Buzz

Suffer the little children
State Sen. Florence Shapiro (R-Plano) appears so frequently on the local evening news she's practically an anchorwoman. It's her personal crusade against child molesters that has earned her those coveted sound bites, of course. Her laudable package of get-tough measures, known as Ashley's Laws--after murdered 7-year-old Ashley Estell--has helped make her a hero to frightened parents everywhere.

But while Shapiro is helping to make the state's children safe from child molesters, she's against another proposed state law that would safeguard children--in far greater numbers than Ashley's Laws ever will. Shapiro is a staunch opponent of the bicycle helmet law that, if passed, would significantly cut the number of traumatic head injuries among children.

Shapiro didn't return Buzz's phone calls. But she has publicly stated her rationale for opposing the law: she's against government intrusion into her constituents' lives. Wonder if she's against laws mandating use of child-safety car seats and seatbelts, too?

Call it The Citizen's Apathy
Kent Moore, a mild-mannered music instrument salesman from Coppell, became the town muckraker when he launched his monthly paper, The Citizen's Advocate, two years ago (Observer, December 1, 1994). Moore won a national Freedom of Infor-mation Award last summer from the Society of Professional Journalists for helping make Coppell city government more open. But, alas, Moore has put down his notebook and pen--at least temporarily. He suspended publication in January, for a variety of reasons.

"When only 6 percent of the population voted in the January election" to fill a vacant city council seat, Moore told Buzz, "I realized people need to be more attentive to their civic duty and there was no reason for me to make the sacrifice. I need to do it somewhere else, where people really care about their community."

Moore has sent out lots of resumes to newspapers but so far has no takers.

Sex and the shrewd stylist
Don't try to slap a sex-discrimination charge against Todd Hedrick, a hairstylist at Select Studio & Salon on Cedar Springs Road.

When he opened his shop last year, Hedrick specifically devised a pricing schedule to avoid the practice of charging women more than men--a tradition that has recently prompted litigation against other salons.

Seeking to avoid liability, Hedrick based his price schedule not on his clients' gender but instead on the frequency of his customers' visits. The more often Hedrick snips a client's locks, the less he charges. Customers who get a trim every two weeks pay only $20, while Hedrick charges $50 to those who show up unshorn after eight weeks. There's a sliding scale in between, also based on frequency, not gender.

On the whole, Hedrick says, men usually pay less because they get their typically shorter styles cut more often. But now a woman who sets her mind to it can trudge in for the frequent-cutter discount. Says Hedrick: "I wanted all my customers who come in more often to feel appreciated.