The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Expected to last four months
By Mark Reaman
It appears the Crested Butte Town Council is poised to impose a temporary moratorium on issuing business licenses for short-term rentals in town. The council will discuss the issue at the August 15 council meeting.
The idea, as presented by town planner Michael Yerman, is meant to be a legislative tool to allow the council to discuss major changes to the town code and possibly put new regulations in place. During the moratorium, which could last as long as seven months until March 17, 2017 but is expected to last about four months, the town will not accept any new “applications for business activities, occupations and enterprises engaged in the business of renting or leasing residential units for a term of 30 days or less.”
The moratorium idea came as a recommendation to the council from the citizen’s committee that has been meeting weekly for two months discussing the short-term rental issue in Crested Butte.
“A lot of information has been covered and they are ready to present ideas and recommendations to the council,” explained Yerman. “Those recommendations that you may or may not implement impact several chapters of the town code, including the finance, zoning and building code areas. Depending on the direction of the council, additional staff could be needed to be hired to implement the new regulations and begin inspections.”
The citizen’s committee has discussed a variety of topics including increasing fees; asking the voters for a tax increase on such rentals that would be earmarked for affordable housing; requiring inspections; putting limits on the number of short-term rental houses; and perhaps putting occupancy caps on the number of people allowed in a rental for safety reasons.
Currently, 16 percent of the town housing stock is available for short-term rentals. The highest concentration of short-term rentals is in the historic core, with nearly one in three homes being used in that capacity.
Yerman said the staff expects to hold “multiple meetings” with the council while the moratorium is in place to discuss and analyze the recommendations of the committee.
Councilman Jim Schmidt is a council representative on the citizen’s committee. He said while he was prepared to advocate for the moratorium, he now plans to vote against it. “With five of the seven councilmembers holding short-term rental licenses and two of them getting them last week before this idea was published, it bothers me a lot,” he said. “It seems like it gave the councilmen a competitive advantage. Because of those reasons, I’ll vote against a moratorium in two weeks.”
“I was one of the people that went and got a license,” admitted councilman Roland Mason. “When the question came to me about possibly implementing an emergency ordinance that would have gone into effect immediately, I didn’t feel that was transparent for the public. But honestly, pulling a license before a moratorium that might go into effect in two weeks is not using proprietary information. If we did it tonight, then yes, it would have been. I am in favor of a short moratorium but not through any emergency ordinance.”
“I’m the other one who made an application last week and I agree with Roland,” admitted councilman Paul Merck. “I think people need a chance to look at the ordinance so I was not in favor of an emergency ordinance.”
Merck said that with some relatives getting older, he viewed the idea of obtaining a short-term rental license as a potential “to bring in income from my resort town property” if he needed to travel to take care of relatives.
“I want people to be able to do it like I did,” he said. “When they hear about it, go do it if they want one.”
Council representative Laura Mitchell was also on the citizen’s committee. “There are a lot of things to discuss on short-term rentals, including perhaps hiring an enforcement official,” she said. “If we can have a productive conversation and make some progress I would support the moratorium.”
“I’m in favor of a temporary moratorium,” added councilwoman Erika Vohman.
“This one issue as our town goes forward is going to define the character of our community more than anything else as far as retaining locals and having established neighborhoods that function properly,” said mayor Glenn Michel. “I am certainly willing to support a moratorium as the council wrestles with this and we figure out what we might do, if anything. It is a time-out, a chance to breathe.”
A public hearing on implementing the potential moratorium was set for August 15.
“There is so much information and discussion needed for this topic, we will probably have to have a special meeting,” said Yerman. “Or we can start with a two-hour work session to get you the information that was discussed over two months. You guys are in the midst of a town manager search and this is something that person probably will want to be involved with pretty heavily. This is not something that will be fast.”
Town building and zoning director Bob Gillie asked if the council wanted to start the long meetings August 15.
“Time is of the essence here,” Gillie said. “We can’t issue licenses for 2017 in March. People will be booking summer before that. I think it is important to start discussions early. Engage it and wrestle it to the ground. We need to be deep in it by September or October at the latest. Let’s get it done.”
“The recommendations of the committee are very, very good and I agree we need to get into it as fast as possible,” said Schmidt.
The council will vote on the temporary moratorium at the August 15 meeting. Whether or not it is approved, the council will then discuss the process of special meetings or work sessions to tackle the issue.
