CLINTON - Sen. David Jordan is disgusted by the thought of finding a fingernail in his soup.
Jordan said a woman shared with him her story of discovering a false fingernail in her bowl of soup, inspiring him to draft legislation to protect other Mississippians from the nauseating experience.
"A lady is serving you and has red, long, burnt claw nails. The perception is that these things will come off," said Jordan, D-Greenwood. "If you're eating, we like to think that everything is clean. Clean nails, short nails, or gloves are what we expect."
Jordan's fingernail legislation is one of several unusual bills filed for the 2004 session.
Among them are proposals to prevent hotels from renting by the hour, ban motorized vehicles from sidewalks, prohibit veterinarians from silencing dogs and require twice as many women's restrooms as men's restrooms in state buildings.
Under Jordan's bill, the state Health Department would regulate the wearing of false fingernails by restaurant employees who serve or prepare food. He said it's a sanitary issue.
The bill isn't winning support from Michael Berry, manager of Nawlin's Grill in Clinton. He said he wouldn't mind if his waitresses wore false fingernails.
"That would be like having a problem with pierced earrings or anything else," Berry said. "I may not wear it or do it myself, but I can't see where that should be a law."
Steve Quinnelly, who had just finished eating breakfast at Shoney's Restaurant in Clinton, said he couldn't recall how his server's fingernails looked.
"I don't see any problem with it," Quinnelly said. "If your hands are going to be nasty, they're going to be nasty with a piece of plastic on the end of them or not. It's not like you can't clean those fingernails."
Jordan said his same bill last year died in a subcommittee.
A similar fate has met some of Rep. Erik Fleming's bills in the House.
Fleming, D-Clinton, filed dozens of bills this session, including those addressing hotel room rentals and removing a dog's ability to bark.
Fleming said requiring a hotel to rent a room for a full night would reduce prostitution. He said he patterned his legislation after a New Orleans ordinance.
Attacks on police officers in other states moved Fleming to propose prohibiting veterinarians from surgically removing a vicious dog's barking ability.
Fleming said drug dealers train dogs, such as Rottweilers or Doberman pinschers, to attack and then have the animals silenced.
"If the police came and raided their home, the policemen wouldn't hear the dogs barking and the dogs would attack them," Fleming said. "This has been a law enforcement bill that I've been pushing for several years to help protect our law officers."
Fleming said he gets ideas for bills by researching other states, as well as from constituents.
"Every now and then, I sit in my room and just think about stuff," Fleming said.
Rep. Roger Ishee, R-Gulfport, said his headlight legislation grew out of complaints from Gulf Coast residents. He said a law in Alabama requires headlights when windshield wipers are in use, so when Mississippians cross the state line without the headlights, they get a ticket.
"It's about safety," Ishee said.
House Speaker Billy McCoy, D-Rienzi, said all bills are given due consideration by an assigned committee.
"We do get unusual requests and we deal with them in a normal way. We take each proposal seriously and it goes through the process," McCoy said.
The 2004 Legislature is entering its fourth week. The deadline for introducing bills dealing with general laws and constitutional amendments is Feb. 23.
Rep. Bobby Moak, D-Bogue Chitto, said municipalities in his south Mississippi district asked him to submit a bill regulating motorized vehicles on sidewalks.
"Senior citizens may walk in the afternoon and there were actually motorcycles or four wheelers on the sidewalk and they were having problems with that," Moak said.
Moak also introduced a bill requiring continuing education for used car salesmen. He said used car salesmen requested the bill as part of an initiative to "raise themselves to a better level."
"They would like to police their ranks just a little bit more," Moak said.
As for the bathroom bill, Moak said from his observations women need twice as many restrooms as men.
"Every time I go to an Ole Miss game or a ballgame, if I pass a women's restroom, they are actually out the door in line, simply because of a physical difference between the sexes," Moak said.
Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
