Court Opinion

ID: 9571810
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:35:22.365226+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:31:02.677523
License: Public Domain

Dore, J.
(dissenting) — I would uphold the constitutionality of all the provisions of resolution 22518 amending chapter 50.16 of the Pierce County Code, except those codified in section 50.16.360. This section requires recordkeep-ing of patrons' names, addresses, etc. The resolution is presumed valid, and the remaining provisions bear a rational relationship to the underlying purpose of the resolution.
I
Properly enacted statutes are presumed constitutional. As we held in In re Marriage of Johnson, 96 Wn.2d 255, 258, 634 P.2d 877 (1981), this court will sustain statutes whenever it can conceive any set of facts which support the statute's constitutionality, and will accept as a verity any legislative declaration of the statute's public purpose, unless arbitrary or unreasonable.
In Spokane v. Bostrom, 12 Wn. App. 116, 528 P.2d 500 (1974), the Court of Appeals upheld the conviction of a massage parlor operator for operation during restricted hours. The defendant had appealed his conviction challenging the constitutionality of the ordinance which *714required massage parlors and bathhouses to close between the hours of 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. The court stated at pages 117-18:
A municipal corporation may, in the lawful exercise of its police power, regulate massage parlors and massagists.
Thus, the limited issue presented is whether the mandatory closure constitutes a reasonable exercise of the City's police power.
The judiciary should not invade the province of the legislative branch of government. In an attempt to define the boundaries of judicial review of legislative action, certain limitations upon the court have been established:
(a) Any ordinance regularly enacted is presumed constitutional. The presumption applies here.
(b) If a state of facts which would justify the legislation can reasonably be conceived to exist, courts must presume it did exist and the legislation was passed for that purpose. There is no requirement that the court find facts justifying the legislation.
(c) An ordinance to be void for unreasonableness must be clearly and plainly unreasonable.
(d) The burden of establishing the invalidity of an ordinance rests heavily upon the party challenging its constitutionality.
(Citations omitted.) Thus, every possible presumption is to be indulged in favor of the constitutionality of an ordinance. Winkenwerder v. Yakima, 52 Wn.2d 617, 624, 328 P.2d 873 (1958); Spokane v. Coon, 3 Wn.2d 243, 100 P.2d 36 (1940).
II
Under a minimum scrutiny rational basis equal protection test, (1) the provisions of an ordinance must bear a real and substantial relationship to the true purpose of the act; and (2) there must, in reality, exist some basis for distinguishing between those within and without the designated class. Equitable Shipyards, Inc. v. State, 93 Wn.2d 465, 611 P.2d 396 (1980); Seattle v. Pullman, 82 Wn.2d 794, 514 P.2d 1059 (1973). It is this standard which I now apply to the requirements of the massage ordinance.
*715A
Liability Insurance Coverage
The $300,000 liability insurance coverage provision is within the regulatory power of the County. I agree with the trial judge who observed in his oral opinion that some patron may be burned or otherwise injured while using a sauna. The majority of businesses are required to carry liability insurance to cover such contingencies. Moreover, neither the due process clause nor the equal protection clause compels a legislative body to remedy all of an evil or none. United States v. Carotene Prods. Co., 304 U.S. 144, 151, 82 L. Ed. 1234, 58 S. Ct. 778 (1938). That other business operations may pose equal or greater risk of injury does not bar legislative action here. The majority agrees that this provision is well within the regulatory powers of the County. I concur.
B
Installation of Overhead Fire Sprinkler Systems
The majority holds that despite the stated purpose of protecting the public health, safety and welfare, the ordinance was really enacted to restrict lewd and immoral activities. Appellants cite 303 W. 42nd St. Corp. v. Klein, 58 A.D.2d 778, 396 N.Y.S.2d 385 (1977) as analogous to the subject case. In Klein, the court held that the government could not put "Show-World", which conducted "sexually oriented activities", out of business simply by imposing fire safety codes requiring prohibitively expensive sprinkler systems.
