Arcadia temporarily bans new massage therapy businesses

ARCADIA - Overwhelmed by a surge in license applications averaging as high as four per day - and concerned about the possibility of prostitution - Arcadia is saying no to new massage therapy businesses.

City Council members this week placed a 45-day moratorium on all new license applications for businesses that supply massages as a secondary service - such as spas, acupuncturists and chiropractors. Arcadia also will stop issuing new licenses to massage therapists.

The ban could be extended for up to one year.

Tuesday’s council action came after Arcadia police reported on a series of inspections officers made at massage therapy businesses launched in May.

Police said they found code violations at more than 30 locations they visited. Although no prostitution-related arrests were made, officers saw enough to believe it is ongoing at some businesses, Arcadia Police Department Chief Robert Sanderson said.

“There were a couple locations where, as we approached the front door, one of the customers went running out the back,” he told City Council members.

Sanderson also singled out a Web site where users share information about sexual acts performed by massage therapists. The site contained reviews for 110 therapists in Arcadia, he said.  In the past three years, the city has handed out some 700 licenses for massage therapy. Recently, applications have risen to an average of two to four per day. Of those, Sanderson believes, only 10 percent were for legitimate therapists.

Officials said a moratorium on new ones will give them time to study the issue.

Ultimately, the council could approve stricter licensing standards for massage therapists and additional conditional use permit requirements.

Cynthia Leath, an assistant manager at Urban Retreat, a day spa with 16 massage therapists, said she supports the ban on new licenses.

“It’s keeping the ones that are legit open without other businesses that are doing illegal stuff going up and making us look bad,” she said.

But Leath also fears the ban will hurt her spa’s business.

“Not everybody stays,” she said. “So if they go, then our staff goes down, and we just expanded our business, so our clientele has gone up a lot.”

Winnie Zhang, manager of Magic Hands Spa, said she has heard rumors about prostitution at massage businesses. Her business is legitimate, she said, and she supports the ban.

“It’s a good thing. A lot of people do massages and don’t have licenses,” she said. “I don’t think it will affect our business.”

Although the ban applies to all new massage therapist licenses - even legitimate therapists - the city needed to take sweeping action in order to stay ahead of a rapidly growing problem, City Manager Don Penman said.

“There could be a legitimate massage therapist that comes in and gets caught in the trap,” said Penman. “That’s just unfortunate. But it would be too difficult to go through the process of screening - that may be one of the recommendations, that we have to have our own screening process.”

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