Crime & Safety

Ice Cream Man Could Get a Background Check

A proposal from City Councilor Mark Cooper calls for state and federal fingerprint-based criminal history checks for people applying for certain licenses, including ice cream truck vending and door-to-door sales.

Earning the right to sell ice cream or any products door-to-door in Attleboro could soon require an extensive background check. City Councilor Mark Cooper will introduce an item at Tuesday's council meeting calling for state and federal fingerprint-based criminal history checks for people applying for certain licenses.

Those who would be subject to the background checks are people attempting to obtain licenses for hawking and peddling or other door-to- door sales, managing alcoholic beverages, owning or operating public conveyance, dealing second-hand articles, pawn dealing, hackney driving and ice cream truck vending.

A similar ordinance has been passed in several Massachusetts cities and towns since last year when a state law went into effect giving municipalities the authority to conduct the background checks. Cooper, who heads the council's committee on public safety & emergency management, was encouraged to bring this proposal to the table by Attleboro Police  Chief Kyle Heagney.

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"I refused to sign a license for a person who wanted a hawker and peddler license because he had a long an notorious record for breaking into houses and this person wanted to sell items by going door to door," wrote Heagney in an email to Attleboro Patch. "We really need to be careful who we are giving these licenses too. We need the best possible check we can and I think the Massachusetts Legislatures recognized this and that's way they changed the law."

While approval of similar measures has been popular in various communities, it has met some resistance. When proposed and eventually approved at the June 2012 Seekonk Town Meeting, Seekonk School Committee member Brian Freitas called the measure well-intentioned, but an example of government reaching too far into people's lives.

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"We cannot bubble-wrap each and every one of our lives for the sake of protection," he said at the meeting. "Again, this is our freedom and our civil liberties being chipped away in the name of security."

Cooper told Patch Thursday this argument does not persuade him.

"I don't think it's an invasion of privacy to make sure the ice cream man isn't a person who would harm our children," Cooper said. 

When asked if there were local examples of people holding these licenses harming residents, he said he didn't know if there were any.

"Why do we want to wait for that to happen?" Cooper asked. "Let's not wait for it to be an issue. It has been an issue in other communities, and that's why they have taken the option of passing this law."


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