Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1999. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
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San Francisco Examiner - June 16, 1999
Rachel Gordon of the Examiner Staff
Without debating the issue itself, the commission decided Tuesday to place the burden of decision making on Dr. Mitch Katz, director of The City's Department of Public Health.
Commissioners, citing local and state laws, said that as The City's top health officer, Katz - not commissioners - has sole authority to determine the best regulations for controlling the spread of venereal disease.
Katz has been adamant about retaining the 15-year-old ban on bathhouses - venues frequented by some gay men that are open to the public.
In bathhouses, which still operate in a handful of other cities, sexual activity is allowed to take place behind closed doors in private rooms, away from the eyes of monitors who are on hand to make sure safer-sex practices are adhered to.
Such a setting, Katz argued, can contribute to the spread of AIDS. Bathhouse boosters dispute that argument.
Current San Francisco public health policy allows other sex clubs with stricter rules to operate. They are required to provide condoms and monitor sexual activity to ensure safer-sex rules are followed. And at those sex clubs, participants typically gather in large common rooms that afford no privacy.
Commissioner Ron Hill, who described himself as the only commissioner on the seven-member panel who is gay and has AIDS, said he fully backs the health chief's position to keep bathhouses outlawed.
Commission President Lee Ann Monfredini echoed the sentiment.
"We do stand by Dr. Katz's decision," she said.
The majority of other commissioners voiced similar support, although they never voted on the matter.
"I appreciate the supportive statements expressed by members of my commission," Katz said after the discussion.
"With evidence that unsafe sex has been increasing among gay and bisexual men. It is important to do all we can to promote safer-sex behavior. Our regulations on congregant sex establishments are an important part of our HIV prevention."
Bathhouse proponents, however, say the Health Department is going too far. "It's a slap in the face to gay men in this community," said Gil Criswell, representing the group Community United for Sexual Privacy, which formed to fight the local ban on bathhouses. "This is a discriminatory policy that is an intrusion into gay men's sexuality."
Katz said one of the government's roles is to promote and protect public health. The bathhouse ban, he said, is one such effort.
Criswell and other proponents also argue that lack of privacy at sex clubs may lead men to engage in sexual activity in parks and cars where safer sex is even less likely.
At least at bathhouses, they say, there are readily available condoms and information on safer-sex practices.
Despite the Health Commission's opinion to keep the status quo, Criswell and his cohorts are moving forward with a proposed ballot initiative to overturn the bathhouse prohibition.
It is unclear whether backers will be able to gather enough signatures to qualify the proposal for the November ballot. If they don't prevail, they may try for the March ballot.
The debate has divided the gay community, which is what happened when The City shut the bathhouses in 1984 at the height of the AIDS epidemic.
Earlier this month, the HIV Prevention Planning Council, which makes recommendations on HIV policy to the Health Commission, urged the Health Department to rescind the policy that forbids private spaces in commercial sex establishments "unless clear and compelling evidence exists to demonstrate that private spaces in commercial / public sex environments increases the rate of HIV infection."
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