The Great Hazelwood Cookie Debate Crumbles

A Hazelwood mother no longer has to risk serious action for violation of city codes, because an outside party has stepped in to end the situation peaceably.

The Rev. George Hutchings is a Manchester resident known as "The Shoeman," because he collects shoes and sells them to buy hydraulic drilling rigs for use in Africa. He bought Abigail and Caitlin Mills' 36 remaining boxes of Girl Scout cookies after the city threatened their mother for breaking City rules against selling food from home.

Hutchings said he was "paying it forward," and said that the Girl Scouts have helped him to collect more than 150,000 pairs of shoes by donating to his cause.

"I'm just a shoe collector," he said. "I just wanted everybody to be happy."

Timeless Tradition

Abigail, a 14-year-old student, and her sister Caitlin, a 16-year-old student, have run a cookie booth in their driveway on Latty Avenue for several years.

Their mother, Carolyn Mills, said they've been active with the Girl Scouts since their days at . Selling the popular cookies requires creative marketing, she told Hazelwood Patch.

"There's no grocery store in Hazelwood where we can go and sell," she said. "We've tried door-to-door, but it's not effective."

Mills said her daughters' booth enables them to sell about $7,000 worth of cookies, more than they ever would be able to going door-to-door. She said people who order from the door-to-door sales often don't pay up. They even dodge the girls on cookie delivery days.

"We've had people in the area that place an order and decide not to pay when the cookie arrives," Mills said. "The chase is just too much of a hassle."

A disadvantage of the driveway cookie booth is that selling food from your home is against the law in Hazelwood. Although the City doesn't go hunting for violators, code enforcers respond to complaints. That's exactly what happened in early March.

The Law is the Law

Carolyn Mills said on March 4 she saw the Codes Enforcement workers at a nearby vacant home and thought they were just checking on the house, but said she soon received a letter she calls "bullyish."

"There's other booths in Hazelwood that aren't shut down," Mills said. "The City told me as long as no one complains, it's OK, but once someone complains they have to do something about it."

Mills said she received a letter from Hazelwood's code-enforcement division on March 7 informing her of an anonymous complaint about the stand and warning her that selling products from the home violates city codes and ordinances.

Tim Davidson, the City of Hazelwood's communications coordinator, said Mills has been cautioned in previous years about the cookie stand and has continuously ignored verbal warnings. He said the City sent Mills an infraction notice after a neighbor complained to the City that the cookie booth had caused excessive dog barking and unusually high traffic on the street.

"The traffic that comes through here is normal traffic for the area," Mills said. "There is no added traffic because of the stand, and the street is a busy thoroughfare anyway because people cut through from Hanley Road and to get to work at Boeing."

The City notice informed Mills she had one day to comply or she would be issued a municipal court summons. Since this story has made it into national news, Davidson said he and other city employees have been bombarded with less-than-kind phone calls and emails. One blog comment even referred to the City as "Girl Scout Nazis."

"I’ve been inundated with nasty emails using foul-mouthed language and phone calls from people all the across the country telling me how dare we crack down on the Girl Scouts and that Hazelwood is a Nazi-type city," Davidson said.

Another commenter said they had called the City and confronted Hazelwood City Clerk Colleen Wolf about applying the rules to Girl Scouts. The City also has received calls from people who agree the Mills family should follow the law.

A letter entitled "Hazelwood Sets the Record Straight on Girl Scout Cookie Stand Story" on the City of Hazelwood's website states, "The safety of the children was of great concern to the City, after a previous theft incident at the Mills residence. On March 1, 2009, a money bag containing cash from selling Girl Scout cookies was stolen from their cookie sales table where the Mills girls were sitting while they were unsupervised in their driveway. The two perpetrators were later apprehended by the and the stolen money was recovered, $907, as well as the money bag."

The letter also states that Mills did apply for a temporary business license this year, but she was informed that selling products like cookies from her house was not allowed by the City's codes and the license application was rejected.

A Matter of Consistency

This conundrum about cookies may be part of a larger push from residents about code enforcement in Hazelwood. City council meetings are attracting more attendees wanting officials to apply existing rules about run-down storage sheds, unruly animals and rat infestation in neglected unkempt yards.

Next month's city council work session is slated to focus on, among other things, city codes and an examination of violation complaints. Members of council and Mayor Matthew Robinson have asked that codes be an agenda item for the work session at each meeting since February because of constituent concerns.

An Exception for Cookies?

Mills feels selling cookies in her driveway is a different story.

"Selling Girl Scout cookies is a pastime, much like a little girl's first lemonade stand," she said. "I'm teaching my girls to stick up for themselves and to not get bullied by people, city politics or anything else."

"You have to fight," Mills said. "If I give in and shut down my booth, that's 500 customers plus that I will disappoint because they can't get cookies."

Mills said she thinks these ordinances need to be changed. However, the only authority that can change city code would be Hazelwood City Council, which would have to vote on the matter after a public hearing.

Means To An End?

Mills said she believes she knows who made the anonymous complaint that started the whole cookie controversy. Hutchings and the Mills girls sent the person a peace offering to show they hold no ill will in the matter.

"We wrote a little note on a box of cookies that said, 'Sorry for the trouble,' and the girls took them over to her," Hutchings said. "I figured she was having a bad day."

Hutchings said he got a sense that cracking down on these two Girls Scouts isn't something the City wanted to do but had to do, because of the complaint, which he said the tipper should not have done anonymously.

"You really shouldn't listen to a complaint if the complainer doesn't have the gall to say they are the one bullying the girls that were just selling cookies when they make the complaint," he said. "I'll keep supporting them, and maybe next year it won't come to this."

So did the Hutchings cookie purchase put an end to the great cookie debate?

"Probably not," Mills said. "My 5-year-old Hannah starts Daisy Scouts next year, so that's even more cookies we'll have to sell. We'll be out here."

As for the City of Hazelwood, Davidson said it has always been about one thing: the law, which the City has to uphold.

She did violate city code, and defied our verbal warnings, he said.