakers Tavern."

In an earlier article on Patch, Moore indicated that he often plans events like Sunday's back-to-school giveaway and a drive in the late fall to help the homeless, but has never planned or promoted anything illegal like what was suggested in the flier.

The alleged violation in O'Shea's email was the apparent plan suggested by the content on the flier to charge a $20 entry fee, of which a public place of amusement license would be needed.

"Someone must be trying to trash my character," Moore said of the distribution of the fliers with his address - but wrong business name - on them last week.

Caroline Connors said the Morgan Park Beverly Hills Business Association has not received any complaints about Mr. Tony & Co. VIP in her four-and-a-half years as the executive director of the organization. O'Shea also said he has not received any previous complaints about the business.

Last week, Moore told Patch he was not contacted by O'Shea about the situation before the mass email was sent. But he has since spoken to the alderman over the phone.

"He (O'Shea) kept pushing the issue, saying that if I didn't do it (promote the event through the fliers) then someone else did," Moore said. "He mentioned something about the landlord, and it didn't at all make sense."

O'Shea said Moore told him he did not distribute the fliers when the two spoke and has offered to set up a meeting with him and the BACP to discuss the matter further.

While most have found the content on the fliers to be objectionable, it's still unclear if there were actual physically printed fliers in the first place.

So far, several people who have looked into the situation said they have not seen physical copies of the fliers around the neighborhood and that the only avenue in which they saw the images was electronically via O'Shea's mass email informing residents of the cease & desist order.

O'Shea did not address an inquiry on whether the fliers had been distributed at any locations in the 19th Ward.

Moore says he still doesn't know who is behind the creation of the fliers. The logo of an apparent event-planning company "Eye Kandi Entertainment" is on one side of the flier, but messages to a social media account using the same logo name and logo were not returned.

For Moore, his focus shifts from the back-to-school drive to regular business as a barber and personal fitness trainer before teaming with neighborhood kids in October to gather winter clothes and lunches and deliver them to the homeless.

"We just want to keep doing what we do," he said. "That's having a space for neighborhood kids to be after school and helping out those who need it."

Photo courtesy of Mr. Tony & Co.VIP