Texans leery of polygamist's plans for town

LOCKNEY, Texas — Samuel Fischer would appear to be just what this withering Texas Panhandle town needs.

A successful cabinet maker with a thriving business in Utah, he hopes to move the operation here, bringing with it as many as 100 jobs and perhaps eventually an influx of residents.

Many here, however, say Fischer is no godsend, and the economic boost he could provide their town of about 2,000 is not worth the cost.

Fischer is a polygamist, a member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a renegade offshoot of the LDS Church. The sect's leader, Warren Jeffs, is awaiting trial on charges he arranged marriages between men and underage girls.

In Lockney, people like shopkeeper Ginger Mathis worry that Fischer, his two wives and their 24 children will soon be joined by thousands of other sect members now living in Utah and Arizona. Fischer has closed on one house in Plainview and has contracts on three others there; he is also checking out property near Lockney.

"He wouldn't be looking at houses if he didn't have some others coming," Mathis said.

Others want to give Fischer the benefit of the doubt.

"I just feel like he's one of God's creatures, and if he wants to come to town, that's his business," said Kay Martin, who owns an insurance agency in Lockney and is a member of the town's economic development board. "It doesn't scare me or bother me."

Ranching and farming are the mainstays in the Lockney area, about 75 miles from Amarillo. Farmers produce cotton, wheat, pumpkins and corn. The town's population has dropped by about 200 from the 2000 Census because there is no other work for young people not interested in farming or ranching.

Fischer took his case for moving to Lockney to his future neighbors at a town meeting this spring. He requested the meeting in a letter to the local paper after it published a column about him and his association with Jeffs.

About 100 people attended. When pressed, Fischer told them that Jeffs was his spiritual leader but that the FLDS doesn't have a stake in his business.

About 150 of Jeffs' followers are already in Texas, living outside the small town of Eldorado, about 230 miles from Lockney. Among the buildings erected by the sect is an 80-foot-tall, gleaming white temple.

Those who attended the meeting in Lockney say Fischer, 53, promised he would not build a compound. He also said he didn't know who would be living in the houses he will soon own.