Cutting Remarks : Curious About Citizen Concerns, City Hall Figures Only Beauticians Know for Sure

When Santa Clarita officials wanted to know what was on citizens’ minds, they turned to those who get in the people’s hair.

That was why the city spent $400 to feed and interview 50 hairdressers, manicurists and makeup artists at City Hall Monday.

“Everyone talks to their beauty professionals. We’d just like to know the kinds of things people are saying,” Mayor Carl Boyer III explained.

The unusual outreach effort transformed the normally sedate City Council chambers into a set worthy of a television interview show. Sitting on the dais facing the audience were four cosmetologists, two of whom were chosen because they trim the hair and buff the nails of the city officials.

Trailing a microphone cord and occasionally consulting a script containing jokes that included gibes at his own balding scalp, Assistant City Manager Ken Puhlskamp kept up a running patter with perfectly coiffed panelists and members of the audience. The hairdressers, most of whom had what appeared to be blond or red hair-dye jobs, sipped diet sodas and nibbled brownies.

“We’re going to orchestrate this somewhat like the Phil Donahue show, so I’d like to introduce you to four panelists who’ve permanently scarred their clients,” joked Puhlskamp.

Puhlskamp, 35, is losing his hair.

“There’s a vicious rumor going around town that I’m going bald, but what you don’t realize is this is just a perm gone bad,” he said, tripping over the microphone cord.

Hairdresser and panelist K.C. Caesar, who sported a longish blond bob, also took a swipe at her profession.

“What my clients are most worried about is what I’m going to do to them,” Caesar said.

Another beautician jokingly called out from the audience that the city should do something about relieving congestion on San Fernando Road because her customers are always late due to the traffic.

But other shampoo and blow-dry experts responded seriously to the city’s invitation to pass on their customers’ concerns. They recited a familiar list of complaints, including gripes about traffic, growth and the lack of recreational facilities in the 3 1/2-year-old city.

“You can only bowl so much,” said Beverly Meeks, a manicurist in Saugus who wore Fuschia Rage on her acrylic nails.

The audience burst into applause when Puhlskamp surmised that what hairdressers know for sure is that residents of Santa Clarita would welcome a Nordstrom department store so they wouldn’t have to go to the San Fernando Valley to shop.

Some stylists were reluctant to let their hair down.

“There are a lot of things my clients tell me that I just can’t divulge,” said Jimmy Tillinghast, 41, a Valencia stylist with a shoulder-length, graying mane and a beard.

George Bright, administrative director of the National Cosmetology Assn., which is based in St. Louis, Mo., said stylists and others enjoy a close relationship with their clients, primarily because of the intimate, physical contact involved in having one’s hair cut or nails trimmed. The city’s uncommon approach to finding out what residents think is “a very smart decision,” he said.

Councilwoman Jan Heidt, who attended the luncheon, said she was pleased that the city had managed to establish a rapport with a group of people who don’t attend City Council meetings. City officials have complained that town meetings held to encourage participation have been sparsely attended.

Heidt said the city should reach out to other service providers who regularly interact with the public, including mail carriers, who she insisted, in the face of skepticism from her colleagues, talk with residents. City officials said privately that they will not invite bartenders because they do not want to appear to be encouraging drinking.

Puhlskamp, who teased the beauticians throughout the 1 1/2-hour luncheon, may have met his match in the end. Harry Craig, who owns Hairy’s Barbershop in Newhall, approached him afterward and told him he could restore Puhlskamp’s brown hair to its former, shoulder-length glory.

“All we’d have to do,” Craig said, “is shrink your head.”