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Memorandum
TO: Mayor Bob Murphy
Lakewood City Council
FROM: Janet Young, Legal Advisor, Office of the Chief
DATE: March 14, 2008
SUBJECT: Licensing of Massage Therapists
Background Information
The Police Department is proposing that an ordinance be presented to City Council that would require massage therapists to be licensed. The City currently has an ordinance that requires all massage parlors to be licensed. This ordinance was passed fifteen years ago. Such businesses are subject to a background investigation by the Police Department. However, the City's licensing requirement does not apply if the business employs only persons who qualify as "massage therapists." A massage therapist is someone who has completed at least 500 hours of training from an accredited school.
All of the massage parlors in the City, including those at which prostitution arrests have been made, fall under this exception. As a result, there has never been a licensed massage parlor in the City. The employees are able to purchase fraudulent certificates, normally from California schools that document the required 500 hours of training. When the Police Department checks, the schools are either closed or they "confirm" attendance by the person in question. These certificates can cost thousands of dollars.
In order to prove that the massage parlors are merely fronts for prostitution, the Special Investigations Unit of the Lakewood Police Department routinely conducts undercover operations at massage businesses throughout the City. This is a labor- intensive operation and is frequently unsuccessful due to the limitations placed on the conduct of such operations. Typically such operations require seven to ten police agents and support personnel, the majority of which are borrowed from other units. If the operation is successful, it takes eight to twelve hours to complete the operation.
To rectify this growing problem, it is recommended that massage therapists be licensed. While the cities of Aurora and Wheat Ridge license both the massage therapy centers and the massage therapists, after consultation with the City Clerk's Office, it is being proposed that only the massage therapists be licensed. If businesses that allow massage therapists to operate on their premises were required to be licensed (with exceptions for medical professionals licensed by the state, athletic trainers, licensed cosmetologists and barbers, etc.), then businesses such as day spas, and athletic clubs or work-out centers would have to be licensed. Licensing would involve fingerprinting, photographing, and conducting background investigations on the owners, partners, and managers involved in the operation of such businesses.
Proposed provisions of the massage therapist licensing ordinance
The proposed ordinance would:
• Require that any person who offers to perform or performs a massage in exchange for something of value must be licensed as a massage therapist (with listed exceptions including hospitals, nursing and convalescent homes, licensed cosmetologists, manicurists, barbers, athletic trainers, licensed acupuncturists, reflexologists, and students of licensed educational institutions);
• Make it illegal for any person, manager, or business to employ, allow, or permit any unlicensed person to act as a massage therapist;
• Require every applicant for a massage therapy license to be photographed and fingerprinted and to submit a completed application form;
• Require every applicant to submit an official certificate and transcripts indicating competition of a minimum of 500 hours of training in massage therapy from a qualified massage therapy school, together with either proof of satisfactory completion of the national certification examination for therapeutic massage or proof of membership in good standing in one of two professional massage therapist organizations;
• Require every massage therapist currently working in the City to submit a completed license application within 90 days after the effective date of the ordinance;
• Subject every applicant to a background investigation and make conviction of any sexual offense or any crime involving prostitution grounds for denial of the application;
• Allow licenses to remain valid for as long as the massage therapists continues to work within the City, unless revoked or suspended;
• Establish procedures for the denial, suspension, or revocation of licenses;
• Require licensed massage therapists to display the license in the place of business and to have a photographic identification card that would have to be presented upon demand of a peace officer or a designee of the City Clerk;
• Restrict the attire of massage therapist and persons working in the massage therapy center, including requiring the wearing of fully opaque clothing that covers the massage therapist fully from four inches below the collar bone to the mid-thigh;
• Prohibit massage therapists from touching intimate parts of clients or engaging in, encouraging, requesting, or permitting any acts of sexual intercourse or masturbation;
• Grant to the Police Department the right of inspection;
• Prohibit massages between nine p.m. and six a.m.; and
• Repeal Chapter 5.52 of the Lakewood Municipal Code that licenses massage parlors.
Conclusion
It is anticipated that the passage of a massage therapist licensing requirement will largely eliminate the need for time-consuming undercover operations at massage parlors across the City. Instead of being required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt in a criminal trial that the masseuse was really a prostitute, the prosecution will merely have to prove that the masseuse was unlicensed and offered a massage in exchange for money or other thing of value.
/ljm
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