DECATUR - Since gas prices shot up to $4 last year, Perry Lewin has seen a boom in his business.

Lewin is the owner of Decatur Jewelry & Pawn, on Pershing Road in Decatur and Illinois 121 in Mount Zion.

The flow of people is constant every day at pawn shops, and with the country in an economic slump, the service pawn shops provide is becoming more in demand.

Pawn shops were the world's first form of organized banking and are the oldest lending institutions, Lewin said.

Lewin said that in the 1500s and 1600s, when people didn't have credit, they traded their agricultural tools, livestock, heirlooms and other items to get cash.

Five centuries later, people are still taking their personal belongings to trade as collateral to get cash.

Donald Vann was one of those individuals who made a quick dash inside Decatur Jewelry & Pawn's West Pershing store to pawn his stainless steel Citizen watch.

He said he usually doesn't frequent pawn shops but needed some cash to get his truck fixed. "I think pawn shops are convenient for emergencies," he said.

James Evrard also was at the store to make a payment on some jewelry he had pawned.

At the time, he said, he needed the money to pay a bill and was in between paychecks.

"I think pawn shops are good, and you can find some good deals," Evrard said. "But when you are really in a bind, they help you when you need money."

Pawn shops usually keep items that have been pawned for 30 days.

Illinois state law provides customers with an additional 30 days to retrieve their items, Lewin said.

"About 80 percent of pawn shop consumers pick up their merchandise, that is statewide and nationwide," Lewin said. "We are a bank for short-term needs."

Consumers, however, who do pawn items end up paying 3 percent interest to get them back, and Lewin makes a 10 percent profit on sales of items that weren't picked up.

"I become the corner retailer," he said. "I have helped the customer out who needed milk for their kids, their power bill paid or whatever they needed."

Hot ticket items being pawned or purchased at pawn shops are flat-screen televisions, jewelry and video game systems.

Cash America Pawn on East Eldorado Street is seeing more jewelry and higher-end items, such as high-definition televisions and electronics, being pawned.

"We are getting more new customers, new faces that you wouldn't typically see in a pawn shop," said Phil Worthey, manager at Cash America.

Worthey said he has seen pawn loans slowly increase since January, and now that it's tax time, more people are coming into the store to purchase items, he said.

Lewin, who is on the board of directors of the National Pawnbrokers Association, said his business is a necessary service for the working American family.

Last week, he went to Washington, D.C., to lobby Congress about the services pawn shops provide and met with U.S Rep. Erin Schock, R-Peoria, and a representative from the office of U.S. Rep. Phil Hare, D-Rock Island.

Hare said small business forms the fabric of our communities and national economy.

"I am supportive of all businesses that operate fairly and openly and do not seek to make a profit by taking advantage of cash-strapped citizens, or anyone else, for that matter. I believe pawn shops are viable, honest businesses, run by good people," Hare said.

"However, after all of the shenanigans we've seen in the current financial crisis, I believe we need to take a look at every institution that provides a financial service and make sure that predatory lending is not taking place."

Pawn shops are still tainted with a negative image, Lewin said.

He said the shops are seen as a haven for stolen merchandise and as taking advantage of the down and out.

Lewin said that is not the case. He said his employees send daily transactions of everything pawned to law enforcement officials.

When it comes to cashing in those personal goods: "People are very private with their money and don't want it publicized that this recession is hurting them as much as it is," Lewin said.

sheilas@herald-review.com|421-7963.