Queen Creek, AZ Business Licensing & Operations: Massage Establishments (2026)

6 of the Zoning Ordinance treats massage establishments as a use the Town Council found needs siting and operating controls to prevent them from becoming fronts for prostitution or money laundering. A massage establishment can locate as a primary use in any zoning district that allows it, or as an accessory use inside a medical or chiropractic office, athletic club, health club, gymnasium, reducing salon, spa or hotel. As a primary use it cannot sit within 500 feet of a public or private school, park, playground, civic center, cultural site or church, and it cannot sit within 500 feet of another massage establishment.

As an accessory use, the massage space is capped at whichever is smaller: 25 percent of the primary use's floor area or 400 square feet. Before the Town will accept an application, every owner, operator, manager and each masseur or masseuse working on site must show they passed the National Certification Exam and completed at least 500 hours of training at a school approved by the American Massage Therapy Association's Commission on Accreditation and Training, and proof of current AMTA membership must be filed with the Planning Administrator (the ordinance's own text also names the City Clerk as a filing point, even though Queen Creek is a Town).

No massage establishment may operate as part of a sexually oriented business, and patrons and staff must keep specified anatomical areas covered at all times outside private dressing areas, with staff clothing reaching from four inches above the kneecap to the base of the neck. Massage rooms need at least 50 square feet of clear floor area, 40 foot-candles of light, a 12-inch observation window in the door, separate facilities for each sex, and daily disinfection of tubs, showers and steam equipment. m.