Council approves, adopts new short-term rental ordinance
Gary Donovan, who is a longtime resident on 19th Street, talks about visitors at neighboring short term rentals keeping him awake.
–The Paso Robles City Council approved on a 3-0 vote an ordinance allowing short term vacation rentals to operate in R-1 residential zones. Councilmen Steve Gregory and John Hamon stepped down because of conflicts of interest. The vote took place after lengthy public testimony, most of it in opposition to short term rentals and the impact they’re having on quiet neighborhoods.
Gary Donovan has lived on 19th street for decades. He told the council, “You flip-flopped before. I’d like to see you do it again.”
The council focused on details more than the basic issue of people buying homes and operating short term vacation rentals in family neighborhoods.
The new ordinance will return to the council for a second reading in two weeks. If it’s pulled from the consent items, the issue will likely go to the end of agenda. That will make for another long night for those on both sides of the short term rental issue.
Twenty-eight towns in California have banned non-hosted, short term vacation rentals in residential zones. They include San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Napa, Healdsburg, Temecula, Santa Monica, Monterey, South Lake Tahoe and twenty other towns and cities.
One critic of the ordinance said, “All the partiers will come celebrate in Paso Robles neighborhoods. They can’t go anywhere else.”
Comments
