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About two years ago, the Stillwater state prison floated the idea of opening a regulated tattoo parlor in hopes of reducing demand for do-it-yourself tattooing. 

The unauthorized practice is a common cause of disease transmission within prisons due to unsanitary conditions and the population's higher rates of blood-borne diseases, like HIV and hepatitis C.

“When you have an unregulated industry, meaning inmates running their own field, sort of the self-styled tattoo parlors, you're not going to have the kind of disease management controls in place that you would in something like a sanctioned tattoo parlor,” said Dr. Brent Gibson, a former Federal Bureau of Prisons medical officer who consults with prisons about health issues and supports safer tattoo options. 

Stillwater’s soon-to-open program, called “Still Waters Run Deep Ink,” is also an effort to be more prudent with taxpayer-funded health care dollars.

Preventing just one blood-borne illness could save the prison a lot of money in medical costs. It currently spends around $25,000 on care for each incarcerated person who has hepatitis C, said Stillwater Warden William Bolin.

“It's a benefit to the facility, at least on our end, and hopefully reducing the amount of infection that takes place,” he said. “And it gives our population an opportunity to get a skilled trade and then, upon release, job opportunities.” 

Minnesota Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell hopes the new tattoo program will address several concerns from health to medical costs to future employment. In addition to offering new tattoos, supervised tattoo artists will be able to cover up existing tattoos that are offensive or could make finding employment upon release difficult.

He says more such programs could be introduced at the other facilities he oversees. 

“It's not fundamentally different than what we do with our barber programs, right? We train people to be barbers,” Schnell said. “They provide barbering services and facilities. People pay for that out of out of their earnings, their monies. The same would be true here.”

Stillwater's program is expected to open this fall. And while it's a novel effort in Minnesota, it's not the first prison tattoo parlor and training program in the United States.

The Missouri Department of Corrections says it was the first.

“Right now, we have over 100 different individuals who are waiting to try to get into the program,” said Alex Earls, the reentry coordinator for the department.

The first class of four Missouri trainees has been learning about safety and blood-borne diseases since July. They will begin doing tattoo art on people soon. 

“We're close, it's looking probably in the mid-October to November range when we will begin actually offering tattoos to individuals,” said Earls.

Missouri’s program excludes prisoners with behavior problems. It also requires participants to pay for their tattoos. All proposals will be vetted to make sure tattoos do not represent violence or gang activity.

There has been some criticism aimed at the state of Missouri for paying for the tattooing program, said Earls. But he said many people have come to realize that the amenity and the training makes sense.

“Public perception is always challenging when you're dealing with anything related to the incarcerated population. But for the most part, the overarching public perception is positive.”

MPR News reporter Brian Bakst contributed to this report.

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The program at the Minnesota Correctional Facility, Stillwater is part of an effort to cut down on the spread of diseases associated with underground tattooing among incarcerated people. 

Stillwater state prison to open tattoo parlor, technician training program

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