The short-term rentals task force and the City of Auburn Planning Department have produced a draft ordinance that will allow some short-term rentals in certain areas of the city for small periods of time.
The task force, which consists of Ward 4 Councilmember Brett Smith and Ward 6 Councilmember Bob Parsons, added two Planning Commission members, Robert Ritenbaugh and Marcus Marshall, before putting this ordinance online.
“The thought process was this is really going to end up being a zoning issue as to where and how these short-term rentals and homestays, how they fit and how we can properly process it,” Smith said. “If it is ultimately going to come from the planning department and go to the Planning Commission to City Council so we thought it best to have two people from the Planning Commission.”
The planning department created this version of the ordinance in early 2018, but this is the first time it has come out to the public.
“Mine and Councilman Parsons thoughts were we don’t want to reinvent the wheel, so let‘s see what we have,” Smith said.
The plan is to allow some time for citizens to give feedback on the ordinance through a survey posted along with the ordinance, and then hold a public meeting sometime in January for citizens to give feedback in person, Smith said.
“As our job is representative, we want to get a general flavor for what our constituents feel and represent their views accordingly,” Parsons said. “I know there is going to be a variety of opinions in their responses, but hopefully we’ll navigate in a way that everybody feels they’ve been heard and treated fairly.”
This ordinance operates under two definitions. A homestay is a dwelling where the permanent resident hires out all of or a portion of their residence for home occupation. A permanent resident is someone that occupies a dwelling as their residence for a period of 180 or more consecutive days and is the usual place of return for housing as is documented in items such as motor vehicle registration or driver’s license.
The purpose of this ordinance is to allow short-term rentals while placing restrictions on them as so not to disturb permanent residents, Smith said.
These homestays are only permissible in 10 of the city’s 18 zones. The zones in which they are allowed include Urban Core, Urban Neighborhoods West, East and South, Redevelopment District, Comprehensive Development District, Rural, Comprehensive Development District and Corridor Redevelopment District-Urban and Suburban.
These include most of the downtown Auburn area as well as areas throughout Auburn. To determine what zone their residence is in, citizens can view a color coordinated map on the city’s website that divides the city based on its zoning.
“I think what stood out to me and I think will come up in conversation pretty quickly is that there are no provisions for short-term rentals in neighborhood conservation zone,” Parsons said. “I think it realistically, that occurring under the radar of The Council. I think we will have a lot of citizens bringing that vary point up.”
Residents that wish to operate a homestay must apply for a home occupation zoning certificate with the city’s planning director. If the certificate is granted it is valid from the day it is granted until Dec. 31 of that same year.
The owner of the dwelling must reapply for the certificate each year they wish to operate the homestay, and occupy the dwelling as their residence for more than 180 days in the operating year, according to the ordinance.
“It’s similar to if you had any other type of business operating out of your home,” Smith said.
A certificate can be revoked if the city receives three or more sustained complaints in one calendar year or the resident fails to comply with the regulations set forth in the ordinance.
If a certificate is revoked, the property owner is ineligible to receive a new zoning certificate for the remaining portion of that calendar year as well as the entirety of the following calendar year.
The homestay may be operated for no more than 30 days per year when the owner of the residence is not staying there, according to the ordinance.
“You get basically 10 weekends you don’t have to be occupying the property,” Smith said. “You can leave the property and have someone rent your full home, but for the remainder of the year, you would actually have to be in the home.”
The ordinance prohibits things such as signs to indicate a homestay is present on property and adding on to or changing the current appearance of the residence to accommodate a homestay. This would mean that a resident cannot add a room onto their dwelling or an accessory structure just for the business activity of operating the short-term rental.
Only one person that is not residing in the dwelling can come to the residence to assist with the short-term rental, and off-street parking must be available for this person.
The maximum number of overnight guests in a homestay is six. Those guests may use available on-street parking only if there is no off-street parking available or it is full, according to the ordinance.
A home occupation also cannot cause problems such as excessive traffic, noise, vibration or other hazards that are more than what is normally experienced in a residential neighborhood. The home occupation must also not be noticeable beyond the property boundaries of residence where the home stay is occurring.
“It’s just good policy to be open and transparent and get as much input as you can,” Smith said. “This isn’t about one building in a commercial area of town or about a restaurant. This is about bringing a hotel eliminate into our neighborhoods so we want to make sure we get this as right as we can.”
The task force will hold a public meeting in January to take additional comments and questions on the ordinance after which another ordinance will be drafted to reflect those views and the process for its approval will begin. The task force hopes to have something in front of The Council in March with final approval not long after.
“We don’t know the extent of short-term rentals at this point and I think that will be another issue,” Parsons said. “You really start getting some clearer idea of the number of property owners involved, and I think once we have a clearer idea of [it] that will help us be better informed a shape a better approach to how we go about regulating short-term rentals.”
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Elizabeth, senior in journalism and political science, is the community editor for The Plainsman
