After months of debate, Lexington moves forward with crackdown on short-term rentals
After more than six months of debate, the Lexington council moved forward with an ordinance that supporters say would help the city catch rogue short-term rental operators who aren’t paying hotel and other taxes.
The Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council voted 8 to 3 to move the ordinance to its docket. The council will take a final vote on the ordinance at its April 2 meeting.
The ordinance would require all short-term rental operators to pay a $100 license fee, get an occupational license and report monthly on the number of stays. Hosts that rent exclusively through Airbnb would be exempt from the monthly reporting requirement. The city has an agreement with Airbnb to collect state and Fayette County hotel taxes.
Short-term rentals would get a local registration number that must be advertised on all short-term rental websites. Those who advertise without a local registration number would be fined $125. Repeat violations of the ordinance could result in fines as high as $1,000. The fines can be appealed to a city code enforcement board.
In February, the Planning and Public Safety Committee voted 5 to 2 to move the ordinance out of council committee. Originally the registration fee was $300.
Council cuts short-term rental annual fees
But some council members expressed reservations about the fee during Tuesday’s meeting, saying it was too steep for some short-term rental hosts who only have a few rentals a year. The council agreed Tuesday to lower the annual fee to $100.
That fee will help the city either employ additional staff or hire a consultant to suss out operators who aren’t registered with the city, said Bill O’Mara, the city’s finance commissioner.
That inspection fee will also pay for building and fire code inspections required for short-term rentals under the ordinance.
Councilman Richard Moloney said those inspections are important.
“We don’t have any rules right now,” Moloney said. “I don’t want to put this back into committee and something bad to happen.”
But some on council said they needed more time to vet the ordinance and encouraged the council to send it back to the Planning and Public Safety Committee.
“I am very concerned about moving this forward,” said Councilwoman Susan Lamb. Lamb said there were still issues that need to be addressed.
A key sticking point was the definition of a short-term rental, which limits rentals to once a week or 52 a year. Many short-term rental hosts said that was too restrictive.
But the city could not make changes to the definition of a short-term rental in this ordinance, said Chad Edwards, a lawyer for the city. Changes to land-use ordinances have to go through the Urban County Planning Commission, Edwards and other city staffers said.
Other changes to Lexington rental rules debated
Councilman Bill Farmer Jr. , a sponsor of the ordinance, said the downtown neighborhoods in his district need more protections. Some are seeing multiple short-term rentals on the same block. There have been complaints. The council started debate on requiring registration of short-term rentals in September.
“We have structures that are turning from homes to small hotels and that’s not fair to the neighbors who had no say in that,” Farmer said. “Every day a neighborhood changes.”
The council ultimately agreed Thursday to put the definition of short-term rental — or the 52 stays a year— into the Planning and Public Safety Committee for further review.
Those who voted in favor of the ordinance: Farmer, Moloney, James Brown, Fred Brown, Josh McCurn, Amanda Bledsoe, Jennifer Reynolds and Kathy Plomin. Those who voted against: Lamb, Jennifer Mossotti, Angela Evans. Vice Mayor Steve Kay and Councilman Chuck Ellinger recused themselves from the vote.
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 1:07 PM.