As indicated in Bostrom, at page 118, however, if a state of facts which would justify the legislation can reasonably be conceived to exist, courts must presume it did exist and the legislation was passed for that purpose. There is no requirement that the court find facts justifying the legislation. The sheriff testified in hearings before the Pierce County Board of County Commissioners that sauna parlors, with steam and high heat, are particularly susceptible to fire and represent a fire hazard. Even if massage parlors did not present such an enhanced risk, the Board might well *716have concluded that massage parlor patrons are particularly susceptible to fire danger. A customer wrapped in nothing but a towel during his or her massage or relaxing with his or her eyes closed in a steam room might well react less quickly to fire than customers in a more standard retail setting.
Further, the Board is no more obliged to enact an all-encompassing remedy here than it is with respect to liability insurance. All businesses pose some fire hazard and the Board is not obliged to act with respect to all at once. This requirement is clearly reasonable and does not violate equal protection provisions of the constitution.
C
Minimum Education Requirement
The majority resolved that the educational requirement as contained in the resolution bears no reasonable relationship to the underlying purpose of the ordinance and that it does not serve to restrict lewd or immoral activity. While the educational requirement may well serve to restrict lewd or immoral activity, the stated purposes of the ordinance are the protection of public health, safety and welfare. We are persuaded by the County's argument that massagists without any instruction in the profession could endanger the health of patrons, even though such employees may have passed a difficult state test when they became licensed masseurs.
This result comports with the reasoning of courts in other jurisdictions which have upheld more stringent education requirements for massage parlor employees. See Rogers v. Miller, 401 F. Supp. 826, 828 (E.D. Va. 1975) (1,000 hours of study); MRM, Inc. v. Davenport, 290 N.W.2d 338 (Iowa 1980) (750 hours of study); Massage Parlors, Inc. v. Mayor & City Coun., 284 Md. 490, 498 n.5, 398 A.2d 52 (1979) (upholding a 500-hour requirement). The American Massage Therapy Association requires 1,000 hours of course work. I would uphold the validity of the ordinance's educational requirement.
*717D
Uniform Requirement
The ordinance amendment also requires that persons employed as massagists shall wear "washable professional type apparel or uniforms" and must be "fully clothed, neat and clean" while on the premises. The majority would have you believe that this provision is void for vagueness.
I do not find the phrase "washable professional type apparel or uniforms" vague. While this language might have been drafted with greater precision, this does not, in itself, render the ordinance constitutionally infirm. Harper v. Lindsay, 616 F.2d 849, 857 (5th Cir. 1980). The description "professional type", which we construe as qualifying both "apparel" and "uniforms" must be read in light of the total ordinance of which it is a part. See State v. Wanrow, 88 Wn.2d 221, 228, 559 P.2d 548 (1977). I interpret it as requiring massagists to wear apparel of the type customarily worn by others in the profession.
With respect to the terms "fully clothed, neat and clean", appellants' complaint is not wholly without merit. These terms may well be constitutionally vague as applied to some conduct; for example, it is unclear whether they encompass the wearing of a bathing suit. On the other hand, other conduct is clearly within or outside the statute; for example, nudity is clearly barred and the wearing of a nurse-type uniform is clearly permitted. The statute is thus only "partially vague"; i.e., it is vague as to only some conduct. See Evans, Void-For-Vagueness — Judicial Response to Allegedly Vague Statutes — State v. Zuanich, 92 Wn.2d 61, 593 P.2d 1314 (1979), 56 Wash. L. Rev. 131, 136-37 (1980).
When a statute is only partially vague, a party has standing to challenge it only if that party has engaged in or seeks to engage in conduct within the "gray area". See Parker v. Levy, 417 U.S. 733, 756, 41 L. Ed. 2d 439, 94 S. Ct. 2547 (1974); State v. Sherman, 98 Wn.2d 53, 56, 653 P.2d 612 (1982); Note, The Void-for-Vagueness Doctrine in the Supreme Court, 109 U. Pa. L. Rev. 67, 101 (1960). In this declaratory judgment action, appellants propose no *718specific apparel they wish to wear. They, therefore, lack standing to challenge the validity of the phrase "fully clothed, neat and clean". Cf. United Pub. Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U.S. 75, 90, 91 L. Ed. 754, 67 S. Ct. 556 (1947) (public workers could not challenge ban on "political activity" until clear what activity they wished to engage in). The majority is extremely vague in its analysis of this section.
