Erin Cox, WTNH-TV (New Haven, Connecticut), January 23, 2009
Communicating with customers is important for hair salons and barber shops alike. But for shop workers, in Waterbury, a state code about language may pose a business barrier for some.
Have you ever tried to explain to a hair stylist how you wanted your hair cut and it still didn’t turn out right?
Now, it’s not the style but the language which could mean hair dressers and barbers are out of business.
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A new city process will now verify employees have a state license to cut hair; the one Rodriguez got in Florida doesn’t cut it. So, he’ll have to take the Connecticut test.
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The state requires barbers and hair stylists to pass the licensing test but the test is only given in English. And, half the men who work there would not be able to pass that test.
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There is now an effort to also administer the test in Spanish so that barber shops and salons catering to Latinos may stay open.
“We have a 40 percent Hispanic populatoin in Waterbury,” Torrent [Juan Torrent, translator] said. “We are not asking for minority treatment; we are just asking for something that is reasonable.”
There are 100 Spanish-speaking barbers and hairdressers in Waterbury. According to the Latino American Chamber of Commerce, other state’s do administer a similar test in Spanish.
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Original article
(Posted on January 26, 2009)
Comments
The Connecticut Hispanic barbers appear to be anti-English speaking customers. If the Hispanics are unable to speak English they should not get a license because this discriminates against English speaking customers and makes the Hispanics a hindrance or a hazard during emergencies. I am aware that many of the new immigrants from Latin America cannot read in any language but if they cannot read the regulations and fill out the forms in English they should not have a license for any job since they cannot do the job properly.
I am from Connecticut and Waterbury was 20 minutes up the road. It’s main industry was Scovill manufacturing until the place was deliberately gutted and put out of business. Waterbury lost it’s biggest employer and taxbase. It used to be known as the “Brass City” for all the brass mills there. It is a very historic town with a beautiful green with a magnificent Civil War Monument. Now this is what it has come to. A mexican barrio. When will the people of this country wake up and realize that these people don’t want to assimilate!!!!!!!
I knew a man who owned a small brass shop there. Some of the items he made were harness fittings that he sold to amish harness makers. I bought an amish-made harness and mentioned that it probably had his brass. He said that the fittings were now coming from Pakistan because the afganistans were sending children into minefields to pick up Russian artillery shells for the brass. My american made harness (probably) had russian brass via afghanistan and pakistan. But the “CSA” buttons I bought (confederate states america) in Gettysburg, are still made in Waterbury, Connecticut. Go figure!
No hispanic barbers want the U.S. to be Mexico. Isn’t that really the goal of most Mexicans lately? If not, why won’t they learn English and get with the program?
Well we’ve got Connecticut beat hands down here in North Carolina on licensing of hairdressers. The NC Cosmetology Board will accept any document of licensure in that trade from foreign countries that appears “reasonably authentic”.
It’d be one thing if the Hispanics only wanted things in Spanish and prefernces for their people if they were in the Southwest. However, they want the entire country. Remember Hitler? He told Chamberlin that he just wanted the Sudentland back and then there would be peace. The rest is history…
Underdog,. I agree. When I went to get a driver’s license here, they made me jump through hoops, but I didn’t fail to notice all the hispanics in the office with friends translating for them. What where they in there for??? I had to provide a birth certificate and a ss card to prove I was a US citizen. The state government here makes me feel like I live in a socialist country already. They take almost as much in state taxes as federal does and that starts at dollar ONE. And it seems that every other person here is on “disability”. They even tax food here.
Interestingly, when they are trying to sneak into our country, they don’t say up fromt what will they be demanding once they are here.
On the contrary. They claim that the only thing they want is to have a chance to contribute to the betterness of American society while improving their lives in the process.
THey quickly change their testimony, don’t they?
One more reason to seal the border and keep them, illegals, south of it (in addition to deporting those already here).
As a Canadian I can only say that for America this whole language issue is a slippery slope and a Trojan horse.
Well I feel awful about Rodriguez’s little dilemma. What do think the chances are of Rodriguez, his customers and a large amount of Waterbury’s population are in this country illegally? Yet, they have the nerve to want the rules changed to suit their needs. This is absurd! Throw them out NOW.
Hispanics will continue to demand more and more until their demands are rammed right down their throats by a public that has finally had enough of them and wants them gone…
