After 21 years of service in the Mid-City community, Sam Jupiter's Barbershop will close to make way for two new hospitals. (Ray Tyler/NYT Institute)

“It’s a shame,” Sam Jupiter said with a heavy sigh. The 92-year-old barber took a step back from behind the customer sitting in the barber chair and set the clippers down on the counter. He pulled a small white towel from his side pocket and wiped sweat from his weathered cheeks and neck.

The old man’s face looked as if he were sorting through a lifetime of memories.

Jupiter has been cutting hair for almost 75 years. And his barbershop, a little red and white building on South Galvez Street in Mid-City, has been a fixture in the neighborhood for  21 years.

But soon, the doors to the place where countless men around the neighborhood have talked about everything from presidents to pastors, from basketball to the Bible, will close for good, and the building will be torn down  to make way for new health care facilities planned to replace the old Charity Hospital, which was shuttered after Hurricane Katrina.

The U.S Department of Veteran Affairs and Louisiana State University plan to raze 25 blocks of the neighborhood for the new facilities. LSU has not released an official date for when the construction for the two new medical centers could begin. Before being severely damaged by the hurricane, Charity was the primary health care center for many of the city’s poor and uninsured.

Plans  show the new buildings  wiping out 67 acres of Mid-City-, including 265  houses. Some historic buildings, including the Deutsches Haus, Dixie Brewery and the old McDonogh School are also threatened.

About  600 people could be displaced, according to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, an organization whose focus includes  historic neighborhoods across the nation.  Eighty-five percent of the people who  could be uprooted are minorities and 40 percent of them are currently living below the poverty line.

“Where am I supposed to go,” Jupiter asked. “Nobody has come around yet to tell me the actual date that I have to close my doors, but we all know that the day is coming,” he said. “Until then, I’m just going to keep doing what I can while I’m still here and this is still my building. I’m just going to keep coming to work like I’ve always done.”

Jupiter said he was told by LSU officials that he would be paid “market value” for his building.

He put the towel back in his pocket, picked up the red clippers from the counter and turned to his customer.  The clippers hummed and the sound filled the old barbershop.

Long-time customer Morris Juneau, 68, said Jupiter’s Barbershop is one of the last shops in the city where you get treated like family instead of just another customer.

“Sam has always been fair. He has only charged $8 for a cut since I first started coming here,” Juneau said. “People don’t just come in here for the haircuts. You come in for the conversation too. ”

The view from the window in the shop’s lobby offers a unique look into the neighborhood and its struggles. There are houses still being renovated from damage left by the hurricane and  long-neglected homes that are deteriorating even as people live in them .

Neighbors may soon share another reality: displacement. New Orleans land use attorney William Borah said state is offering “woefully low” compensatory amounts to residential property and business owners in the area.

“I honestly feel like I can’t do anything about it at this point,” Jupiter said. “It’s a shame because New Orleans is supposed to take care of neighborhoods like this, but that’s not the case anymore.”

The barbershop is rarely as busy as it once was. On a sunny afternoon last week the flow in and out its doors was a drizzle at best. Two men sat in the lobby of the shop, glancing over at the television sitting on top of a cabinet in the corner and talking about who knows what.

As soon as Jupiter’s chair opened up, one of the men in the lobby, Melvin Arbuthnot, 58 walked over,  sat down and explained his theory on the state and its decision making. He said the state has an “agenda” when it comes to clearing out the lower Mid-City area.

“They’re trying to get close to Canal Street is what they’re trying to do,” Arbuthnot said. “They want to get close to those businesses to make this area less residential. They don’t care who’s in their way.”

Speculation on  why the state is planting the new medical centers in the historic neighborhood is endless. Neighbors wonder why the state doesn’t just renovate Charity and spare their neighborhood. The Foundation for Historical Louisiana commissioned a $600,000 study by the architecture firm RMJM Hillier to inspect  the old building and determine if it was  a viable option as a medical center despite the hurricane damage.

The firm concluded a retrofitted Charity could serve as LSU’s teaching hospital and the VA hospital could be moved to the Mid-City location.

Michael Andry, a  member of the community advisory committee for the LSU health care services division, said there were several reasons  Charity Hospital was not chosen as the site for one of the medical facilities.

“The decision was made based on Charity not being able to support regular hospital functions after Katrina,” Andry said. “Also, the cost of renovating the facility was a major factor.”

Despite the arguments for  why Charity is not a suitable alternative location, Jupiter said he does not believe the new complexes will help the area if it requires much of Mid-City to be destroyed.

“People have been saying that this will make the area better. Putting a hospital up may bring in money and new stuff like that, but it’s going to make a lot of people lose their homes,” Jupiter said as he turned back to Arbuthnot, preparing to give the man a straight-razor shave. “And if you work in this area, you’re going to lose your job. I know they have other options for places to build these hospitals.”

Jupiter  finished up with the shave and a haircut and then leaned back against the hand rail along the steps a couple feet from his chair.

“I’m really not sure what I’m going to do when this place has to close,” he said. “This neighborhood is a good place. It doesn’t need to be torn down. I’m going to hope and pray it doesn’t have to be.”