Any person employing or directing another to perform labor of any kind in erecting, repairing, altering, or painting any water pipe, stand pipe, smoke stack, chimney, tower, steeple, pole, staff, dome, or cupola, with the use of any scaffold, staging, swing hammock, support, temporary platform, or other similar contrivance for such labor shall keep and maintain at all times while that labor is being performed and the mechanical device is in use or operation a safe and proper scaffold, stay, support, or other suitable device, not less than sixteen feet below the working device when the work is being performed at a height of thirty-two feet or more, for the purpose of protecting the person performing the labor from falling in case of any accident to the working device.