At its meeting on Monday, Owen Sound council voted 5-3 in favour of raising the annual nightly rental from the 90 days that was proposed in the draft bylaw. The change came after concerns were raised about how restrictive the bylaw was at an Oct. 23 meeting, where the bylaw was on the agenda for approval.
On Monday, council decided to make no other changes to the bylaw, which will come back at the next council meeting on Dec. 4 for approval.
Coun. Brock Hamley, who moved the motion to set the 180-day annual rental cap, said that with the lower cap, the city’s planned STR licensing program would no longer be revenue neutral and would cost the taxpayers.
Some on council had felt the proposed 90-day annual rental cap was too restrictive and would reduce Municipal Accommodation Tax revenue, and that there should be different rules for STAs in commercially-zoned areas.
But while council chose to go with the higher 180-day cap, they did not approve any other changes to the bylaw, which will be apply to all zones in the city.
In a report from Clerk Brianna Bloomfield, it estimated the MAT collected through STRs with a 180-day annual rental cap would be more than $630 higher per STR than if there was a 90-day rental cap. If the city issues 65 STR licences, it would result in a potential loss of MAT revenue of more than $40,000 annually if they chose to go with the 90-day cap over the 180-day cap.
The report also suggested that should there be exemptions to a principal residence and rental cap requirements, those exemptions should only apply to C1 (downtown commercial) and MC (waterfront mixed use commercial) zones, and the licencing fee for those zones should be upped to $750 as enforcement may be more complex. But council chose for the city-wide blanket bylaw instead.
City staff are to monitor the bylaw requirements and will provide an update report once the program has been implemented for a year. The bylaw, once approved, is slated to come into effect on March 1.
Those who voted in favour of the 180-cap included Mayor Ian Boddy, Deputy-mayor Scott Greig, and councillors Hamley, John Farmer and Melanie Middlebro’. Councillors Marion Koepke, Suneet Kukreja and Carol Merton voted against the motion, while Coun. Travis Dodd was absent.
Koepke said she wasn’t in favour of a length-of-stay cap, but was in favour of licensing and regulating STRs. Merton also called for a year without a nightly rental cap to allow for the program to be evaluated, while Kukreja said she was in favour of having STRs in specific zones only.
On Monday, council heard a deputation from STR operators Christopher Johannsen and Chelsea Miller, who also spoke during the public question period of the Nov. 6 council meeting, where they said the 90-day cap would severely limit income they rely on.
On Monday, the couple spoke in favour of regulating STRs, but against measures that hinder those STRs they called community assets. They highlighted that guests who have recently used their STR include doctors or locums at the hospital, PSWs and nurses in the city on short-term contracts, neighbours’ family members, businesspeople and contractors in town for work and tourists.
They said in their case, and many others, stopping STRs will not create more rentals. They said many STR hosts just offer a room and don’t have the setup for a separate rental unit, they want to keep their space available for family and friends who visit between paying guests, and concerns about a lack of homeowner rights under the Landlord Tenant Act.
They said they are aware of STR disasters like party houses and corporate-run houses, but small operators like them are not getting the same attention.
“These small operators provide a valuable service that visitors want,” they said. “Why go after ‘the little guys’ that aren’t causing any problems.”
They proposed letting responsible home-run STRs operate for more than 200 days per year, taxing them more, using the tax revenue to create affordable housing and using the first year of regulation to assess each STR and quantify its value to the community.
Johannsen, a former teacher who has had to resort to the rental of his home after concussions derailed his career, said he accepts the 180-day cap for STRs.
Johannsen said he also sympathizes with those who have dealt with “party house.”
“We don’t think they should operate 90 or 180 or whatever,” Johannsen said. “If they are a problem, hopefully the bylaw has the teeth to stop them.”