E
Two-Way Viewing Requirement
The majority holds that the requirements of unobstructed doorways and windows violate the patrons' privacy rights. The United States Supreme Court held in Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, 413 U.S. 49, 65-66, 37 L. Ed. 2d 446, 93 S. Ct. 2628, reh'g denied, 414 U.S. 881, 38 L. Ed. 2d 128, 94 S. Ct. 27 (1973), cert. denied, 418 U.S. 939, 41 L. Ed. 2d 1173, 94 S. Ct. 3227 (1974) that the constitutional right to privacy extends only to fundamental rights. The Court stated:
Our prior decisions recognizing a right to privacy guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment included "only personal rights that can be deemed 'fundamental' or 'implicit in the concept of ordered liberty."' This privacy right encompasses and protects the personal intimacies of the home, the family, marriage, motherhood, procreation, and child rearing. Nothing, however, in this Court's decisions intimates that there is any "fundamental" privacy right "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty” to watch obscene movies in places of public accommodation.
(Citations omitted.)
While there are no Washington cases on this issue, the Alaska Supreme Court in 1980 held there was no subjective expectation of privacy either for the operators or customers of a public business which purports to ofifer legitimate massages. Hilbers v. Anchorage, 611 P.2d 31 (Alaska 1980). Additionally, in J.B.K., Inc. v. Caron, 600 F.2d 710 (8th Cir. 1979), the court stated the right to privacy did not extend to all sexual practices performed in private, including the commercialized sexual activities regulated in that *719case.
The trial court in the present case observed that an unobstructed doorway would protect patrons in case of fire. Such a windowed doorway would also make it easier for personnel to observe whether the person taking a sauna had succumbed to the heat and steam. The trial judge found this provision of the resolution reasonable and I agree.
F
Prior Convictions as Basis for Revocation or Suspension
Appellant massagists argue an automatic denial of a license or a refusal to renew their licenses regardless of the nature of the offense violates their due process rights. The offenses listed include those of force, sexual misconduct, narcotics or dangerous drugs, moral turpitude and fraud, and felonious use of dangerous weapons. The ordinance provides an appeal process for suspension or revocation, including stringent notice requirements. It also permits issuance or renewal despite a prior conviction of the types specified if the conviction is at least 5 years old.
Initially, we note that these general categories of crimes are not to be construed in their abstract sense apart from their relevance to fitness to be a massagist. Cf. Gaylord v. Tacoma Sch. Dist. 10, 88 Wn.2d 286, 290-91, 559 P.2d 1340, cert. denied, 434 U.S. 879 (1977) (construing "immorality" as ground for teacher discharge to encompass only immorality which may adversely affect teaching performance). For example, a crime of "moral turpitude" is grounds for disqualification of an applicant only if it reflects on his or her fitness to be a massagist.
So construed, I do not believe the categories of crime specified in the ordinance are so unrelated to fitness to be a massagist as to deny due process. The private and personalized nature of massage clearly provides greater opportunity for drug transactions and prostitution and other sexual misconduct. The relaxation of customers and their exposure to permitted physical contact in the form of massage makes *720them significantly more vulnerable to crimes such as assault and indecent liberties. Any business customer is a potential victim of fraud as well, though massage parlor customers concededly seem no more vulnerable than most.
G
Recordkeeping Requirement
I turn next to the ordinance amendment's requirement that a record of the names and addresses of patrons be kept. I agree with the majority and its reasoning in holding that this section of the ordinance constitutes an impermissible and unconstitutional abridgment of one's rights.
Conclusion
In summary, I would hold that all the provisions of the ordinance, as amended, except the recordkeeping requirement, bear a rational relationship to the underlying purpose of the resolution. The challenged amendments are designed to protect the public health, safety and welfare of the people of Pierce County, and are a bona fide attempt to restrict possibly harmful activities within the massage industry.
Section 50.16.420 provides for the severability of each provision of the resolution. I would hold the recordkeeping provision, section 50.16.360, invalid and uphold the remaining sections of the Pierce County Code as amended by resolution 22518.
Dolliver and Dimmick, JJ., concur with Dore, J.
Utter, J., concurs in sections IIA, B, D, F, and G.
Reconsideration denied April 25, 1984.