For more than two hours on Nov. 6 Centerville officials, residents and business owners hashed out the issue of a tattoo parlor/body art studio, or a beauty salon doing fine line tattooing, being located in the community. The room was packed with people anxious to have their say.

All of this was in response to resident Nicole Hutchins asking to have a new addition added to the definitions section of the Centerville zoning code which would allow fine line tattooing and also allow that use in any commercial zone.

Hutchins already offers permanent cosmetics at the New Trend Salon owned by Delle and Karen George at 66 North Main Street, Centerville.

“Currently I am legally able to tattoo permanent makeup on a client's face – eyebrows, lips, eyeliner, beauty marks, freckles – but I am not allowed to tattoo an initial on someone’s arm even though I am using the exact same needle size, the exact same tattoo machine to perform both forms of art,” Hutchins said.

The planning commission  and city staff both recommended denying Hutchins’ application because mixing the two definitions of certain permanent cosmetics uses and tattoo establishments into a new category identified as “Body Art Studio” “could lead to zoning application confusion and uncertainty as more potential businesses might explore doing business within Centerville and have scattered questions regarding variations of this category of use,” the staff report said.

Also, this proposed zoning policy change “is not good planning practice or policy and creates too significant of a chaotic, non- directional impact to the commercial interests of each of the commercial districts in the city,” it said.

Hutchins’ request is not consistent with the general plan or the city’s core applicable zoning codes, Community Development Director Michael Eggett told the city council that evening. It is “overly broad and logistically difficult to administer.”

Twenty-six people spoke at the public hearing; of those 12 were supportive of Hutchins’ request, 12 were opposed and two said they could see both sides of the argument.

Of those who spoke in favor, several said that Hutchins had a small operation within an existing salon providing permanent cosmetics for her clients and only wanted to expand her business within that framework. They also spoke to the constitutionality of allowing free expression.

“Let us be a city that celebrates diversity, supports local entrepreneurs and recognizes the importance of personal expression,” Karen George said. “I urge you to consider the positive impact of this change and to move forward with amending our regulations to allow fine line tattooing in Centerville under the personal services code.”

On the other side, some said they liked tattoos, other said they didn’t, but they all said they feared granting Hutchins’ request would open the door to full-scale tattoo parlors in multiple zones in the city. They were particularly opposed to them being located on Main Street where New Trend already has its premises.

“It's not even a question about whether this is a tattoo parlor or something else,” Larry Wright said. “It's the fact that we have someone making a request to change an ordinance that's going to have an impact across the community … What this request is doing is asking for the application of possible tattoo establishments across multiple commercial zones so we can’t control what’s going to come in later.”

 After the public hearing, Hutchins spoke briefly.

 “I probably should have just asked for it to be put in a medium zone which would have been easier and probably not caused so much trouble,” she said. “I’m not asking for you guys to just change it for me. … I also don’t necessarily want a tattoo parlor, but I think it’s kind of discriminatory for people to assume that because there’s a tattoo parlor or because someone’s performing tattoos that we’re going to get a vape shop and an adult novelty store because those things all go together.” 

In the end, the city council said they would take the information and opinions presented under advisement and utilize it to help them make an informed decision when the issue comes before them for a vote. 

Another public hearing will be held on this issue in four to six weeks. It is likely it will be voted on that evening.