Planning Commission to consider changes to Short-Term and Vacation Rentals

Following the presentation of the Short-Term and Vacation Rental Two-Year Review in January, the Boulder County Commissioners directed the Community Planning & Permitting (CPP) staff to draft recommended changes to the Land Use Code and Licensing Ordinance associated with Short-Term Rentals (STRs) in unincorporated Boulder County.

Those recommendations will be presented to the Planning Commission on Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023.

Public comments will be invited during the commission’s hearing which will be held at the Downtown Boulder County Courthouse, 3rd Floor, 1325 Pearl Street in Boulder, at 1:30 p.m. Information about the commission’s public hearing and how to present comments will be available on the Planning Commission webpage: https://bouldercounty.gov/government/boards-and-commissions/planning-commission/.

The Planning Commission is expected to make a recommendation to the county commissioners concerning the proposed changes.

The county commissioners’ directive to the CPP staff included evaluating ways to create more certainty for applicants looking to engage in short-term rentals, streamline the application and review process, and reduce redundancies and discretion within the current land use review and licensing process.

Prior to drafting the proposed amendments to Article 4 of the Boulder County Land Use Code and updates to the Licensing Ordinance regulating Short-Term and Vacation Rental uses, the CPP staff held two in-person community feedback sessions in the spring – one in Allenspark and one in Boulder – as well as a virtual session.

The staff offered nine conceptual changes during the feedback sessions which included eliminating or simplifying the review process; establishing licensing caps for specific types of short-term rentals in specific geographical areas; ensuring licensing requirements are clear and serve a defined purpose; establishing requirements for minimum number of nights per rental and total number of rental nights per year; establishing guidelines to define residence and/or occupancy requirements; available options for taxing short-term and vacation rentals; and means of increasing active enforcement of the regulations.

According to the CPP staff summary document, its proposed changes “simplify the process by reducing the number of uses from three to two and establish a single process through which both the Short-Term and Vacation Rental uses are reviewed by zoning and licensing staff. Additional recommendations create parameters that establish a baseline level of health and safety in rental dwellings, outline areas where Vacation Rentals may be more appropriate, and reduce impacts to traditional housing stock.”

The proposed changes are only for Boulder County’s unincorporated areas, which include the rural, mountain and plains communities, such as Niwot and Gunbarrel, and not incorporated cities such as Boulder and Longmont.

In the current regulations, three rental types are defined – Primary Dwelling Short-Term Rentals, Secondary Dwelling Short-Term Rentals, and Vacation Rentals. In the proposed changes that number would be reduced to two types – Short-Term Rentals and Vacation Rentals.

Vacation Rentals would be defined as “a single-family dwelling unit that offers transient lodging accommodations to a single booking party at a time within that dwelling unit for a rental duration of fewer than 30 days where the entire unit is solely occupied by the rental party during the duration of the rental period.” Approved Vacation Rentals could be rented for up to 365 days per year.

Other major changes for Vacation Rentals include requiring a two-night minimum stay to reduce turnover and neighborhood impact; changing parking requirements to two on-site spaces, or one space per every four approved occupants, whichever is fewer; and only allowing Vacation Rentals in Forestry and Mountain Institutional zoning districts.

The vast majority of unincorporated land in the mountains of Boulder County is zoned Forestry while Mountain Institutional zoning is for areas “established in the mountainous part of Boulder County for the purpose of permitting more intensive use of land than the surrounding Forestry District, where such use can be accomplished without harm to forest resources, natural environment, open areas and residential uses in the surrounding area.”

The new proposed Short-Term Rental definition would change the owner-occupancy guidelines currently in use to differentiate between Primary and Secondary STRs and establish one standard where the dwelling unit is the primary residence of either the owner or tenant (occupies dwelling for more than 30 days) and the owner or tenant is present during the duration of the rental period (fewer than 30 days). There would be an exception for up to 30 nights per year that the owner or tenant would not be required to be present during the rental period.

The requirements for proof of primary residence would change to the dwelling unit in which a person lives for more than nine months out of each calendar year. The current requirement is six months. Proof of residency would be eased to presenting a Colorado state-issued driver’s license or identification card along with a sworn Statement of Primary Residence.

At the Short-Term and Vacation Rental Two-Year Review in January, Commissioner Claire Levy voiced some doubt about the effectiveness of placing caps on the number of licenses permitted for each rental type. The commissioner’s concern was that such a system would “reward the ones who race to the court house” to grab available licenses, which may not, in her opinion, be the best way to determine who should actually receive the limited number.

Despite those concerns, the CPP staff, looking for ways to reduce stress on the available housing stock and overall neighborhood impact, proposes limiting the number of Vacation Rental licenses, while no limit would be set on Short-Term Rental licenses. The Vacation Rental limit would be set at a 3.5 percent cap on the total housing units within the Upper St. Vrain Census County District (CCD) and Bald Mountain CCD. That guidance would cap the number of Vacation Rental licenses in the Upper St. Vrain to 169 and to 73 licenses in the Bald Mountain CCD.

Another proposed change would be in the Wildfire Partners Certification process. Currently Vacation Rental applicants are required to have completed a wildfire assessment, implemented all recommendations, and received certification prior to license approval. Short-term rentals were only required to have an assessment within the past five years of their application.

Under the new licensing guidelines, both Short-Term and Vacation Rental applicants would need to have completed an assessment within the past five years in order to obtain their initial license. Both rental types would have to receive Wildfire Partners Certification to renew their licenses, which is required two years after the date of the initial license.

The Planning Commission recommendation will be forwarded to the county commissioners, and the Board of County Commissioners hearing is anticipated to occur on October 24, 2023.

A summary of all the proposed amendments can be found at https://assets.bouldercounty.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/dc-23-0001-summary-of-changes-20230920.pdf. The entire text of the Land Use Code amendments and associated licensing ordinance is available at https://bouldercounty.gov/property-and-land/land-use/planning/land-use-code-update/dc-23-0001/.