CENTRE WELLINGTON – Centre Wellington council wants more opinions and time to evaluate the newest draft of the township's Airbnb regulation bylaw.
When discussing a new draft bylaw report about regulating short-term rentals (S.T.R) at a council meeting Monday evening, Centre Wellington council decided to refer the draft to the Economic Prosperity and Growth Advisory Committee and post it to Connect CW for additional feedback.
Created to regulate the approximately 150 to 200 short-term rentals currently operating in Centre Wellington, a report on the draft bylaw recommends a licensing system requiring owners to make multiple submissions to the township and pay $225 for a single room or up to $800 for a whole unit, over three years.
Other proposed regulations include a penalty point system, parking and occupancy limitations and requiring the host to live within 1,000 metres of the subject property.
At the meeting, Coun. Barb Evoy said she felt a lot of "warning red bells" around enforcing the draft bylaw's potential cost to the township and asked for a future report to include exact or approximate numbers.
"So as much as I agree with you we do need regulation, I'm not sure how from a financial lens the township addresses this," said Evoy.
Managing director of corporate services and treasurer Adam McNabb said it's common to outsource a vendor for monitoring. He later clarified the township has "staff sufficient" to conduct the inspection process "given that it is a phased approach."
"We'll be doing it on a best-efforts basis," said McNabb. "Certainly there will be a significant amount of uptake at the beginning, but beyond that, it's part of that fee structure in terms of what we intend to do, how rigorously we intend to monitor and discipline through the demerit system."
Coun. Bronwynne Wilton suggested council refer the draft bylaw to the Economic Prosperity and Growth Advisory Committee for additional feedback and to give councillors more time to study it.
Agreeing, Coun. Jennifer Adams said consulting the committee would be "a good way of utilizing our community members," as many of the issues being discussed within the bylaw are issues the advisory committees are familiar with.
"I think it's important to involve our advisory committees because we're again kind've moving away from our core services and getting into some pretty heavy regulations," said Adams. "Some might call it a lot of over-regulation."
Resident Darcy Saunders, one of two residents who delegated at the meeting, said the two and a half years he lived next to a now-closed S.T.R were a "nightmare."
Telling stories about endless wedding groups and drunken parties typically three times a week, Wednesday to Sunday, Saunders said the draft bylaw lacks "sufficient measures" to prevent the problems they experienced as there's "little control" over absentee owners and "no accountability" for disturbances without stronger penalties and regulations.
"I have no problem with S.T.R's, where the owners live on-site, but unattended, party houses, absolutely not. Can any of you honestly say you'd want to live next to one?" said Saunders, addressing the council. "We hope strong laws are put in place so no one must go through what we did and we can all find a lasting solution."
Isabel Buckmaster is the Local Journalism Initiative reporter for GuelphToday. LJI is a federally-funded program.
