COEUR d’ALENE - Eric and Kathyrn Mack sacrificed, saved and worked hard to buy a second home in downtown Coeur d’Alene that they use as a short-term rental.

They said the revenue it generates allows them to take care of their family and maintain a middle-class lifestyle.

So, the possibility that the city might adopt stricter regulations on short-term rentals, or STRs, perhaps even using a lottery system to determine who gets a permit for one, didn’t sit well with them.

“This hurts me and it’s hurting other people like me,” Eric Mack said Monday.

Kathryn Mack said the loss of their STR income would be an economic blow that should not happen.

“If we live here, it seems right we should be able to own and operate an STR,” she said.

Jim Miller of Sky Harbor Drive had another view.

He said there are several STRs near his home and it hasn’t been positive.

“This has been quite an issue for us as far as noise, parking and trash are concerned,” he said.

Miller said some visitors renting STRs aren’t concerned about the viability of neighborhoods nor do they have consideration for local residents. The house across from him had about 20 people there at one time.

He said to alleviate problems with STRs, the city should require off-street parking, limit occupancy numbers, establish a fine process for noncompliance with noise abatement and hire an enforcement officer.

“These people are making a ton of money on these,” he said.

Those were just two of the testimonies offered during a joint three-hour workshop of the City Council and the Planning Commission on the city’s short-term rental code. About 100 people packed the Library Community Room.

The city’s STR codes were adopted in 2017 and have largely gone unenforced. In the past few months, city officials have discussed tougher regulations on STRs, which are rising in number. The city has about 450 permitted STRs, and an estimated 700 or so unpermitted.

The city reported 22,000 residential units, which means about 4% of housing stock is used as STRs.

There are areas, like Sanders Beach, that have multiple STRs on one block, which results in a deterioration of community character and loss of neighborhood integrity, a city report said.

Staff evaluated the number of STR permits in neighborhoods throughout the city and determined the concentration of STRs in many neighborhoods is too high, the report said.

About 30 people spoke at the workshop. Many were STR owners, real estate agents and property managers who cited the positive economic impact of tourists spending money at local businesses, creating jobs and allowing residents to use their property in a legal way to provide income.

“Let’s not add new arbitrary rules that aren’t going to be enforced because that’s not going to solve any problems,” said Caleb David.

But many residents said STRs are negative. They said they hurt neighborhood integrity, reduce long-term rentals needed by local blue-collar workers, hog street parking and even open doors for a criminal element.

Barb Crumpacker said there are six homes on her side of Lakeside Avenue and two are STRs.

“I would prefer to not have so many of them,” she said.

According to a city report, “The short-term rental ordinance should be about finding and maintaining balance, while protecting private property rights and quiet enjoyment of properties, and preserving neighborhood integrity and community character."

The report said locals “bought with an expectation that the neighborhood would remain intact and that their investment would be preserved.”

Proposed code amendments for consideration include:

• A 300-foot buffer between short-term rentals with a lottery system which could utilize a point system to determine who gets the permit within the buffer area.
• Use an STR monitoring/compliance company (permit fees would cover the service).
• An inspection for at least the first year by a city employee or contractor.
• Requirement to provide proof of liability insurance for $1 million.

The possibility that STRs could be limited, or that current, STRs could lose their permit under a lottery system, upset some, who said the city was taking a heavy-handed approach.

Melissa Radford of the recently formed Coeur d’Alene Rental Alliance, which has 322 members, said STRs are part of pursuing the American dream and she trusted the city to protect their rights to rent their property.

If the city wants to create new or change current STR regulations, she said, “the burden of proof is on them” to provide evidence that short-term rentals are a threat to the health and welfare of neighborhoods.

Some called on the city to provide data that STRs were a source of problems.

Radford said from May 2020 to Aug. 22, 2022, Coeur d'Alene police received 1,122 noise/disturbance complaints and only 14 were associated with legally permitted vacation rentals.

STR owners are respectful of neighbors, maintain property, vet guests and respond to concerns, Radford said.

“We love this community and care deeply about its future,” she said.

Elton Bain said if anyone wanted proof of how lack of rental regulations can cause chaos in a neighborhood, they should visit South Lake Tahoe, Calif.

“I don’t want to see it happen to Coeur d’Alene,” he said.

Bain said he wasn’t trying to stop anyone from earning a living by having a rental property, “But I think there should be some form of monitoring enforcement.”

Resident Jim Volke said he believed the city’s effort to establish new STR codes was “our last, best chance moving forward to put some common sense, guardrails, in place to protect all our collective rights.”

“The integrity of our community neighbors is paramount because it is the fabric that makes up our fair city," Volke said.

No decisions were made and there will be future opportunities for public input as the city considers its STR codes.

Planning Commissioner Lynn Fleming said Venice is an example of what happens when everything turns into rentals. There, it has squeezed out everyone but the old, retired, and wealthy.

She said there’s no life, no little kids, no actual neighborhoods.

“It’s a walking museum,” she said, "when you turn over your beloved city to those you don’t know."

Councilman Dan Gookin said Coeur d’Alene is great “because we are a community.”

“We have to do something to save the neighborhoods,” he said.