by Wendy Parker
The Cobb Board of Commissioners will be asked next week to adopt a six-month moratorium on issuing licenses for health spas in order to make possible changes to county ordinances.
An agenda item for a business meeting Tuesday night referenced “a growing problem with illegal and illicit activities at health spas including various code violations, prostitution and human trafficking.”
The agenda item (you can read it here) didn’t specify any incidents, but the proposed measure comes shortly after the county fined the owner of an East Cobb health spa for several violations and a review board approved a suspension of its health spa license.
While the state oversees the licensing of massage therapists in Georgia, local governments regulate the businesses.
According to county documents, Cobb business license compliance officials, as well as an investigator from the Cobb Police Department, inspected Peace Spa at 4994 Lower Roswell Road in April after receiving a complaint from a different agency “stating the possibility of sexual activities being offered.”
A summary of a Cobb License Review Board show cause hearing in May (you can read it here) said that the business, which has a license to run a health spa with massage services, didn’t have a state-licensed therapist or designated manager on the premises during business hours, which is required by law.
The only staff person who was there when inspectors arrived was a woman who was not included on an official list of Peace Spa employees, according to the show cause summary.
The owner, Xiangnan Zhang, is a state-licensed therapist, but had gone home temporarily. The summary said she was cited for three violations, including not filing an employee list with the county, not recording treatments provided and allowing unlicensed persons to provide massage therapy services.
(You can read the county code regulations on health spas by clicking here.)
The summary said Zhang pleaded guilty to the charges in Cobb Magistrate Court and paid the fines, and that the Cobb License Review Board voted to impose a two-week suspension of Peace Spa’s health spa license.
But the report, which said Zhang took over the business from a previous owner in January, did not detail any illicit activities. It said that Zhang apologized for the violations and said she would be hiring a licensed massage therapist to help with the business.
At their June 11 meeting, commissioners were to have considered a withdrawal of a request to review the suspension.
But that matter was pulled from the consent agenda with Commissioner Jerica Richardson saying it was to come back for a hearing.
Cobb’s proposed 180-day moratorium would follow similar action by the City of Roswell, which last year twice paused issuing new health spa licenses.
Undercover police discovered what they alleged was a network of prostitution and human trafficking activities at several health spas, and the city council voted to close seven of themduring the moratorium.
An AJC news report indicated the health spas in Roswell were “operating without valid licenses and had either been previously closed or changed ownership as a way to continue operating illegally.”
In the agenda item for Tuesday’s meeting, Cobb Community Services Director Jessica Guinn said that “this is a serious concern for the protection of the health, safety and welfare of the public. Community Development and Public Safety have determined that the illicit health spa establishments are evading code and law enforcement; therefore, a temporary moratorium will provide a necessary opportunity to review the Cobb County Code to enhance regulations and strengthen protections to the public by suspending any health spa applications and further reviewing this regulatory process.”
You can read the proposed resolution for the moratorium by clicking here.
The agenda item is on the commission’s consent agenda; the meeting begins at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the second floor board room of the Cobb government building (100 Cherokee St., downtown Marietta).
The full agenda can be found by clicking here.
You also can watch on thecounty’s websiteandYouTubechannels and on Cobb TV 23 on Comcast Cable.
Related:
- Cobb approves $7M Lower Roswell Road project
- Cobb voters to decide transit sales tax in November referendum
- East Piedmont Road lane closures in effect due to sewer repairs
- Cobb adopts new policy for traffic-calming in neighborhoods
- Cobb approves ridership survey for transit tax referendum
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