What do you get when you take a community gathering spot, add a lot of children with time on their hands and toss in a waiting period for a needed service? If you ask Vicksburg’s Ward 1 Alderman T.J. Mayfield, the answer is opportunity. And that’s how he and The HeadQuarters Barber & Beauty Salon owner Geno Williams ended up at the Warren County-Vicksburg Public Library Wednesday with Director David Scott.

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“I met with Mr. Scott and we were talking about some of the initiatives that the public library has in place for the community with literacy,” Mayfield explained. “Of course, you know I’m a strong supporter of the barbershop. And the amount of time people spend in the barbershop, we’re just looking into enhancing our youth literacy.”

Mayfield’s idea is a simple one, but it’s an idea he and Williams think will be effective, placing books in the hands of children waiting for haircuts, or simply hanging out with parents or friends.

“It’s a great thing, because, for so many people that spend so much time in the barbershop, it’s a lot of time listening to conversations about sports and playing on the phone,” Mayfield said. “When you could be sharpening your reading skills. That’s always a good thing, especially for our youth.”

Mayfield said the library donated around 50 books to The HeadQuarters, but added that more like 200 have come in from the community as a whole over the last month.

“They had some people from the community come in and drop some books off to the library and the library is always looking for a nonprofit or people in the community that need books,” he said. “They’re apparently looking for a bookshelf, they have so many books at the barbershop.”

And Mayfield said his ideas for promoting education through community hotspots won’t stop with literacy.

“Then we’ll move on to some of the more prominent issues, such as financial literacy and healthcare,” he said. “But for now, we just want to utilize the barbershop to help promote reading for kids.”