Next week’s Short-Term Rental hearing

Next week, the city’s ad hoc committee on Short-Term Rentals will have its second meeting. The 37-page agenda was posted this afternoon.

Tuesday, November 27, 2018
2:30 P.M. – 5:30 P.M.
City Council Chambers
300 North Coast Highway
Oceanside, CA 92054

All three commissioners (Balch, Busk and Rosales) are expected to attend. Save South O encourages all residents to attend the hearing who are concerned about the potential impact of STRs. The third (and final) hearing is scheduled for January 29.

The Worsening Problem

The report has some new statistics on the impact of STRs on Oceanside. By far, the largest impact of STRs has been on three neighborhoods: Townsite (downtown), South O and Fire Mountain:

• Townsite: 592/12,190 = 4.86%
• South O: 88/3,330 = 2.64%
• Fire Mountain: 35/2,799 = 1.25%

The statistic is potentially misleading, because it doesn’t talk about the growth of STRs — where we will be in 2019 or 2020. According to the city, total registered STRs on June 21 were 779, and on October 10 it was 821. At that rate, we would have 852 at the end of 2018 and 990 at the end of 2019.

As both the city and the STR operators themselves admit, Oceanside has the most lax regulation of any coastal community in North County.

Policy Options

At the August 21 meeting, the ad hoc committee hearing attracted 70 people attending, with 50 testifying.

The major part of the earlier meeting was having the two committee members (Balch, Rosales) react to potential policy proposals from the staff. The minutes show that these proposals got unanimous support:

• Business license for all STRs
• All STR operators must agree to the 2016 “Good Neighbor Policy”
• Regulation applies to all parts of the city
• Potential exemption for Homeowner Associations such as North Coast Village.
• Minimum stay of at least 3 days
• Some sort of restriction on special events
• Concerns about parking
• Annual inspections, one hour warning for inspections to investigate violation, and revocation of the business license for three strikes in one year
• Permit fee to fund inspections