Orange City Council - Regular Meeting

I'd like to call a special City Council meeting of June 29, 2026 to order. If you have not silenced your cell phones, please do so at this time. Council Member Dimitri will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Please stand and place your hand over your heart and join me. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Councilmember. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

I am here.

Present.

Here. Councilmember Gutierrez? Here. Councilmember Gillenhammer?

Here.

Mayor Slater?

Here.

Quorum is present with Mayor Pro Tem Bilodeau absent at the moment.

Thank you. We have one presentation. Suggested by councilmember gillenhammer. It's a it's a good one. Thank you for bringing that to our attention so There's a proclamation recognized the United States semi-quincentennial Council member. Thank you mayor.

I'm gonna say 250th instead of that but um We are here in a meeting before July 4th, and just want to take a moment to celebrate with proclamation the 250th So I will read that United States 250th years of independence, whereas July 4th, 2026 will be the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and birth of the United States. And whereas the United States was founded on the revolutionary principles proclaimed in the declaration that we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. And whereas these principles are the heritage of all Americans, regardless of ethnicity, national origin, religion, or political affiliation, and whereas it is right and proper that citizens and residents of Orange should be encouraged to commemorate and celebrate the historical ideals and aspirations embodied in the Declaration, and to reflect on the origin of the City of Orange, its history and contributions to the development of California and the United States. And whereas the 250th anniversary celebration provides a community-wide effort to equip our citizens and residents to engage in the civic life of their community and to listen to and learn from our history and each other to make a lasting impact for generations to come. And whereas USA 250 OC was formed to engage all Orange citizens, Countians, in a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reflect on our founding principles and shared heritage, celebrate our achievements, look to our future, and collectively work towards a more perfect union. And whereas USA 250 OC engages Orange Countians through a dynamic website and robust social media, serves as a comprehensive resource with access to a broad range of historical resources, develops strategic partnerships with cities, civic organizations, and others, is a catalyst for stimulating creativity and integrating experiences of all Orange Countians. inspired by building a sense of community and provides significant programs focusing on our American founding and beyond. Now, therefore, I, Daniel R. Slater, Mayor of City of Orange and the entire City Council do hereby recognize July 4th, 2026 as the 250th anniversary of the foundation of our great nation, celebrating two and a half centuries of the land of liberty, freedom, innovation, and unlimited potential.

Thank you.

Well, again, thank you for bringing that forward. If any council members haven't signed it yet, we can still do that. So, again, thank you. All right, so there are no public comments since this is a special meeting, although we can entertain comments on the item on the agenda, which is item 2.1, public hearing to receive and Required report and consider extending interim or urgency ordinance number 8-26 establishing a temporary moratorium on new massage establishments and We'll entertain a brief staff report Good evening mayor members of the City Council the matter before you tonight is to consider extending interim urgency number 08-26

establishing a temporary moratorium on new massage establishments and the expansion of existing massage establishments. The original 45-day moratorium was adopted on May 26 to allow staff time to evaluate the city's current regulations and develop updated municipal and zoning code amendments. Since the adoption of the moratorium, staff has reviewed existing regulations, research best practices from neighboring jurisdictions, evaluating zoning strategies, participating in specialized enforcement training, and coordinated with the city's attorney's office to develop legally defensible regulations. These efforts are ongoing, and staff is requesting an extension of the interim urgency ordinance for additional 22 months and 15 days to allow sufficient time to complete this work and return to planning commission and city council immediately. with permanent regulations. That concludes my presentation. We are available for any questions.

Thank you, gentlemen. Before we open the public hearing, are there any questions of staff? Very well. I'm opening the public hearing, and first speaker is Carolyn Kavechi, followed by Sean Chavarria.

Good afternoon, Mayor Slater and members of the City Council. I just want to take the time today to thank you for taking this step to stop new massage parlors from opening. We need a strong new ordinance. We need to put a line in the sand very clearly. I did a quick trip up and down Tustin Street from the city line just south of the 22 to Lincoln on the north end. Just two and a half miles, 33 massage parlors. In fact, it's hard to find a strip mall on Tustin that doesn't have one. According to the city's business license search engine, 21 of those have opened in just the last few years, from 2020 until now, 21. 10 from 2013 to 2020, and two that I can't find a business license for at all. Something is not right with our current ordinance if that many are opening in Orange so quickly. And this is just testing. I didn't do Chapman, Cotella, Maine. 33 in a two and a half mile line. In April, one of those massage parlors actually received multiple violations, including illegal sexual contact. They're still open for business. I don't understand why they weren't shut down immediately. If our current ordinance doesn't allow that to happen, then I'm truly hoping that the new one will. This is actually impacting legitimate businesses in our city now. And I just want to say I truly appreciate the task, the Herculean task that code enforcement and OPD has in front of them. It's going to be difficult to get this cat back in the bag now that it has been unleashed, but I'm trusting we're going to be able to do it. There should be zero tolerance for this. Again, thank you so much for your moratorium on new openings. I look forward now to seeing how many you can shut down over these next 22 months. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Kevechi. Sean Cheverea, followed by Brandy Romero.

