ping at local businesses like boutiques restaurants that's all I have to say thank you for listening to me thank you Jessica we'll go to Harry followed by Thomas my name is Harry Albers I'm a my name is Harry Albers I'm a dental professor at UCSF and I've had a practice in Santa Rosa for 40 years um I have a daughter in medical school that's costing me about $280,000 a year and on the weekends I rent my home out to help pay that enormous tuition so last year next year and I basically have been renting for four years the issue I have is that I have had no complaints about my property in over a year yet I'm told that there are many complaints being filed to the city and complaints to the neighbors in my property there are dogs that bark when you come up the neighbors basically keep their dogs right near my fence they put signs up against my fence facing my front door basically harassing people I have a neighbor that when guests are in their dining room in my dining room having dinner with the sliding door open about two feet and talking there's a guest there's a neighbor of 50 yards away that sits on a deck when he can hear anybody he gets out a bullhorn and he tells them go home you're not welcome here please leave and then they also come over to my property and interfere with my guests while they're having dinner outside asking them to place a bad review because they don't want this rental there other neighbors have a hose they when the guests are outside they take their garden hose and they spray water back and forth and wet them so they can't enjoy the outdoor space their harassment has been enormous and they don't even call me they just rest I find out in the reviews I call the the the guest up after they have left the review and it's appalling I have stayed in vacation rentals in other parts of the country in the world in nice areas and I can't imagine people coming to cinema county being treated this badly if a neighbor does not let me know there's a problem with someone having a dining room door open two feet while someone's talking I would think that they would be kind enough to call me my I'm available 24 7 the issue we have here is that the information given to the council is not facts it's exaggerated here say I have 12 video cameras on my property and when I do get a complaint I check the video it's grossly exaggerated and it's almost like a witch hunt for some they think that you know I am hurting the community I'm on a full acre you can't see if anyone's on or off the property from the street I only render on weekends usually a Friday Saturday night rarely during the week and I ran it about nine ten months a year on Friday and Saturday night and the guests signed before they sign up I give them a 40 page brochure that has listed on it with the rules are and they sign off on that thank you sir thank you next we'll have Thomas followed by K thank you for the opportunity to speak on of course I'm a civil and environmental engineer just to let people know and an anthropologist community design is a really difficult challenge and I just wanted to point out I mean everyone here is is very concerned about housing I think and about their housing and and that makes sense we've gone through a lot of economic challenges and I don't know if everybody recognizes that there are across the country there is a seven percent vacancy rate where there's owned housing owned housing that is vacant which is owned by the banks it's very similar in Sonoma County that we have about a seven percent vacancy rate of buildings that are homes that are owned by the banks and remain empty so comparing that to point two percent is miniscule please be advocates for housing get those houses converted and make the banks sell those houses they're not because they can hold them without depreciating their capital at this point so the entire accounting systems of the of the country are completely messed up all right but particularly with regard to banking but whatever housing is critical please stay involved please stay involved with the development of housing please don't be nimby about housing but it seems like these problems that that you're talking about are are addressed by the code and and and this ordinance which I would I would agree that you should you should move forward on the orders and prevent people it sounded like you know nine o'clock they shouldn't be creating noises and and that's pretty reasonable and and if one person is using a bullhorn against somebody who is talking inside of the dining room one of them is creating a nuisance and and disturbing the peace and I'm pretty sure it's the guy with the bullhorn uh you know which you just heard that there there could be a bullhorn but but when somebody has 19 people on their on their patio uh that might be okay well you know I mean realistically somebody owns their house and they want to have a a um a celebration of one type or another have a number of people inside no problem I mean even if they rented it and had a number of people but if you're having that at 10 o'clock at night or one o'clock in the morning that's a really serious problem especially you know even if it is Friday could people do work on the weekend so I'm sure I kind of agree with the other guy who said there's a way to accommodate it but remember point two or point three percent is a very small number compared to seven percent thank you thank you Thomas we have Kay followed by Jeff good evening my name is Kay Ward and I've lived in Santa Rosa for 86 years other people saying 30 and 20 but anyway I have the house I live in the house I was raised in I did move away for 30 years and we lived in Sunnyvale raising five kids and then came back here for retirement and it is the city designed for living as someone has stated I have an Airbnb and I've been having it for six years or seven years and I love it dearly I've met the nicest people they are people who have helped me do improvements to my 1880 barn I live in and it's just been wonderful now I've been reading all the things that you're putting through and thinking of putting through and it seems to me that the hosted Airbnb's are okay they're trying to get more but why are they trying to get more unhosted when that seems to be the biggest problem I just don't understand that and I know it's not an easy task and I also have heard complaints that there have been I've heard questions that there have been complaints but no follow-through and if there's not going to be a follow-through to the owners then it's not worth it I've been lucky and as I say I've met the nicest people from all over the world thank you thank you and Kay did you say you've been in Santa Rosa for 83 years no 86 excuse me 86 I love it thank you for being here next we have Jeff followed by Nancy my father was a past mayor we have Jeff all right let's go to Nancy thank you good evening mayor city council city managers city attorney and city staff I wasn't going to speak tonight I just want to be observed giving fair chance I'm 45 years resident in Santa Rosa I think not 86 I think I'm the second one 45 years also I want to share with everybody these unhosted Airbnb I'm shocking I volunteer myself for 12 years on the city council advisor board I think a few city council know me how hard you guys want to meet go out to reach out the community the neighborhood everybody has to know each other because of disaster coming government maybe not coming to rescue you you only can count it's your neighbors we have no one