photo by: Screenshot/Airbnb.com

Some of the approximately 90 whole-home short-term rentals listed on the Airbnb website for the Lawrence area are pictured in this screenshot from Monday, Aug. 17, 2020.

City leaders did not have enough support Tuesday to adopt new regulations for short-term rentals where the property owner lives elsewhere, and they will continue the discussion at a future meeting.

As part of its meeting Tuesday, the Lawrence City Commission considered adopting a new ordinance for whole-home Airbnbs and other short-term rentals that aimed to correct concerns regarding the city’s original permitting process. However, the commission was roughly split on the more fundamental question of whether whole-home rentals should be allowed in residential areas at all.

Commissioners Stuart Boley and Lisa Larsen said that they considered whole-home rentals commercial enterprises that should not be allowed in residential neighborhoods. Boley, Larsen and Commissioner Courtney Shipley also expressed concern that allowing such rentals — which city maps show are primarily located in the city’s older, core neighborhoods — takes away from the city’s stock of affordable housing.

Shipley said that the commission needed to consider public comments from some residents who said they had seen such rentals displace affordable housing in their neighborhoods. She added that personally, she had watched a home in her own neighborhood go up for sale at an affordable price, get quickly purchased and converted into a short-term rental.

“It was anecdotal, but it was in my neighborhood, and I saw it, and it was real,” Shipley said. “I don’t want neighbors and neighborhood to feel dismissed.”

Vice Mayor Brad Finkeldei and Mayor Jennifer Ananda said they would support the ordinance as proposed by city, which included significant restrictions. Ananda said that she didn’t want to make the decision to disallow whole-home short-term rentals without data. She said that putting an ordinance in place would allow the city to get more data, and that the commission could always change the ordinance if needed.

“We can always rescind something,” Ananda said. “We are not carving this in stone; it’s on a piece of paper and it’s within our power to change it should we need to.”

The proposed ordinance would permit whole-home short-term rentals as a use by right citywide but includes restrictions that aim to prevent a concentration of such rentals in residential neighborhoods, among other limitations. Specifically, operators — individuals or business entities — could only have a maximum of three such rentals citywide. In addition, an application for a whole-home rental license in a single-family neighborhood would not be accepted if the rental were located within 500 feet of another whole-home rental within the same neighborhood. For whole-home rentals in multi-dwelling areas, the application would not be accepted if more than 2% of the units on the premises or lot were already whole-home short-term rentals.

Licenses would have to be renewed annually, rentals inspected every two years, and there would be an objection process for neighbors, which could lead to a license not being granted or renewed.

After significant discussion and back-and-forth about various options, Larsen made a motion to adopt the ordinance but to not allow whole-home rentals in residential neighborhoods, including neighborhoods zoned as multifamily. That motion failed 3-2, with only Larsen and Boley voting in favor. Shipley said she would not want to vote in favor of such a motion without expanding the definition of owner-occupied short-term rentals to include properties with accessory dwelling units.

Ultimately, the commission directed city staff to bring back more information about potentially restricting whole-home rental use by zoning or other parameters and to continue the conversation about the definition of an owner-occupied short-term rental, which are allowed by right and governed under an existing part of city code.

City Commission Meeting 08/18/20