Hampton will not approve any short term rentals until at least November as the city government puts a pause on applications to receive legal advice and further study how the rentals will impact residential neighborhoods.
The City Council deferred voting until November on five applications on the agenda at Wednesday’s meeting to give staff more time to research issues of density and talk to more Hampton residents. Mayor Donnie Tuck said the council had so far approved 11 use permits for short-term rentals and approximately 50 applications were pending.
The council took action last year to regulate short-term rental homes — such as those rented through Airbnb or Vrbo — by requiring all short-term rentals to have a use permit and a business license. The council also made it possible for more property owners to operate short-term rentals by removing a previous requirement that short-term rentals were only allowed as an “accessory use” to a home that is primarily a residence.
Before enacting the new use permit rules, the city estimated about 370 short-term rentals were advertised online in Hampton.
Since the December vote, the council and city staff have discussed ways to regulate short-term rentals and what conditions they would like to see included in use permit applications. Before the city began considering short-term rental use permits, it had also convened a stakeholder group — made up of Neighborhood Commission members, a bed-and-breakfast operator, a hotel operator, and short-term rental operators — to provide the council with recommendations about how to best regulate short term rentals.
“The group provided the council with recommended conditions for short-term rentals,” Tuck said. “However, since the council began holding public hearings regarding specific use applications, we’ve heard from many other community members about the anticipated impacts to their neighborhoods stemming from the use.”
Tuck said city staff was already evaluating the issue of density and how many short-term rentals should be in a given area. They are now also looking at what city areas make the most sense to contain short-term rentals.
He said the deferral of the applications until November will allow the city to receive legal guidance from the city attorney and weigh the density and location questions.
Several property owners who had expected their short-term rental applications to be considered at last week’s meeting were upset at the delay.
Loretta O’Brien-Parham, who owns a home on Chesapeake Avenue near the water, questioned why the council voted in December to change how it regulated short-term rentals if the city was not ready to make decisions on applications.
“I think that the process has been exhausting,” she said. “For me, as an applicant, I started this process in March, and it’s been delay after delay after delay.”
O’Brien-Parham called her property “a second home” and said she isn’t trying to rent it to strangers. Instead, she wants to be able to rent it to friends and family.
“I simply was following what I thought were well-established rules and policies,” she said of submitting her application to the city.
Despite the setbacks, O’Brien-Parham says she has not given up.
Antoinette Smith, who has a property on Settlers Landing Road, called the delays “very stressful.”
“It takes a lot to get an Airbnb, short term rentals, in order. It is a business,” she said. “People put their passion and heart into it.”
She also expressed concern that people who follow the new short-term rental rules — by filing for a permit —are being punished by the delays.
“We’re being punished for wanting to follow the rules,” Smith said. “There are a number of Airbnbs being run that are not following the rules that have never filed a permit. And so they’re really placing this signal out that the ones who want to follow the rules get punished.”
Smith noted that if Hampton wants to attract people to the city for tourism, it needs places to house them. While there are hotels, she said many families prefer to have kitchens and space that come with short-term rentals.
“You can’t just say, ‘We want to market the great things that have been happening to Hampton, but we don’t have anywhere for you to stay,’” Smith said. “’And if we have somewhere for you to stay, we’re going to force you into a hotel.’ But guess what? People will look elsewhere.”
Josh Janney, joshua.janney@virginiamedia.com
