‘Moms For Family and Community’ Oppose Massage Establishment That Could Replace Blockbuster Store

A representative of “Moms For Family and Community,” a recent homegrown group that hopes to reach out to other communities in the near future, told the South Pasadena City Council Wednesday night to help stop the potential opening of the four-square-mile city’s 15th massage parlor at the location of the current Blockbuster store.

“It has recently been brought to our attention that another massage parlor wants to lease the property located at 1100 Fair Oaks Avenue in South Pasadena,” Lisa Boyd, the MFC member told the city council at its bimonthly meeting, pointing out that the soon-to-close Blockbuster store is located at that address.

“There are already four such businesses within a two-block radius and soon to be another one where Out of The Closet used to be,” Boyd said. “Why do we need another one?”

Hundreds of students walk along that stretch of Fair Oaks on their way to and from school every day, Boyd pointed out. (Asked by South Pasadena Patch how she knows that a massage establishment may replace the Blockbuster store after it closes in January, Boyd replied that she had heard it “over the grapevine.”)

“We strive hard to make this a wonderful community for our families and our children and we need to bring businesses that support these same values,” she said, adding: “Do we really need another massage parlor for them to walk past? What kind of message does this give our kids, our families and our community?”

Speaking during the council’s public comment period, Boyd said she had relocated from Austin, TX, to South Pas because of the city's good schools and small-community feel. ("Massage parlors here, massage parlors there," she told Patch after her comments to the city council, adding: "We could have stayed in Austin—there were many massage parlors off of Congress [Avenue].")

Boyd urged the city council to encourage new businesses that will support the local community in ways that make South Pasadena the “amazing city” it strives to be.

“We are not saying, No to massage parlors, we are saying No More massage parlors,” she said, referring to recent news reports that have quoted City Manager Sergio Gonzalez as saying that South Pasadena already has as many as 14 massage parlors. 

In response to Boyd’s comment, Councilmember Michael Cacciotti said that the proliferation of massage parlors has been a long-running issue not just in South Pasadena but the entire San Gabriel Valley.

Cacciotti asked City Attorney Richard Adams II if it would be technically appropriate for the city manager to respond to a public comment such as the one Boyd had made.

Adams replied that the Brown Act does allow a brief response to public comments, but not a debate, prompting Gonzalez to explain the legal difficulties in regulating massage establishments in the city.

Because the powerful massage establishment industry is well represented by lobbyists in Sacramento, the industry helped in the passage of a 2008 state law (SB 731) that treats massage therapists on par with “professionals” such as doctors, dentists and architects, Gonzalez said.

As a result, massage establishments cannot be regulated differently from the offices of other professionals, Gonzalez said, explaining that if the City of South Pasadena decides where—and how many—massage establishments can open on a particular street, it would have to apply the same standard to the offices of physicians and other professionals.

However, SB 731 is scheduled to sunset on Jan. 1, 2015, and South Pasadena is working with the League of California Cities to try to regain regulation over massage parlors, Gonzalez said.

The city manager's comments came on the same day that the League of California Cities predicted that the policy implications of SB 731 would be "hotly debated in 2014" and that cities ought to "engage in the process." City officials, the league said in a post on its website, "will need to review proposed policies, share their experiences with massage establishments in their communities, in legislative hearings and work to create better policies in this area." 

Moms for Family and Community is planning to meet in a couple of weeks, Boyd told Patch. Anyone interested in joining the meeting should contact Lisa or Amy at nedohr2077@aol.com.

Related: City Manager: ‘We Cannot Regulate Massage Establishments Differently’

Editor's note: An earlier version of this article inaccurately reflected a quote from Lisa Boyd about massage parlors on Congress Avenue in Austin, TX. The quote has been corrected.