Windsor approves ban on short-term rentals. What that means for the owners

Windsor’s Town Council voted Wednesday to ban non-hosted short-term rentals in residential neighborhoods -- a move that short-term rental owners said they may challenge in court.

Non-hosted short-term rentals are sites that are rented for fewer than 30 days and the owner is not present while the guest is there. Hosted rentals remain a permitted use in Windsor and non-hosted rentals are still allowed in commercial and mixed-use zones.

Wednesday’s 4-1 vote was the result of a monthslong process during which the council repeatedly reversed course on the issue.

Windsor has about 108 short-term rentals with business licenses, town officials said.

Council’s vote came a day after Santa Rosa’s City Council limited the number of short-term rentals an operator can own but said existing operators with more than one property will be allowed to remain in business under prior rules. The council’s vote effectively froze for now at 171 the number of short-term rentals allowed in the county’s largest city.

In Windsor, the council granted owners of existing short-term rentals a two-year grace period so they could figure out what to do with their properties.

Those owners said they were leaning toward legal action.

“I don’t feel we’re going to just sit by and watch this happen,” said Barbara Austin, a Windsor resident who rents her home out for short stints when she travels.

The council did make something of an exception for homeowners who can prove that their property is their primary home. In those cases, under the new ordinance, homeowners would be allowed to rent out their properties for fewer than 30 days at a time — up to a total of 60 days a year.

For Austin, who is among that group, the decision still sat poorly.

“I don’t think its fair to limit the number of days I can use my home for an STR based on a number pulled out of thin air,” the 33-year Windsor resident said.

But for people like Barbara Mills, who saw the issue as one that placed the interests of out-of-town investors against Windsor residents who want to preserve their neighborhoods, the council’s decision was the only right one.

“It came down to people with second homes or third homes who want to make money off Windsor and those of us who want to make a life here,” said Mills. “Our council decided not to compromise and voted in favor of the citizens. I’m not joyous, I know there are people who will lose income, but I am relieved.”

Windsor has inched toward some sort of short-term rental regulation since 2015 but this year the issue became a real policy and political struggle for the council.

“There will be winners and losers,” said Vice Mayor Sam Salmon. “That’s not an area this council has historically had to deal with, personal losses based on our decisions. This is a different animal.”

In February, council members considered an ordinance that would have required all short-term rental owners to get a permit and limited them to owning no more than five such properties in Windsor. That ordinance would not have limited the overall number of short-term rentals operating in town.

The path to Wednesday’s vote has been thorny since that meeting, passing through a thicket of arguments about small town quality-of-life and atmosphere versus property rights and the ability to earn a livelihood.

The council in February asked staff to come back with a new ordinance much like the one it signed off on Wednesday, banning non-hosted short-term rentals in residential areas and giving owners a grace period.

But in March, the council reversed itself, asking city staff to come up with a new ordinance to limit non-hosted short-term rentals in the city to those already operating, prohibit that right from being passed along if the property was sold, and ban any new short-term rentals in residential areas.

Later yet, in April, the council asked staff to bring back the tougher ordinance to ban short-term rentals in residential areas and give the owners a year from this October to shut them down.

The council on Wednesday approved that version — modified to grant a grace period of two years and to allow limited short-term rentals by owners like Austin who can prove their property is a primary residence.

Mayor Rosa Reynoza said enforcement of the ordinance’s rules limiting parties and other disturbances had to take place during the grace period.

“Enforcement needs to relieve the residents living next to them — whatever we decide, that has to happen,” she said.

Alex Mog, Windsor’s assistant town attorney, said that short-term rentals are not a permitted use in Windsor — the town simply requires owners to get a business license — “but even if they were, the town can use its police power to terminate a permitted use.”

Mog said the town could do that either by paying to compensate a short-term rental owner or by offering a “reasonable grace period” so the owner “can recover some of their investment.”

That doesn’t cut it with owners who say the town’s zoning code doesn’t mention short-term rentals and in several places grants homeowners the right to rent those properties for periods of time less than 30 days.

“This is really the crux of the conversation: is short-term rental a vested right or not a vested right?” said Michael Ferl, a Realtor and Windsor resident who rents out a house in town to short-term visitors.

Ferl, a leader in the Town of Windsor Homeowners Rights Association, said he and other owners have consulted with attorneys who have “confirmed that these individuals have indeed a vested right to continue to operate.”

Ferl said: “Litigation is on the table, but we want to, of course, be strategic about it. We don’t want to act without knowing what our options are.”

Council member Debora Fudge — who said owners of existing short-term rental properties should be allowed to continue operating — was the sole dissenting vote on the council against the ban.

She also said extending the grace period to a date after a new council will be seated — which Salmon proposed — sent the message that the town may again reverse its approach to short-term rentals.

“I think that’s leading people on,” she said.

Austin, the homeowner who rents her house out when she travels, agreed and said it was cause for more uncertainty.

“It’s still kicking the can down the road and it still means that the good faith short-term rental owners don’t know what to do next,” she said.

If the new ordinance gets past a second reading on June 21, it would take effect 30 days later.

You can reach Staff Writer Jeremy Hay at 707-387-2960 or jeremy.hay@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @jeremyhay