Saturday 11/21/09 4:22 am news | weather | radar | sports | traffic

I-Team: Unlicensed Hair Stylists

Posted - January 26, 2009 5:59pm

WASHINGTON - -WJLA Script- Anchor Intro: Despite a bad economy, many women wouldn't think twice about spending their hard earned money to get their hair done. But you probably would never think to check whether your hairdresser is licensed. The I-Team's Roberta Baskin did some checking. She found many of the top-notch D.C. hairdressers don't bother to be licensed. Roberta on Camera: I think the licensed hairdressers might wonder why they bother to obey the law. What's the point of licensing? Those chemicals hairdressers use to dye and straighten your hair can be dangerous, and you don't want your new hairdo costing even more in medical bills. STORY:  "This was a total state of shock for me. To have all this hair breaking and even more coming out in clumps all over the place," Erika White said. After getting her hair colored and straightened, White went through more than just a "bad hair day." "There was such severe peeling and itching that the physician couldn't take care of it and referred me to a dermatologist," White said. Erika says the damage done to her scalp cost more than $1,500 in doctor visits and medications. As for her thick blond hair, it was singed and coming out in clumps! "It was in the bottom of my shower," White recalled. "It was coming out everywhere." Christine Gordon manages a school for aspiring hairdressers in Arlington and understands the risks of dangerous hair chemicals. That's why students must have a minimum of 1,500 hours of cosmetology training before they're allowed to work in the District. "We have people who have chemical reactions to hair color. Your face can swell up and you can stop breathing. These things happen," Gordon said. Washingtonian Magazine recently asked, "Who Does Your Hair?" Readers responded, and out of 16 stylists listed from the District, we checked, and half are not licensed. We showed our findings to the head of the D.C. Board of Barbers and Cosmetology. "Wow, unbelievable," said Vera Winfield. She blames the problem on the District who only has eight investigators to check up on more than1,500 salons. And that's not all they do! "No, no they do everything," Winfield said. "They do restaurants, they do hotels, elevators." That's right -- eight inspectors in the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs to do it all. Those unlicensed hairdressers shouldn't worry about being caught. "There is probably an attitude that they take for granted that they will not be inspected," Winfield said. "The city would benefit from increasing their number of investigators so that we can be a little more aggressive in investigating whether someone is in compliance or not." In fact, Winfield says, it's up to the consumer to do their own inspecting. Don't sit in the stylist's chair until you've seen his or her license. It's supposed to be publicly displayed. Roberta on Camera: If the District enforced the licensing rules it could be a serious source of revenue. Fines start at $2,000 and go up for repeat violations. We first showed our list to the Board on November 10th. Officials now tell us there is an investigation. But so far no fines have been issued.

© Copyright 2009 Allbritton Communications Company All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

return to home page