Little Rock floats proposals for short rentals

Panel to take up 2 rezoning bids

FILE — Little Rock City Hall is shown in this 2019 file photo.
FILE — Little Rock City Hall is shown in this 2019 file photo.

Little Rock is working on a uniform way to regulate short-term rentals as two locations in the city's Hillcrest neighborhood are set to go before the city Board of Directors on Tuesday.

Cities across the nation are working on how to approach short-term rentals as vacation rental platforms such as Airbnb, VRBO and HomeAway have become popular ways for travelers to experience neighborhoods in new cities and for property owners to maximize their unused space.

"In the past year to year and a half, there's been definitely a growing demand for short-term rentals, not only here in the city of Little Rock but in the United States and also in the world as a whole," Little Rock Planning and Development Director Jamie Collins told the board last month.

As a result, concerns from municipalities about maintaining neighborhood character and collecting tax dollars have arisen.

Little Rock currently treats short-term rentals -- generally defined as having guests who stay 30 nights or fewer -- as planned developments that require property owners to put rezoning applications before the Little Rock Planning Commission as well as the city Board of Directors.

The city already has an agreement with Airbnb to remit the 4% lodging tax that the Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau collects, but it has no such deal with the other platforms.

At an April 28 city board policy discussion, Collins proposed ways to handle two types of short-term rental properties, which the city's staff came up with after months of studying the matter.

Per the proposals, short-term rentals that are owner-occupied -- for instance, if the owners are renting out attached structures or backyard cottages on the properties they live on -- would go through a special-use permit process that requires approval from just the Planning Commission. There would still be a process for public comments to be heard, and neighbors would still be notified.

If the owners do not live on the properties, the city is proposing that those short-term rental hosts go through the planned zoning development process, due to the properties being used commercially. Those types of short-term rentals would have to go before the Board of Directors for approval.

The city's codes also would be revised to require both types of short-term rentals to obtain business licenses, provide adequate parking, go through inspection from the building code office and the fire marshal, and meet certain safety requirements.

Collins said he hopes to bring an ordinance incorporating those changes before the board by the end of the year, citing coronavirus-related travel restrictions that make the matter less urgent.

In the meantime, owners of two Hillcrest properties on Crystal Court who seek to rent out accessory dwellings are requesting rezoning as planned zoning developments.

Mark Baillie and Tiffany Weinkopff, the owners of one of the properties, said that renting out a 250-square-foot cottage behind their home has been a positive experience and has attracted little attention from neighbors.

After spending a year rebuilding the cottage, Baillie said, they began renting it out in February of last year for several months until being notified by the city that it was out of compliance and that a rezoning request was needed.

"We're hoping the fact that we haven't had anybody stay in our cottage throughout the year will show that we're willing to comply in the future, and we're making our best efforts to be patient as the city navigates kind of a tough issue," Weinkopff said.

According to numbers from AirDNA, a third-party service that the Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau has used to track short-term rentals, there are at least 100 short-term rental properties in Ward 3, which includes the Hillcrest neighborhood, the most of the city's seven wards.

The number of short-term rental listings on Airbnb fluctuates day to day, Collins said, but has topped 300.

Ward 3 City Director Kathy Webb said the Hillcrest Residents Association had discussed short-term rentals and was not opposed.

The city board is scheduled to vote on the properties' rezoning at Tuesday's regular meeting at 6 p.m.

Metro on 05/18/2020

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