On February 5, the Chapel Hill STR task force held its fifth and final meeting.
Reminder: Per advisory board rules, task force members and members of the public who attend the meetings must abide by non-attribution when reporting on the meetings, meaning we cannot attribute specific comments to specific people. The CHSTRA will uphold this rule.
Meeting 4 Recap
The group approved the minutes from the fourth meeting, available here.
Read our full recap of the STR task force meeting 4 >
The objective of the task force’s last meeting was to review and wrap up some unfinished discussions from meeting 4 to finalize a list of recommendations to provide to council.
The task force discussed several key areas of ordinance provisions to identify statements of general agreement. A draft of these statements are captured below.
FAQs
Throughout the series of meetings, the task force got several repeated questions and points of confusion amongst task force members and the public. The co-chairs and planning department put together the following FAQ list to clarify several key points:
Q: Why isn’t the STR Task Force talking about hosted STRs and primary residence STRs? / Is the Task Force talking about hosted STRs and primary residence STRs?
A: The Chapel Hill Town Council has created and charged the STR Task Force to focus only on dedicated STRs–those properties that never have a primary occupant. However, outside of the Task Force, Town staff is considering ordinance provisions for hosted and unhosted STRs of primary residence and considering specific areas such as safety and registration. Additional ordinance provisions the Task Force discusses will be layered on top of this for dedicated STRs specifically.
Q: I homeshare/homestay on my property during the guest’s stay. Is the Task Force talking about my property?
A: No. However, a future ordinance will likely include provisions for your hosted rental with provisions on safety, registration, and occupancy tax.
Q: I rent my primary residence and am not at the property during the guest’s stay. Is the Task Force talking about my property?
A: No. However, a future ordinance will likely include provisions for your unhosted rental with provisions on safety, registration, and occupancy tax.
Q: Can the Task Force make recommendations that limit the number of permits issued per property owner or limit the number of permits issued to only those who live in the area?
A: No. The Task Force’s recommendations must be tied to zoning, not who is the property owners.
Q: Why isn’t the Task Force talking about nuisance issues – noise, parking and trash?
A: Chapel Hill already has a nuisance ordinance in place that governs all properties. The Town Council removed this from our conversation as the Town considers changing from a criminal path of enforcement of this ordinance to a civil path, which will improve enforcement for all properties.
Q: Why isn’t the Task Force talking about occupancy tax?
A: Chapel Hill’s and Orange County’s occupancy tax requirement already applies to short-term rentals.
Q: Do the Task Force’s decisions dictate the final ordinance?
A: No. The Task Force is only making recommendations for the advisory boards and Council to consider. After our findings are presented to the Council, the Council will direct the Planning Department to draft an ordinance for Council approval. This process will involve several other checkpoints and opportunity for public input. The Planning Department will supply a timeline of these milestones at the end of this meeting.
What Happens Next
From here, the STR discussion goes back to town staff and town council. The planning department and task force co-chairs will present the task force’s findings to the Council Committee on Economic Stability on March 6 to be followed by a series of public meetings and hearings tentatively scheduled as follows:
MEMBER ACTION ITEM
Between now and the Chapel Hill Town Council’s final vote on a potential STR ordinance in a few months, council members and other key decision-makers need to regularly hear from all of those who support and rely on STRs in our community.
The Council has expressly told town staff NOT to enforce the current ordinance, so there is no penalty for speaking up – and we need everyone to do so now before it’s too late.
To make this easy, the CHSTRA has created the STR Action Team to spread out efforts among all of those who want to stand up for the right to rent but don’t have time to engage every week. With all of us working together, a little effort from each of us adds up to go a long way toward a fair ordinance that protects our property rights and allows responsible hosts to continue to be an asset to Chapel Hill.