After its ninth public meeting on short-term residential vacation rentals, Kalispell City Council is finally ready to take regulation measures to a vote.

The council at Monday’s work session discussed arguments for and against vacation rentals, and after two hours decided it’s time to move forward. Council is expected to hear the first reading of an ordinance in early November.

Currently there is no ordinance addressing short-term rentals in the city. Zoning laws confine vacation rentals to business districts that allow lodging, however short-term rentals can be found outside those areas. Council began working through the municipal policy process about eight months ago to implement some form of citywide regulation.

The proposed ordinance would allow short-term rentals within residential districts. The ordinance requires a property owner to obtain an administrative conditional use permit to operate a vacation rental and prohibits short-term rentals from exceeding the allowable density defined by the property’s zoning.

If a short-term rental is located in a single-family zoning district, the owners wouldn’t be allowed to rent out the basement, main floor and second floor to three different families, City Planning Director Tom Jentz explained.

The proposed ordinance carries many of the conditions from earlier drafts. Property owners planning to offer a vacation rental must obtain proof of inspection by the building department, proof of a state tourist accommodation license and register to pay the state bed tax. They also will be required to provide a name and phone number to area residents, and rental guests must have access to parking.

The proposed ordinance also prohibits any signage pointing to the rental, requires owners to submit for an annual license renewal and holds property owners responsible for any violations of the ordinance.

A HANDFUL of residents spoke at Monday’s work session.

Erica Wirtala of Northwest Montana Association of Realtors said short-term rentals have their pros and cons for the real-estate community. She said vacation rentals are difficult to sell after their rental use, but acknowledged they are a useful tool for homeowners in the valley. All things considered, Wirtala said the association supported short-term rentals in the city and will work with the county to develop a similar policy.

“We’re in favor of legal short-term rentals in the Kalispell area,” she said. “But what was scaring me last night was talking about doing it block by block or [neighborhood by neighborhood]. That would be, for the planning staff and a Realtor, very difficult to sort out.”

Scott and Megan Lester, who operate a short-term rental in town, had spoken in previous council meetings in support of the rentals and did so again Monday. Scott said when their house was previously used as a long-term rental the quality and value depreciated while tenants had issues paying rent. He said converting to a short-term rental saved the couple from selling the home at a loss.

“It really saved our bacon that it worked and the Canadians were coming down on shopping trips,” Scott said. “It gave us enough income to cover the mortgage and improve the house over time.”

Village Greens resident Ed Snoeck said added tourists in the community would require more police and fire support than is currently available. He also believes businesses that buy up properties to use as short-term rentals wouldn’t help maintain the community.

“You’ve got people smoking dope over here and speaking dirty language and throwing cigarette butts in the boulevard. What do you do then? You have to call the guy in Florida because that’s where he’s staying,” Snoeck said.

Snoeck said individual neighborhoods should have the opportunity to choose whether to allow vacation rentals. Last month, Village Greens residents produced a petition with 355 signatures asking to exempt the neighborhood from action permitting short-term rentals.

“I think the people should get to choose. We choose to live here, invest good money in a nice neighborhood,” Snoeck said.

Kalispell city planner PJ Sorensen on Monday said the city hasn’t received any complaints this year regarding short-term rentals, although previous years have averaged about two or three complaints.

At a September meeting council asked the planning department to compile a list of unintended consequences of allowing vacation rentals in residential areas, where they are currently not permitted. Housing affordability was the issue brought by residents during that meeting. According to the planning department report, research shows that housing affordability becomes an issue when short-term rentals take up a larger percentage of available housing in the market. In Breckenridge, Colo., 71 percent of homes on the market are used for short-term rentals. In Kalispell, approximately 47 homes are available for short-term rentals out of the total 9,800.

Patchwork zoning is another unintended consequence, where some neighborhoods with objection to short-term rentals would have to be addressed individually. The planning department’s report said neighborhoods could adopt their own bylaws through a homeowners association to be enforced at the private level, like Snoeck suggested. According to the planning department’s report, this could create a patchy, inconsistent zoning map over the city and could cause more problems later on. The ordinance could also exclude certain subdivisions or neighborhoods, such as parking in the downtown district. This could create its own problem, though, the report states, in losing consistency of the ordinance itself.

Another concern was that allowing short-term rentals could open the doors for group homes to flood residential areas. According to the report, short-term rentals don’t have a specific client base taken into consideration when under review.

Reporter Seaborn Larson may be reached at 758-4441 or by email at slarson@dailyinterlake.com.