LAWTON – Sales to scrap metal dealers of shopping carts, copper and catalytic converters will soon be illegal in the City of Lawton.
In fact, it will be against the law for a scrap metal dealer here to purchase, sell – or even be in possession of – a shopping cart or parts of a shopping cart.
The City Council was considering an ordinance revision to forbid scrap metal dealers from buying copper “in any form,” copper/aluminum material mixtures such as condensing or evaporating coils, and motor vehicle catalytic converters.
The issue of copper thefts in Lawton was discussed extensively during the council meeting Feb. 13. “When air conditioner innards are stolen and scrapped out, that person is going to get, probably, $200 max for it,” Assistant Police Chief Eric Carter told the council. “But the homeowner is going to have to spend a couple of thousand dollars to get that replaced.”
The Lawton Police Department reported 89 copper-related thefts last year and received 18 such reports between Jan. 1 and March 27 this year, Lawton Police Sgt. Christopher Blessing told Southwest Ledger.
The department has detectives who are assigned exclusively to property crimes, Carter said.
The Lawton ordinance also prohibits scrap metal dealers from buying manhole covers, street signs and traffic signs, metal beer kegs, and funeral markers, unless the seller has proof of ownership or a bill of sale, or is an “exempted seller” or an employee of an exempted seller.
Councilman Kelly Harris offered a floor amendment to also prohibit scrap dealers from buying bicycles, lawn mowers, metal fencing, metal real estate signs, trailers such as boat trailers and shopping carts.
Harris focused on shopping carts because he investigated and learned that the managers of all three Walmart stores in Lawton have to replace scores of shopping carts – at a cost of $239 apiece – “on a regular basis.”
He even videotaped an unidentified woman pushing a shopping cart, containing some merchandise across Cache Road and down 19th Street. Shopping carts are being filled with stolen and discarded property and abandoned at various locations, including an alley in the vicinity of 18th and Kingsbury.
The council accepted Harris’ proposals and approved the amended ordinance unanimously. The changes go into effect 30 days after passage, on April 25.
The City Code defines an exempted seller as “any person, firm, corpora-tion or municipal corporation which constructs, operates or maintains electric distribution and transmission or communication facilities; or any person, firm or corporation that produces or otherwise acquires any scrap metal regulated by the provisions of this section in the normal course of business as:
• mechanical, electrical or plumbing contractor licensed to do business in this state,
• a licensed scrap metal dealer (Standard Industrial Classification Codes 5051 or 5093), • anyone with a farm-use tax permit,
• a manufacturer, a distributor, or a retailer.
Councilman George Gill expressed concern that the amended ordinance deletes a provision which decrees that any person who knowingly provides false information about the source of scrap metal “shall, upon conviction, be guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by a fine of not more than $500.”
Those cases are now prosecuted in district court, not municipal court, Carter said.