The Barbering and Cosmetology Advisory Board met on January 31 to discuss staff reports, workgroup assignments, training, and allow for public comment. An archive video of this meeting can be found here.

This report is intended to give you an overview and highlight of the discussions on the various topics taken up. It is not a verbatim transcript of the discussions but is based upon what was audible or understandable to the observer and the desire to get details out as quickly as possible with few errors or omissions.

Item B: Roll call, Certification of Quorum and Introductions

  • Inderman – Absent
  • Lindsay – Current board Chair and previous board member
  • Figueroa – Chairman of TDLR Commission
  • Farthing – Served on various TDLR Boards
  • Valdez – Cosmetologist and educator; owns a cosmetology school in Austin
  • Peterson – Owner of Finley’s Barbershop
  • Holman – Nail & Joy Hair owner in Plano
  • Leonard – Barber school educator in Austin
  • Flores – District Director for McCallan ISD
  • Callier – TDLR Commissioner
  • Jemison Jr. – Franklin Institute owner
  • Francis – Executive director for TDLR
    • Read HB 1560
  • Winston – TDLR Advising Board attorney

 

Item D: Public Comment

Lily BenĂ­tez

  • Director of Blade Craft Barber Academy
  • Has been confusion on the email about changing the name of barber technician license to esthetics holding license
  • Whenever an email is being sent regarding licenses, a member of the board should review them
  • Regarding HB 1560
    • PSI is the form barbers use for testing
    • All schools should have a grade or result of the written and practical exams
    • Could the board help hold cosmetology schools to a better standard
  • Why did legislature change the barber technician license to the esthetics holding license?
    • Esthetics holding license does not include hair braiding but barber technician did
    • Were there more esthetics holding licenses than barber technicians?

 

Item F: Staff Reports

Molly Fudell, Representative from Office of the General Counsel

  • Oversee any litigation the board is involved with; work on collections
  • Have an open records attorney
  • 47 proposals filed and 41 proposals adopted
  • Total pending proposals as of 12/31/21 – 86
  • On track to process even more requests than last year

 

Yvonne Lopez, Representative from Licensing Division

  • Staff of 71 to review license applications/renewals and Dede McEachern is head of division
  • 1 staff member to 12,000 license holders
  • Have 39 programs and include over 200 different license types
  • 73% of licensed populations are individuals
  • 9 different licensing processes and are currently working on getting a single system
  • Student applications mainly come through public schools
  • Average application backlog has decreased
  • Jamison – Regarding continuing education, are those licenses renewed online or only by mail?
    • They can be done both ways
  • Jamison – Still be separating exams by reports, correct?
    • Yes

 

Jacqueline Rush, Manager in Customer Service Division

  • Assist applicants through application process
  • Team includes frontline customer service reps, embedded service reps, ombudsmen, quality training performance analyst, managers, and the director
  • Communicate via phone email and social media
  • First point of contact between the customer and the agency

 

John Medlock, Chief Prosecutor for Enforcement Division

  • Ronald Foster is the director of the Enforcement Division
  • Broken into three subgroups:
    • Intake – led by Chery Wilson
    • Investigation – led by Art Arevalo
    • Prosecution – led by John Medlock
  • Enforcement division’s job is to investigate and resolve complaints that come into the department
  • Complaints come into intake for assessment
  • Gets moved to investigators to take statement and collect documents than write reports
  • Report gets moved to the prosecution section
  • Complaints characterized from three sources
    • Consumer – sources outside agency
    • Department – sources inside agency
    • Criminal History – complaints arising from criminal background history
  • The enforcement plan describes the ranges of penalties
  • Complaint resolution procedures manual provides standard procedures to all division staff handling complaints
  • The criminal conviction guidelines set out specific criminal convictions that may render an applicant unsuitable

 

