BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Palo Alto City Council welcomed a suggestion tonight (Dec. 12) to update and enforce the city’s ban on short-term rentals.
A ban against entire houses from being rented out for less than 30 days would both increase the city’s housing stock and make neighborhoods more pleasant, a memo from council members Lydia Kou, Tom DuBois and Greer Stone said.
“When a house is empty and people just drop in for a day or two, that’s not building community,” Kou said.
DuBois said that Palo Alto has a well-established and lucrative short-term rental industry, with “super hosts” renting out dozens of properties.
There are between 500 and 1,000 properties in Palo Alto that have been rented out using Airbnb, compared to around 100 long-term rental vacancies, he said.
Stone citied several articles and studies that found that short-term rentals raise home prices and reduce availability.
Their arguments convinced Mayor Pat Burt and Councilman Eric Filseth to join them in asking the Policy and Services Committee, which is made up of three council members, to make a recommendation on the topic to the full council.
Two council members, Alison Cormack and Greg Tanaka, opposed the ban.
Cormack said she hadn’t heard that Airbnbs were an issue in surveys, office hours or public comments. She said that families come to Palo Alto for the hospitals, and they sometimes need a kitchen, a laundry room or an extra room for kids.
Cormack took issue with Stone lobbying for a yes vote by saying that tonight was only to authorize a discussion of short-term rentals, and that no decision was being made.
She brought up her colleague’s memo from earlier this year that suggested selling some of Palo Alto’s water rights to another city, which was shot down by the rest of council.
“I find it disappointing,” she said.
Tanaka said the real problem is actually bad neighbors, not Airbnbs. For example, he said he lives by an Airbnb that has pleasant guests, while a long-term neighbor has loud parties.
Tanaka said many people rent Airbnbs because they’re at Stanford for academic purposes for only a few months. He also said he knows a widow who relies on income from renting her second houses out on Airbnb.
The city of Palo Alto has a ban on rentals for less than 30 days, but it’s rarely been enforced. Planning Director Jonathan Last said code enforcement officers have a difficult time determining that a house is being rented out for less than 30 days, and they’re not always able to respond right away.
The city also signed an agreement with Airbnb to collect hotel taxes, collecting revenue on an illegal practice.
“We turn a blind eye and accept their transient occupancy tax, and I think that’s inherently wrong to take that approach,” Burt said.
Any decision on short-term rentals will be made by the council that takes office next month. Julie Lythcott-Haims, Ed Lauing and Vicki Veenker will replace DuBois, Filseth and Cormack.