Though the time frame is still unknown, city staff is back at work on an ordinance that would regulate and license the currently unchecked massage industry in Lawrence.

There is no state or local licensing to ensure massage businesses are legitimate or to differentiate a certified professional from those who use the business as a front for illicit activity. It’s been a year and a half since Douglas County District Attorney Charles Branson asked the city to create a licensing system, citing concerns that the lack of regulations was drawing human trafficking activity to Lawrence.

City Commissioner Jennifer Ananda, an attorney and social worker, recognized that creation of an ordinance had been delayed, but said getting it right was key to its success. She said she hoped to see something put forward soon that is a fair compromise.

“It is hard that it’s taking so long,” Ananda said. “I think everybody wishes that it could be done, but I also applaud the city attorney as well as the massage industry for working together to make it right, rather than to make it quick.”

The city introduced a draft ordinance a year ago, but massage professionals have criticized the draft, which includes provisions that call for client registries and drop-in inspections, as involving more policing than necessary. In that time, local human trafficking advocates have told the Journal-World that they’ve worked with young girls who report they’ve been controlled by procurers and forced to provide sexual services at Lawrence massage businesses. Earlier this year, Polaris, a nonprofit organization that fights modern slavery, issued a report stating that massage parlors are the second-largest U.S. human-trafficking industry behind escort services. The report found that there are more than 9,000 illicit massage businesses in the U.S. and that those businesses make about $2.5 billion annually from forcing victims to perform sex work.

Revisions to the ordinance are now underway, and City Manager Tom Markus reported to the commission at its meeting last week that city staff recently got input from Branson, Ananda and massage professionals on the ordinance.

Assistant City Attorney Maria Garcia said the city had two meetings with massage professionals last week. Garcia said the meetings were productive and that city staff and the massage professionals discussed how to achieve reasonable regulations that are not “unduly burdensome.” She said it was too early to tell exactly what changes would be made but that staffers would be doing further research before they started writing a new draft of the ordinance.

Ananda said she has met with city legal staff about concerns she has with the ordinance and how the city should address the issue of human trafficking and prostitution in a way that is not “reactionary.” She said while the ordinance needs to have the teeth to protect the industry from human trafficking, it should also avoid micromanaging. In addition, she said a provision that requires massage businesses to keep a client list needs to be seriously examined so as to address privacy concerns for those who haven’t committed a crime.

“I think there are some optic issues with the client registry,” Ananda said. “I’m not saying that it should or shouldn’t happen, but I think that we have to more carefully consider the repercussions in doing so.”

Ananda said addressing human trafficking also goes beyond the ordinance. She said the overall response to the problem needs to address the prosecution of those operating human-trafficking operations and their patrons. At the same time, she said human-trafficking victims also need to be protected, as many of those individuals are from vulnerable populations and have been coerced, manipulated or forced into providing sexual services by their traffickers.

City leaders have also indicated that effective regulation must involve Douglas County. When the ordinance was discussed last year, the commission directed the city to coordinate with the county in adopting regulations so as to not just push illicit businesses outside the city limits. Each government would need to pass its own regulations.

Douglas County Commissioner Nancy Thellman said the commission was aware that the city wanted to work on the regulation jointly, but right now has no information or sense of when the city might introduce the issue. Thellman said the county was interested in regulating massage businesses and that she looked forward to a full discussion. At this point, though, she said she didn’t know enough to say what challenges the county might encounter when it came to licensing and regulating massage businesses.

“I’m just waiting to hear more real information,” Thellman said. “…I know it’s of concern from lots of different angles, but we need to hear the whole story and then wade in together and see where we land.”