by Christina Sandefur
February 1, 2019
Kilauea’s
eruption on the island of Hawai‘i made 2018 a tough year for local businesses.
Now a new anti-home-sharing
law is threatening to hamper recovery in the town of Volcano, where
tourism is the backbone of the economy. Beginning April 1, homeowners won’t be allowed
to offer their homes as short-term rentals unless their properties fall within designated
“resort zones”—and they can face tens of thousands of dollars in fines for
violating that law.
Ironically,
homeowners in Volcano could be spared from these regulations if their city were
itself rezoned as a “resort zone,” but then they’d have to give up the town’s
quiet, residential atmosphere to make way for large hotels. By contrast, home-sharing—the
ability to rent one’s home to guests for a short period of time—has allowed
local restaurants and businesses to thrive on tourism while still allowing the
town to maintain its residential character. That’s not surprising: After all, home-sharing
is a residential use, and renting a home for a short period of time
doesn’t transform a house into a hotel. But instead of letting local residents
decide for themselves how to use their property in a manner that’s consistent
with the small-town atmosphere, government officials are forbidding homeowners
from welcoming guests who help the local economy thrive.
Bans
on home-sharing are usually rationalized on the theory that home-sharing causes
noise or excessive traffic. It’s questionable whether that’s really the case,
but even if it is, officials should focus on whether owners or tenants are
causing nuisances, rather than writing across-the-board bans or discriminating
between people based on whether they rent their homes on a short-term or
long-term basis. That distinction makes no sense—if people are causing a
ruckus, the police can and should put a stop to it, regardless of whether those
people are staying for a month or just a single night.
Cities
nationwide are now facing litigation
over extreme anti-home-sharing regulations that tread on people’s rights
without addressing legitimate nuisance concerns. But it doesn’t have to be this
way. We’ve crafted a state-level
legislative solution that ensures cities can restrict real
nuisances—without making responsible property owners into outlaws simply
because they let guests stay in their homes overnight. States
that have adopted this approach, like Arizona, Tennessee, and
Indiana, are protecting their citizens’ rights—promoting quiet, clean, and safe
neighborhoods, and obviating the need for statewide litigation against
overreaching cities. Property owners coast-to-coast are calling
upon lawmakers to follow in these states’ footsteps.
But
citizens shouldn’t have to beg the legislatures or courts to protect their
rights. City officials have a duty to craft reasonable policy solutions rather
than rushing to pass excessive regulations or outright bans on home-sharing
that cause more problems than they solve—and that violate people’s
constitutional rights. Some cities, like Colorado
Springs, are taking care to regulate home-sharing in a lawful manner
by focusing on genuine health and safety concerns, making home-sharers follow
the same rules as everyone else, and otherwise leaving people free to rent
their property as they see fit.
Other
officials are taking a more passive approach. Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel E.
Bowser recently refused to sign an anti-home-sharing bill because she
believed it was unconstitutional and likely to be overturned by the
courts. This came after a federal judge blocked a similar New York City
ordinance that forced home-sharing platforms to turn over personal information
about their users. (Of course, if Mayor Bowser thinks the D.C. ordinance
violates her constituents’ rights, she should have put them first and vetoed
the legislation, since the bill can automatically become law even without her
signature, after the 30-day congressional review period required for D.C.
legislation.)
Home-sharing
has become a controversial issue in recent years, and knee-jerk, emotional
reactions make for bad laws. They also deprive homeowners of needed economic
opportunities–especially in areas where residents
are struggling to recover from downturns and disasters, like on
Hawai‘i’s Big Island. City officials and state lawmakers alike should take a
deep breath and focus on eliminating noise, traffic, and pollution—regardless
of whether those problems are caused by an overnight guest or the homeowner
himself. Determining who is and is not suitable to stay in a given neighborhood
isn’t the government’s job.
Christina
Sandefur is the Executive Vice President of the Goldwater Institute.
