Cosmetologist's Plea To Cuomo: 'Don't Dismiss Us... Partner With Us'
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - Small business owners are frustrated and want to know when they can open.
CBS2 took the question straight to Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
CBS2's Jenna DeAngelis spoke to a cosmetologist making a plea of her own.
"It's more than just a hair cut, or the hair color. It's the connection with people," said Candice Rios.
Rios got emotional explaining how important her work is. She's been a cosmetologist for 26 years with a passion to help others look and feel good.
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"I'm probably gonna get upset, sorry. I had a client, years ago, I was part of the Cut It Out program for domestic violence, and you can really help people just by them sitting in your chair," Rios said.
But she hasn't had someone in her chair for months, and feels there's no plan from Cuomo to change that for her industry anytime soon.
"I have friends that own salons that might never recover. You put your whole life into this career, and to have it just ripped away from you and just dismissed is very frustrating," she said.
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Rios said she felt "ridiculed by my governor" after seeing an interview two weeks ago on late night TV addressing the opening of barber shops an salons.
In an interview on The Daily Show With Trevor Noah, Cuomo said "People would argue, but in the scope of things they're not that essential because they are high risk... I want to see a person perform a haircut and maintain social distancing while they give you a haircut and I wanna see the haircut that they do after they did it socially distant."
"You're right, you can't do a haircut six feet away, it's impossible," Rios said. "But there's precautions we take every day now that are required by the state board as part of sanitation, cleaning your station and tools between every client, wearing gloves already... We can take additional safety measures if you want, to wear a mask, wear a shield, wear a gown."
Rios is one of many people who feel they can go back to work safely. Business owners are even coming up with creative ways to do so, so CBS2 took their plea directly to Cuomo.
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"If a business owner right now says, I have a super creative way to do this, I can do it immediately and be safe. You're talking about smart New Yorkers, intelligent New Yorkers. Do you trust that and do you move forward?" asked CBS2's Dave Carlin.
"We have a very detailed reopening plan with very detailed steps. We look at different regions in the state because there are different situations in different regions," Cuomo said.
The governor said there are factual data points to look at in each region, including low infection rate, health care capacity and more, before deciding which businesses can reopen.
"Businesses that are most essential and pose the lowest risk should go first. Construction jobs, because construction jobs especially exterior construction jobs, workers are basically socially distanced by the nature of the work and can wear masks," Cuomo said. "And then you can even go business by business."
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"So what's your message to Governor Cuomo?" DeAngelis asked Rios.
"Don't dismiss us, we're your constituents, we vote," she said. "Just partner with us. We don't want it to be an us versus them. Talk to us. We're feeling very ignored and not being communicated with."
Rios is just asking for this industry to be part of the conversation, to work together to safely get the economy back up and running.
