WALNUT CREEK -- Police have been struggling with what appears to be a growing problem -- prostitution operations being run out of licensed massage businesses, according to local authorities.

Walnut Creek police Lt. Steve Skinner told the City Council that there were currently 135 licensed massage businesses operating in the city.

Skinner estimated that between 10 and 20 percent of those businesses were actually running illicit prostitution operations and said he receives two to three phone calls each week from people asking about how to open up a massage business in the city who also ask him to confirm that no regulations exist.

"We are literally on a daily basis seeing more and more of these prostitution cases come up," Skinner said.

Because the city doesn't regulate massage businesses, as most surrounding cities do, anyone who fills out an application for a business license is granted the license.

In the past five years, the city has seen a 60 percent increase in massage businesses, according to Skinner.

He proposed an ordinance similar to ordinances in surrounding cities that would allow the city to better regulate massage businesses. He also noted that the cities that do regulate massage businesses have significantly fewer massage establishments than Walnut Creek currently has, apparently because the illegitimate operations pack up and leave.

Antioch, for example, has 40 permitted massage businesses, Clayton has one, Concord has 40, Orinda has one, Pleasant Hill has 35, Pleasanton has 40 and San Ramon has 10, Skinner said.

With it's 135 massage businesses, Walnut Creek, a city of under 70,000 residents, has more than San Jose, which has a population of over 1 million and only 54 licensed massage businesses, according to Skinner.

"We're leading the pack, so to speak, in cities our size," he said.

In the past two years, a total of 30 separate undercover operations have been conducted on massage businesses in Walnut Creek and all of those investigations were initiated because residents or businesses in the area called police to report suspected prostitution.

But again, because the city didn't have any laws regulating massage businesses, police had no way to revoke a person's license even after they had been convicted of prostitution.

People have been arrested for prostitution and then, within a week, have returned to the city and set up a business under a different name, he said.

In one investigation, undercover officers went to the same business three times in the same month, and each time they were solicited for prostitution, and each time they made arrests, Skinner said, but they were never able to arrest the owner or shut the place down.

The proposed ordinance would require that people undergo a criminal background check before being granted a massage business license. Nobody with a sexual criminal background would be granted a license. Fees would also be imposed to cover the cost of licensing, and businesses would have to comply with certain rules, such as displaying their licenses, maintaining liability insurance and limiting the hours of operation.

Only one massage business owner showed up to the meeting, however, and council members decided to continue the reading of the ordinance until all massage businesses could be notified and some of the details of the ordinance could be worked out.

The ordinance was expected to be back on the City Council agenda in about 30 days.