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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0739.086 2016-2018Barbara Bell 69-1536 Puako Beach Drive, Kamuela, HI 96743 bbellster@gmail.com; 808.937.2573 May 31, 2018 P� To: All Hawaii County Council members, Planning Committee Members, C Qc� Planning Committee Chair, Karen Eoff, and C:) Planning Committee Vice -Chair, Eileen O'Hara �x .X= ©-< nc-) Re: Proposed Bill 108, Draft 2, Relating to Short -Term Vacation Rentals. A 41;U Aloha to the Council Planning Committee Chair, Vice -Chair, and all committee memf3rs,D am a full-time Hawaii Island resident, and along with my husband am an owner/manager of three Hawaii Island short-term rentals. Two are in Resort nodes, the other is in AG -1 zoning. am supportive of the Council's effort to create an inventory and to establish basic oversight of vacation rentals in Hawaii County. I appreciate the language about prima facie evidence stating someone is in business when they do any advertising. Enforcement needs all the tools it can get. A FEW CONCERNS: 1. 1 sincerely hope wastewater disposal will be handled in both the registration form and the special use permit process. It is a much bigger piece of basic infrastructure than parking and this is a great opportunity to address this sooner rather than later. For a business based on a property that uses a cesspool for wastewater disposal, it seems only fair to be required to be in line with the current state Department of Health regulations. As you all know, many short term -rentals, out of the County-sewered areas, are pre -1993 homes. They were often small, older "beach" cottages, where a cesspool was the standard. Times have changed and these older homes can now be used year-round, often with big groups. I don't know of any requirements to upgrade single-family dwellings with the new or expanded use. The state has recently designated five areas on Hawaii Island as priority areas to address wastewater upgrades sooner than the 2050 cesspool abandonment Gomm. No. 1 Ref. To.. L Ref. Date ;N 0-5 ZUE requirement. Kapoho and Puako are especially vulnerable, with low elevations and around 45-50% of homes using cesspools! There is no hope of a public sewer anytime soon. While many Hilo and Kailua-Kona homes are connected to public sewers, there are not enough to keep the Kailua and Hilo bays off the state's priority list. 2. Parking. HCC Chapter 25-4-51 (a) (8) states that dwellings rented whole, with short-term occupancy, shall provide two parking places. The draft bill also states that guest vehicles shall be parked in a designated onsite parking area. What if someone arrives with 10 cars? You require two spaces. On the other side, may the owner allow only one car, and be compliant with the parking requirement? Two of our rentals are in the resort nodes, in older buildings, with only one parking place for each. I do not see any easy solution for making more parking at the existing locations, as the properties are both tight. a) One rental is a studio (55 -year-old building), so one space has always been sufficient. b) The second rental has three bedrooms (45 -year-old building). If someone needs more than the one parking space, the building manager juggles the occupied units with unoccupied units/unused parking. This has worked fairly well, in an informal way, for many years. Perhaps a certain number of "Visitor" parking places can cover this requirement for older buildings? Though that will also be challenging, at least it is a start. Or, will there be an opportunity to appeal, or exemptions? 3. Owner or contact availability. We reside within 30 miles of two of our properties. The third, a previous home for many years, is about 80 miles away. Rather than sell this property (it is not suitable for long-term rental) we will designate the handy-man/cleaner, husband/wife team that takes care of the house now. They are very reliable and have been with us for many years. I suspect many other vacation rental owners do not have such loyal help, and it will be difficult to keep your contacts up to date, especially for the problem rentals. Also problematic is owners of properties in the allowed zones register once and have no requirement to renew/update. 4. Non -conforming use certificate. a. Display of certificate. "Conspicuous" and "readily visible" for an inspector may not be the best solution to avoid thefts to our visitors. I know many owners who carefully make their homes look like full-time residences --to avoid guests being victims of petty crimes. If it is inside the unit, or not visible to opportunistic folks, that seems safer. b. Annual renewal. This seems very time consuming for the County as well as the owner/operator. Perhaps a 2 -year renewal? Or perhaps the renewal process will be streamlined compared to the original approval process. c. $500 renewal fee. This seems excessive, especially if it is every year. Perhaps the initial application can be more expensive and an easier renewal process could be cheaper. COMMENTS: 1. Presumably the designation of resort areas is an effort to control for land -use predictability and infrastructure needs. The appeal process seems to cover the non -conforming use permits. I don't see an appeal process for the permitted properties that only need to register. 2. We use VRBO as well as AirBnB. I don't know how to get a guest to confirm they agree to the "Good neighbor policy" with AirBnB. For us, VRBO has a better method for rental agreements to be (digitally) signed. We may have missed this feature on AirBnB. 3. The Good Neighbor Policy is very basic; everyone should be following these guidelines already. The fact that Council feels the need to place this into law is rather sad. Thank you for your work, and for this opportunity to testify. Sincerely, Barbara Bell