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Sonya Ayers was jailed last year for what she said was her inability to pay a water bill. Her actions led to the Chickasaw City Council, on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016, to repeal an ordinance that makes it a misdemeanor for someone to live inside a house without running water. (photo provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center)

Sonya Ayers walked into Chickasaw City Hall last November to get a piece of paper notarized for a job application. She soon found herself being escorted out by a police officer, in handcuffs and en route to the city jail.

Ayers, who was unemployed at the time and had buried her long-ailing mother just two weeks earlier, had missed a court date related to being unable to pay a lingering water bill. The past-due bill totaled $69, resulting in city fines piled on many dollars more, and her water had already been shut off.

"I thought he was joking at first," said Ayers, recalling when the officer approached.

She'd never been in jail before, she said. But she was stuck in the Chickasaw jail for more than 24 hours.

After being released, Ayers spoke to a friend who referred her to the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, which decided to fight on her behalf. And now, no one else burdened by old water bills in Chickasaw will sit behind bars.

On Tuesday, Chickasaw's City Council unanimously repealed its ordinance that made it a misdemeanor for someone to live in a house without running water. The city follows others that have made similar changes, such as Montgomery and Alexander City. Those two cities agreed, after SPLC intervention, to stop criminalizing the inability to pay fines.

"I'm just glad this is over and they cannot victimize people like that anymore," said Ayers, 48, who is still looking for a job after struggling with health issues including an arthritic knee.

The city, in a statement, said the ordinance was originally passed in 1997 to "ensure the health and safety of our citizens" and not as a means to collect debt. Basically, the ordinance prohibited human occupancy on premises that had no inside access to an approved water supply, and established penalties for violations.

Ayers had left a post office job to become her dementia-afflicted mother's caretaker. "No one else could do it," she said.

When she got behind on her bills, and the water was terminated, the local municipal court slapped her with fines and fees exceeding $400. She also was instructed to pay monthly supervision fees to Judicial Correction Services, a for-profit probation company that up until last November collected minor fines and fees from cities throughout the state.

Ayers said she was unaware of the scheduled court date for which she failed to appear.

Sam Brooke, deputy legal director with the SPLC, said the Chickasaw ordinance punished Ayers and others "for their poverty." Chickasaw, which is located about six miles north of downtown Mobile, has a poverty rate of 33.3 percent.

Brooke said the SPLC is concerned that other towns and cities could also have ordinances that put poor debtors at risk of jail time.

A high-profile such case involved a Montgomery woman named Harriet Cleveland, who was jailed for 14 days for being unable to pay traffic fines. Pressed by the SPLC, the city to rid itself of JCS' collecting services and undertook an analysis of its local ordinances. Cleveland testified before Congress in January on behalf of the federal End of Debtor's Prison Act.

Brooke said the federal legislation could be part of a comprehensive criminal justice reform bill, although it's stalled at the moment.

"The reason we want to highlight this right now is so other cities and towns know this and know that they need to be checking any ordinance that criminalizes poverty and non-payment of utilities," Brooke said.