Good afternoon, Council. Also, I'm in support of this item. I wanted to thank you for bringing this up, and I would also give a special blessing for Jared Hildebrand and Natalie, because I'm looking for perhaps some innovative ideas on how to implement this moratorium. I know that this is probably something that we all agree upon, So that makes me great. It makes me super happy because sometimes we're divided. This is something we all agree upon, though. So I thank you for this. And on behalf of our church, Friends Church Orange, we support you in this manner. Thank you.

Thank you, Sean.

Brandy.

evening mayor slater and city council members i just want to say finally this has been something on all of our radars for a long time it's one of the number one complaints that i hear all the time is why do we have so many businesses and we see them their windows are all blocked so you can't see in the door it looks like they're closed and there's a flashing open sign my husband and i actually for our date night on saturday we didn't do what you think we did But we drove around, just like Carolyn mentioned, and counted the number of massage parlors. It was 10 o'clock at night. They all looked closed, and they're open. You can see people going in and out of them. Human trafficking is real. I know you guys saw the OC Wellness that actually looked like a legitimate business just got shut down for this. So I'm so grateful, and I hope we have a very strong ordinance and are able to work with our surrounding cities that have already put these ordinances in place. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Brandy. With that, I am closing the public hearing and bringing it back to the council. We have a motion to approve from Council Member Barrios and a second from Council Member Gutierrez. This time we can have further discussion. Council Member Barrios.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just had a couple of questions and something I just wanted to put into the public record. But first of all, where are we currently with the number? her two speakers, and they had different numbers because they went to different places. What does the city currently take as a full number that we think we have operating?

So approximately we're at 90. massage establishment.

So it's been up just from the last couple of months that I asked that. Okay, thank you. And then when we're talking about, is this just like the ones that former Mayor Kevechi mentioned, where we have had enforcement, we had one with the vice squad, which was quite impressive when you watched the video. Why isn't that now or the other one that's up on test and shut down afterwards? Is that just a lack of our ordinances now and that's what we're going to be looking to do?

Absolutely. So the matter still remains under investigation in conjunction with the Orange Police Department. We've certainly documented some violations and are working through the process to potentially take some type of action. Something will be forthcoming at some point.

And I know not in every single case that you find necessarily explicit prostitution, but in some of the reports that I've read where there's been at the very least nakedness, you know, in terms of rendering services, how do other cities handle it? Do they have, what have you found so far in terms of how other cities are dealing with this?

Sure, and evaluating several cities, some of our major cities around, they have continued to update their ordinance to be more effective and more robust in terms of doing suspension or automatic revocation. Our ordinance is currently inadequate in its process. and those are things that we're gonna look at to bring them up to current standards. And then the ability to work with the state, who currently is the licensing board for all massage therapists, to be able to suspend and revoke their licenses at the state level so that many of these therapists cannot just simply hop around from place to place and continue essentially their illicit activity.

And that also would protect places like say a Brooke Williams, you know, the high end, it's a full spa or say like a Massage Envy, which is a franchise and has very strict regulations, right?

That's part of the regulation review is to look at the associated uses with legitimate operators and kind of create a system where we don't indirectly affect those types of professional high-end business operators while giving us the tools to be able to effectively address the problematic ones.

And then I had a question for the police chief. It might be for both of you, but I was wondering if I could follow up and ask about the one where the vice squad went out, where it was clearly prostitution and drugs were found. So often in these cases, we're dealing with situations of human trafficking and or individual young women who are coerced. What kind of resources do we offer them?

So we work with the victim witness through the DA's office, and then we work through the other California, I don't want to call it like a victim advocate, but it's all wrapped into that, like waymakers and other private or not-for-profit entities that come alongside and help. And then we have a I can't think of the name. It's a quarter blue. They're a resource that we use. So there's lots of nonprofits that come and partner with them to connect them to resources to help them if they have immigration issues, U visas and other things in order to connect them to services.

