Starkville city leaders set curfew

A 10 p.m. - 5 a.m. curfew has been put in place for the city of Starkville.

Ten.

Starkville board of aldermen met tonight to discuss the city's response to the coronavirus.... one of the things they chose to create is a curfew... w-t-v-a's kayla thompson joins us with how city officials and residents feel about this decision... "i think it's prudent of us to mirror the board of supervisors and set a curfew from 10 p.m.

Until 5 a.m.

" the starkville board of aldermen voted 6-1 to set a city- wide curfew.... mayor spruill says putting this curfew in place will help provide clairity to residents... "for whatever reason the word curfew resonates with people in a way that follow the governors order does not and we've seen that over the last 3 or 4 days we have to keep explaining that the executive order is 24/7 and it means stay home."

Residents say they think having a curfew will help slow the spread... "since we have a curfew in place it will slow down the spread of covid-19 and stop people from just coming to hang out in starkville."

Several businesses like petty's barbecue have already changed their hours to reflect this curfew and say it's gonna be tough to manage "we have to close up a little early but we're going to do what we have to do to keep business going."

Chief mark ballard says penalties will be decided on by a judge... "we will take it up on a starkville curfew and that will be a judges decision on the penalties which i will imagine will mimic that 500 dollar ...up to a 500 dollar fine misdemeanor offense."

Chief ballard also says you can expect to see officers out not to scare you to help protect residents... "they're on the street to address the fear and you're going to get a feeling of safety and sometimes we have a criminal element at place but you're going to see a lot of starkville police officers in uniform at night."

This curfew will stay in effect until april 20th... also tonight, the starkville board of alderman voted to temporarily