Ray Pizarro, Director of Education and Examination Division

  • Oversee requirements for examinations, continuing Education, and pre-licensure education
  • 20 staff members; involved with 31 of the 39 programs regulated by TDLR
  • Approve schools and school’s curriculum
  • Licensing handles individuals, this division handless the business practices
  • Will work in depth with board once work groups are provided
  • Administer more than 75,000 exams each yea and provide training
  • Class A Barber still exists, no change in name
  • Engage in contract development on behalf of TDLR
    • PSI contract
  • Jemison – Can barbers get renewal of payments online
    • Not currently, want to make these changes and anticipate that it will happen
  • Flores – Will every license have the same name as before or will they change?
    • Some will stay the same, but some will have a changed title
    • Class A titles will stay the same

 

Charlotte Melder, Director of Regulatory Program Management Division

  • Is the single point of contact for anyone in the industry for question and concerns
  • Responsible for all programs except for education related programs
  • Heather Moorer – Responsible for barbering and cosmetology program
  • Response to sunset commissions review
    • Tasked by sunset to be more data driven
    • Have a data specialist so all programs have analytical tools
  • Angela Sanders and Sean O’Neal tasked with assisting barber and cosmetology program
  • Current projects:
    • Implementation of HB 1560
    • Updated health and safety rules posting for barber and cosmetology
    • Reviewing licensing and examination requirements to update equivalency determinations
    • Updating internal standard operating procedures

 

Eric Beverly, Director of Field Inspections Division

  • Performs onsite and virtual inspections
  • This division is divided into an SAT team and four regions each with a specific manager
  • Pre-license and periodic inspections
  • Began development of Risk-based inspections in response to new sunset ruling
  • Oversee third-party inspections for mold remediation
  • May provide educational presentations and information to licensees, consumers, and municipal officials
  • Provide roughly 25,500 inspections per year
  • Trained to identify and report signs of human trafficking

 

Teresa Alvarez, Representative for Office of Process and Product Management

  • Positions TDLR for completion of projects and growth
  • Comprised of the process review and enhancement partners and the enterprise project management office
  • Process Review and Enhancement Partners (PREP) reduces deficiencies
  • Agency wide standard approach to project delivery
  • Transparent project status information for the agency
  • Perform scenario planning exercise
  • Perform division gap analysis
  • Assist with interviews at the executive level
  • Provide insight to executives
  • Deliver training on project efficiency

 

Steve Bruno, Senior government Relations Officer for Office of Strategic Communication

  • Provides advisory board support and coordinates anti-trafficking efforts
  • Responsible for all communications – social media, promotional materials, new media relations, etc.
  • Responsible for TDLR’s Government Relation’s
  • Design’s and maintains TDLR’s public website and internet

 

David Gonzalez, Executive Office

  • Charged with providing leadership for the agency
  • Brian Frances – Executive Director
  • Christina Kaiser – Deputy of Executive Director
  • 3 deputies to support the Executive Director
  • Several Groups in the Executive Office
    • General Counsel
    • Process and Project Management
    • Strategic Communications
    • Budgeting
    • Human Resources
    • Information’s Security Group
  • 28 bill implementation teams to work on legislation; 10 of them responsible on working on sunset bill
    • These teams update agency procedures
  • Communicate the changes that have been made in the law to the regulated agencies
  • Sunset review of TDLR began 2019
    • Staff report came out June 2020
    • Report was voted on by Sunset Commission
    • Sunset Bill passed on last day of session
  • Two types of changes through sunset
    • Statute changes
    • Management Action Recommendations
  • Instructed TDLR to collect data on a more consistent basis
  • Bill Team number 17 headed by Ray Pizarro and Steve Bruno deals with barber and cosmetology
  • Article 3 of sunset bill discusses merge of barber and cosmetology

 

Item G: Workgroup Assignments

Education and Examination Work Group

  • Leonard, Holman, Flores, Valdez

 

Enforcement Workgroup

  • Jemison, Farthing, Lindsay, Holman

 

Health and Safety Workgroup

  • Farthing, Peterson, Lindsay, Valdez

 

Licensing Workgroup

  • Jemison, Leonard, Peterson, Flores

 

Item H: Recommendations for agenda items for the next Advisory Board meeting

  • Mary Winston, TDLR Host – Work group report

 

Item I: Discussion of date, time, and location of next advisory board meeting

  • Ana Calvo, TDLR Host – Will meet again after work groups have met

 

Adjournment