16.3 Residential Facilities and Temporary Facility Permits

Two high-yield Facility Standards fact patterns sit outside the ordinary storefront: the home shop and the short-term location. Oregon does not ban either. It writes different paper and different physical rules for each. Mix the residential sign rule with the temporary 30-day clock, or treat a weekend pop-up as covered by the downtown wall card, and the 35-item domain will take the point.

Facilities located in a residence — OAR 817-007-0075

OAR 817-007-0075 is titled Standards for Facilities Located in Residence. Subsection (1) says a facility located in a residence must do three things:

(a) Comply with all standards listed in OAR Chapter 817, Division 10, unless otherwise specified by rule. The water, restroom, floor, wall, disinfection, and waste rules still apply. A kitchen table does not become a licensed working area just because the holder lives there.

(b) Have an identifying house number and a sign with the facility name that matches the one on file with the Office, is easily visible from the street, and indicates the location of the facility. Four details, all in one paragraph: house number; sign; name match to the Office file; visible from the street and pointing to where the facility actually is. A cute logo that does not match the licensed name, a sign in a backyard not visible from the street, or a house with no number fails this subsection.

(c) Be equipped with the structures, accommodations, and equipment that the Office requires for all facilities. A home shop is not a reduced-equipment class.

Subsection (2) is the wall-and-door rule: the living area of the home must be separated from the facility by solid walls extending from floor to ceiling, with any connecting doors kept closed while the facility is in operation. A half-wall, a bead curtain, or a door left open so the dog can wander through during a fade is not the text. Solid. Floor to ceiling. Doors closed while operating.

Subsection (3) is the water sentence that is stricter than the natural-hair-care exception in OAR 817-010-0014(3): an adequate supply of hot and cold running water must be available. Sinks in the restroom do not qualify as a water source for a facility located within a residence. Do not argue that the home shop “only” does natural hair care and therefore the toilet-room sink counts. For a facility located within a residence, 817-007-0075(3) says the restroom sink does not qualify.

Subsection (4) is the surprise that candidates over-correct: a separate entrance is not required for facilities located in a residence. The exam will offer “clients must have their own exterior door” as a confident wrong answer. The current rule says a separate entrance is not required.

ORS 690.205(2) — the Board cannot ban domestic use of separate rooms

OAR 817-007-0075 is the Board’s residential standard. ORS 690.205(2) is the statute that limits how far those standards can go into the rest of the house. Currently effective ORS 690.205(1) lets the Board adopt rules for safety and infection control at facilities, with infection-control requirements subject to Oregon Health Authority approval. Subsection (2) then says: notwithstanding subsection (1), the board may not prohibit the use of the facility for domestic purposes if the part devoted to domestic purposes is in a completely separate room not used by customers, with walls extending from floor to ceiling and with any connecting doors kept closed while the facility is in actual operation.

Read that against 817-007-0075(2). The Board requires the living area to be separated by solid floor-to-ceiling walls and closed connecting doors while the shop is open. The statute forbids the Board from prohibiting domestic use of those completely separate rooms. A home can be a home and a facility in the same building. Customers stay on the facility side. Domestic rooms stay domestic. Doors closed during actual operation.

ORS 690.205(3) requires those safety and infection-control rules to be adopted under ORS chapter 183. That is process, not a third physical standard.

Temporary facility permits — 30 consecutive calendar days

ORS 690.005(19) defines a temporary facility permit as a written authorization issued under ORS 690.055 to provide services on a temporary basis in one or more fields of practice. ORS 690.055(2) is the statutory application list. The applicant must:

• Operate the facility on a temporary basis for a period not to exceed 30 consecutive calendar days and in accordance with Board rules.
• Be 18 years of age or older, if the applicant is a natural person.
• Apply on forms prescribed by the Health Licensing Office prior to opening for business.
• Comply with Board health, safety, and infection-control rules.
• Comply with applicable Oregon Health Authority and other agency health and safety laws and rules.
• Pay the applicable fees under ORS 676.576.
• If an entity other than a natural person, be formed and operated in accordance with Oregon law.

OAR 817-007-0100 restates the operating rules. A temporary facility permit holder may perform services in a field of practice. The holder must be a natural person. The permit is valid for a limited time not to exceed 30 consecutive calendar days. The holder must meet Divisions 7, 10, 15, and 60, OAR 817-007-0050, and, if applicable, OAR 817-007-0075. Consecutive calendar days is the trap. Thirty weekdays stretched across six weekends is not 30 consecutive calendar days. Twenty-nine days, a one-day gap, and another weekend is not one permit.

OAR 817-007-0100(5) is the licensed-owner trap: if a facility owner licensed under OAR 817-007-0000 intends to operate a facility on a limited basis, away from the facility address on file with the Office, that owner must obtain a temporary facility permit. The downtown wall card does not follow the chairs to a Saturday market, a fair booth, or a one-week pop-up across town.

OAR 817-007-0125 is the application list, parallel to ordinary facility licensure: meet OAR 331 Division 30; completed Office form with OAR 331-030-0000 information and fees; proof of age 18; a list of authorization holders providing services in the temporary facility; the name of the temporary facility; and Secretary of State documentation under ORS 648 if the temporary facility is not operating under the real and true name of each owner.

OAR 817-040-0003, effective July 1, 2024, prices the short-term paper: temporary facility permit application $70 and temporary facility permit $140. Do not swap those with the ordinary facility pair ($140 application, $155 original/renewal). OAR 817-007-0350(5) requires demonstration and temporary authorizations to be posted in public view.

A Bend garage and a Portland Saturday market

Luis licenses a barber facility in a Bend residence. The house number faces the street. A sign with the exact facility name on file with the Office is easily visible from the street and shows where clients enter. The garage bay is the working area, separated from the kitchen and bedrooms by solid floor-to-ceiling walls. The connecting door stays closed while the facility is in operation. Hot and cold running water is in the working area; Luis does not treat the bathroom sink as the facility source. Clients walk through the same exterior door the family uses. That is legal: a separate entrance is not required. ORS 690.205(2) keeps the Board from banning the family from the rest of the house so long as those domestic rooms are completely separate and unused by customers during actual operation.

The next month Luis wants three consecutive Saturdays at a Portland market. The Bend facility license does not cover that address. He applies before opening, as a natural person 18 or older, lists the authorization holders who will cut, pays $70 plus $140, and keeps the run inside 30 consecutive calendar days. He posts the temporary authorization in public view at the booth. That is a temporary facility, not a freelance loophole and not a second year of the Bend license.