Recent budget cuts forced health department to cut back in June
Read more: Local, State, Health, Community, Colorado Springs
Recent county budget cuts have forced the El Paso County Health Department to temporarily stop inspecting local body art and tattoo parlors along with enforcing state regulations.
Now local shop owners are telling their side.
In June, El Paso County Commissioners cut a total of $9.1 million from the budget to account for a mid-year shortfall of $8.8 million. Of that money, $4.1 million was taken from county administration and elected offices and agencies while another $5 million was cut from other balancing options.
The health department took the biggest hit: it was forced to eliminate $507,000 dollars from its budget. To find some of that money, staff said they were going to have to cut body art and tattoo parlor inspections and regulations. At the time, they said they were not happy about the cuts but had no other choice.
"We are extremely concerned about the risk that this places to the children and families here in El Paso County, the result of these cuts," Deputy Director Kandy Buckland said.
Now that the inspections have stopped, some shop owners said they fear for public health.
"I just think it is ridiculous. I do not know if they can find somewhere else to cut it or take it from, but like I said, you would not go eat at a restaurant that you knew was not getting inspected by the health department," Tony Digirolamo said.
Digirolamo owns Bijou Tattoo, with 16 years experience he said he knows what it takes to run a successful, clean and sanitary parlor.
"Inspections are important for many, many reasons, but I think the top two are for client and customer safety as well as the artists safety that work in the studio," Digirolamo said.
He said tattoo artists deal with blood on a daily basis adding that certain diseases can spread easily when artist do not use proper sanitation.
"You are dealing with hepatitis--C is the worst, but then there is A and B, there is HIV, staph infections--I mean the list goes on and on," Digirolamo said.
He said if one un-reputable shop is allowed to get away with bad practices, it puts a bad light on the profession in general.
"The reputable shops will probably stay afloat, but it is just the fact that we have to deal with it, the repercussions from other shops that are not clean and up to standards," Digirolamo said.
He said to keep his customers and employees safe, most of the tools used in his shop our disposable. He conducts spore tests often, and he displays his licenses and certificates in the front of the store.
"If the inspections were $1,000 or $1,500, we would all want to pay it just to keep the health department inspecting studios," Digirolamo said.
The El Paso County Board of Health has scheduled a public meeting for July 16. At that time board members will vote on whether or not to make the cuts permanent.
The public is invited to attend the hearing, which begins at 3:30 p.m. at 305 South Union Blvd. in Colorado Springs.
