Stokes to propose saggy pants ban

HINDS COUNTY, MS (Mississippi News Now) - Saggy pants: the look of fashion, or the look of a criminal?

We get the low-down on baggy pants from Hinds County District 5 Supervisor Kenneth Stokes.

"Young people have to pull their pants up," he says.

At Monday's Supervisors' meeting, Stokes will propose an ordinance banning the saggy look county-wide. A similar ordinance passed in Albany, Georgia, about a year ago. A first offense results in a $25 fine. The State of Florida now has a law against exposing underwear or body parts in an indecent manner at school. Arkansas' new law prohibits clothes that reveal underwear, buttocks, or the breasts of a female at school.

Rather than a stiff fine, Stokes' plan would impose community service for offenders. He takes the saggy pants controversy very seriously.

"Most of the young people with their pants down are people who think they're gangsters. They have the wrong outlook on life. It's not a fashion thing. It's a criminal thing," he says.

Some others we talked to agree that something should be done.

"I think it's a great idea. Guys should have more respect for themselves to pull their pants up," says Mindy Granger of Copiah County.

"It's usually a depiction on certain males. You don't want to have a depiction on that, so we should try to at least make some type of effort to look at it," says Edward Worthy of Jackson.

But don't tell Dominek Tucker how to dress.

"No way," Tucker says. "Some people who do that, they just feel like that's them. It's just how they wear it."

Trey Whitley agrees.

"I think they should have their own opinion on how they wear their own clothes," Whitley tells us.

The Hinds County Supervisors' meeting takes place on Monday at 9am in the Chancery Court building.