thought this might interest aya and rakeeshi. sorry about albany existing, guys.
City official raises debate over surname
Some applicants for an alcohol license may need more paperwork after an
Albany city commissioner takes issue with a name.
James Diffee
ALBANY - Albany City Commissioner Tommie Postell says he wants to make
sure those with the Patel surname aren't skirting the process for
obtaining an alcohol license.
Postell has questioned at commission meetings the legitimacy of those
with Patel surnames serving as references for other Patels on license
application forms. He said at a Tuesday work session that it is
"discriminatory" to let the Patels use each other as references when
other applicants are not allowed to use their relatives.
After Postell raised his concerns, City Attorney Nathan Davis
volunteered to create an affidavit that requires references to swear
they are not related by blood or marriage to the applicants.
Brijesh Patel, owner of the BP Foodmart on Dawson Road, said Thursday
that singling out Patels, at least at the commission table, "sounds
like name discrimination."
I
n India, the last name Patel "is like a Smith here," Brijesh said.
"I'm Hindu, and my last name is Patel," he said. "If you go to India, a
Muslim from another community will have the last name Patel. But we're
not related."
Brijesh said there are at least 40 family groups in the Albany area
with the last name Patel.
There are 45 listings for Patel in Albany in the Bellsouth phone book.
There are about 500 for the last name Smith.
The commission considered granting two licenses to applicants with the
last name Patel Tuesday. One of the applicants used three references
with the last name Patel. The second used one.
A Herald reporter reached one of the applicants by telephone Thursday.
The applicant said he did not want to comment on the record for fear of
reprisal. He said he has had trouble with other licenses because he
used more than one Patel as a reference.
The commission tentatively approved both licenses.
Several commissioners, among them Jon Howard, told Postell that the
name Patel is a part of the Indian culture, possibly related to the
social caste system, and that two people with the last name Patel are
not necessarily related.
Deputy Marshall Walter Norman, who is responsible for business and
alcohol license enforcement, told commissioners that Patels who are not
related own many convenience stores and hotels and motels.
But Postell insisted that the Patels must be related, saying
that in America, "you two are relatives if you've got the same last
name."
He asked Davis to investigate the "customs of the
culture," but Davis
said the Indian culture is not part of his expertise. Instead, Davis
offered to create the affidavit.
The name Patel is actually a matter of geography, not custom, said
Anupam Srivastava, director of the University of Georgia's Asian
Program at the Center for International Trade and Security.
Srivastava said Patel is a common last name in the western Indian state
of Gujarat, home to about 35 million of the nation's 1 billion people.
"Presumably 13 to 14 percent of (Gujarat's) population" has the last
name Patel, he said.
"When these people came to the U.S. ... a lot went into real estate and
small business -owning gas stations, hotels, motels, small franchises,"
Srivastava said. "As they made money, they sort of attracted other
people from the same community to come and run similar enterprises.
(Those industries) have a very large presence of the Patel community."
Srivastava said there is no reason to assume people with the last name
Patel are related. There is no harm, however, in making sure people
with the last name Patel are not directly related, Srivastava said.
Davis said the city's affidavit will apply to all people who share the
same last name, not just Patels.
Postell did not return several messages left at his home and on his
mobile phone Thursday.
The alcohol license application specifies that applicants cannot use
relatives as references, and it includes an oath applicants must sign,
affirming the truthfulness of the information on their forms.
Davis delivered the affidavit to Norman Thursday. Norman said that he
will try to implement the affidavit process by November.
Norman said he reads the application line by line with the license
seekers and lets them know that their licenses can be revoked if they
are caught in a falsehood. He said he performs criminal, driving and in
some cases credit
background checks on the applicants, and makes sure to call their
references.
"I call all the references to make sure they aren't related" to the
applicant, he said,
Norman said that because of the difficulty in proving extended familial
ties, he keeps the inquiries on relationship status to siblings,
parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.
Norman said he isn't sure how he will fit the affidavit into the
process, though it will be used when the last name of a reference and
an applicant are the same.
"(Davis) just gave it to me today, so I'm still brainstorming," Norman
said Thursday. "There are factors, like people living outside of the
state, to
consider ... I have to come up with how to implement it fairly."
Norman said he thought the system before the affidavit worked well, but
"it does raise a point of suspicion, but the amount of people that use
that same name."
However "(the affidavit) is not going to be a 100 percent solution for
the problem," he said. "You can't determine blood lines unless you do a
DNA test. That's a bit extensive for a reference."
Norman said the affidavit won't add much to his work load, as long as
an applicant's references live in Dougherty County.
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