Okay, and is that something too that as we work along with the ordinance and we're working actively to close some of these places down or at least inspect and make sure that there's nothing nefarious going on, are there going to be additional resources that we need to be thinking about that PD's gonna need or that code enforcement's gonna need?

Well, so the biggest thing that we need is if we're going bigger, which we're finding, as somebody mentioned about the human trafficking, is connecting more with the vertical unit in the DA's office in order to assist with search warrants, to assist with the vertical prosecution. So as I was just talking to the fire chief, in our current model, sometimes the only enforcement aspect is a municipal code misdemeanor. or their business is shut down and then they open up somewhere else. So what we did with OC Wellness is connecting a crime of the moral turpitude, so the trafficking or the drug sales, that to make it, and then get it with, connect it with the vertical unit so that there is more teeth instead of just a business. The other tool that we've had is connecting it with the, I believe it's the California Tax Franchise Board because I think as one of the speakers mentioned, some of them don't have active business license, and so that's the teeth is now they have a case instead of just a misdemeanor or the business closing. And so moving forward, I think those, and we were talking beforehand, is we need to be more connected to a whole process instead of just shutting it down. Shutting it down is the first aspect, but then connecting it to a criminal case.

Sure, and when I say additional resources, One of the things, and this would be for both of you to think about too, is that if we need to hire translators to go with you, that if we don't have anyone who are native speakers in whatever language we might think we might need, that that might be extra resources that you would need to have an effective enforcement action. And then my final question, again, for both of you, if, so... I work just up the street. There is one right on the other side of the wall from me. We know exactly what it is because of things that have been delivered at other offices for whatever reason. So we all know. What can we as citizens or what would you tell citizens in terms of what is the best way to report?

So my recommendation is certainly to the public to continue to report active activity or unlawful activity both through the Orange 24-7 app. That information comes to our office in code enforcement and then we parallel a separate investigation with our counterparts in the police department and jointly we will investigate these matters and then take them through the appropriate process for enforcing action to the extent allowable in the law.

And that would be the same if we If you were witnessing or thought there was a crime going on, that was immediate.

Yeah, so obviously, as I've advocated for any time something doesn't seem right, call us and we can investigate. Everything starts with a tip, and we have our anonymous WeTip line. They can leave an anonymous voice message. The OC Wellness that was mentioned, that started with an anonymous tip. We spend resources doing surveillance, sending in people, doing a general check of a business check, partnering with code enforcement, and it just starts to cascade from there. But it starts with making us aware that there is something illegal going on. Sometimes it is a, I'll call it a scorned visitor who says this isn't right, but that's all it takes and then we can look into it. So it doesn't take much. But yeah, please call us.

And I think that Mayor Kavechi did mention that to me, that some of the ladies who go to the flower shop next door were like, oh great, I'm going to get a massage and maybe some spa treatments, not so much. But that helped put all that in. So thank you both for all your actions. I really appreciate it.

Thank you. Council Member Dimitri?

Real quick question. In developing whatever the new ordinance is going to be, could it Be written in such a way that it has the same scrutiny as an alcohol license with conditions such as no coverings on front windows that they have to be completely exposed, lighting requirements, and such like that to make it. I mean, we put folks that want to have a liquor license go through pretty big scrutiny. Could we do the same here? Yes, so that is something we're currently looking into as we speak. And then could that be retroactive on any current businesses? Yes. Okay, perfect. Thank you.

Any other questions? All right. We'll vote. I would ask the maker of the motion to please read the ordinance title as listed in the recommended action.

Adopt urgency ordinance number 0826A, extending interim urgency ordinance number 0826. establishing a temporary moratorium on new massage establishments and the expansion of existing massage establishments for an additional 22 months and 15 days while the city completes its review and adoption of updated municipal code and zoning code regulations.

Thank you. I believe this needs six votes. Okay. Please vote. That was approved unanimously, seven to zero. Okay, City Attorney, do we have any items for closed session?

Yes, thank you, Mayor. The City Council will now recess the closed session to discuss the following item. It's one item today. It's Conference with Legal Counsel Existing Litigation, and it's one case, Cole McDonough v. The City of Orange, Et al., and the case number is United States District Court Case No. 826-CV00881-JDE.

Thank you. We are recessed to closed session.

Thank you.