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By Dawn Burleigh

After word spread of a tattoo shop owner wanting to open his doors again, elected officials stepped in to help in his fight.

Randall “Flipper” Doolittle of Flipper’s Skin Flix Tattoo and Ryan Green of All About Art Tattoo wrote the paper entitled “COVID Tattoo Standards” to be submitted to Texas Governor Gregg Abbott.

The purpose of the writing is bring awareness to the high standards already in place in tattoo shops as well as how they could help prevent the spread of the coronavirus if allowed to reopen.

In one section is states, “Notice at no time in this process does the artist skin touch clients skin, THERE IS ALWAYS A PROTECTIVE BARRIER BETWEEN CLIENT AND ARTIST.”

The full document can be seen Covid Tattoo Standards

State Representatives Dade Phelan and James White composed a letter asking: ‘Could you please provide us a time tomorrow, by phone conference or other mediums, that we could bring stakeholders from our state government and the tattoo industry together and discuss how we can get this industry open and prosperous. Dade and I are confident that if you hear and what we have heard, we can come up with a path to have this industry open by Monday, May 11, 2020.’

Monday, the artist met with representatives of Congressman Brian Babin’s office in hopes to have a date for when they can reopen.

Tuesday morning, Flipper was informed the letter from White and Phelan were forwarded to the Governor’s Reopening Task Force and to Dr. Hellerstedt for their review.

Flipper is hoping for a positive outcome from the meetings.