neighbors because these are turned to the short-term rental every weekend different people coming just for the party the people this is the investment company I just can't stand it they did a lot of broadcast coming to Santa Rosa 19 I mean 95 404 this is the best place you can invest me your money because that most has a big house so you can turn into the unhosted party home I was really hurting my deep deep my heart 45 years resident here raised my three growing up children here and working under 12 years for the city council for city advisor board wants me go out to reach out the no we don't have any more neighborhood you're chasing the people away we have no more the school enrollments down because they're moving out because I can't shock to listen today 198 we issued now you're going to increase to 215 can we stop somewhere please I begging the city council member please I really please you know we need to bring our city back I don't want the room our city we need to bring our city back thank you thank you so much Nancy is there anyone else in the chambers who would like to provide comment okay we'll go to our public comment via zoom as we make the transition over I will say we're a little over an hour in on public comment folks on zoom you'll get the same amount of time as folks in the chamber but I'll also say if you agree with things that have been said it's perfectly okay this is just say I agree let's go to Barbara followed by Charles thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak my name is Barbara toman and I've lived in my home on Ronnie drive for 48 years so I think I'm number two as far as living here the longest so far the property next to me was recently sold and there three homes on it and I then after that learned that they have applied for a non-hosted short-term rental which had interesting reactions I felt extremely safe in this neighborhood all these years raised my daughter here um and all of a sudden even though they have gotten a permit and they're just kind of doing landscaping I started feeling really really unsafe and after listening to the meeting tonight I thought well maybe I shouldn't have come and listen because it really frightened me more the idea that someone would be right next door and have up to 10 people sleeping there because there are three homes and um five more guests and I think the city is giving permits to people but the burden of monitoring seems to be on the neighbors and somehow that feels like a really heavy burden and feels honestly inappropriate if no one's there hosting who but the neighbors are responsible for what's going on or to say what's going on I definitely feel it is not a positive addition to the neighborhood and I'm not sure if you wanted to satisfy the people that were already in queue why you wouldn't stop it there and why you would make room for more who maybe want to be when apparently the non-hosted ones are ones causing a problem so I don't want to repeat what everyone else says but it gave me a real unsafe feeling after 48 years of feeling really comfortable and safe in my neighborhood and it hasn't even happened yet so maybe that's my issue too anyway thank you thank you Barbara we'll go to Charles followed by Caroline hi my name is Charles and I would like to make a comment on the staff report statement that there should be a cap on the number of vacation rentals and I quote minimize the adverse impacts non-hosted short-term rentals and certain operators and good standing may have on surrounding residential properties these adverse impacts specifically deal with public health and safety issues related to wildfires and dense social gatherings and non-hosted at non-hosted short-term rentals I'd like to bring to your attention that in 2021 when we first opened up after lockdown non-hosted vacation rentals were among the first transient establishments to open up in California and the rest of the United States because the family could isolate themselves from people around them currently in Santa Rosa the maximum number of daytime guests if a case rental can have is equal to half the number of nighttime guests so a three-bedroom vacation rental can only have three extra daytime guests I'm certain there are a lot of full-time residents in in Santa Rosa that have more than three people visiting their home at any one time and the city doesn't seem to think that this is a burden but you're trying to make it an issue and create caps on vacation rentals also if the city is concerned about some vacation rentals and hazardous areas do what the county is looking at and require vacation rental guests we evacuate during voluntary orders then the guest will already be gone during a mandatory evacuation their home-based businesses in these areas that have visitors clients that are even more transient are they going to be banned you have people staying in hotels and motels year around like the flaminga hotel in hillside in that are at the base of monocidal heights are you going to prohibit these establishments from operating why single out vacation rentals when they have a manual to instruct guests in the event of emergency don't disallow them by placing a cap instead require vacation rental guests to evacuate during voluntary orders if an output an adequate roads is the issue currently a vacation rental can only have one on-street parking if it's allowable if there is a space on the street everything else has to be on premises under the current regulations the city has in place vacation rentals are already held to a higher standard they're not a health risk north state safety risk and such claims should not be used to support account the city just needs to enforce the current regulations so some of the neighbors like we heard today are not disturbed thank you thank you charles we'll go to carolin followed by lola i'm sorry mayor did you call carolin thank you hi i'm carolin and i've been a 32 resident your resident of santa rosa i want to thank everybody for this participation i'm an unusual air bb host because i am considered non-hosted even though i am hosted and live on the premises 48 weeks of the year however my husband who's an educator and i travel for two weeks in summer and then again another two weeks thus we had to apply for non-hosted status we live in our main host house and host from our in-law unit with a separate entrance you might think well what is four weeks income well to me i'm semi-retired i raised my now 31 year old daughter who was born with a disability for 20 years i earned half of the income because i chose to be at home with her every day after school to tutor her and would be preschool run an intensive behavioral program she's now a senior about to graduate it's no mistake i don't think you can put a cost on this however i did have to give up half of my income so um in 2018 i had a health condition that i received treatment for could not yet apply for social security so i decided to retire from my professional career due to the stress it would cause me and increase my risk of reoccurrence my average gross income is about $2,000 i'm hardly going to be rich from my airbnb however we host many people visiting family and for work purposes in fact i'm going to host one of my daughter's friends from the neighborhood and her little baby and her husband in a couple months so i would like to dispel the the belief that all non-hosted rentals are large homes they are not i have data i would like to request that the city recorder slash secretary record the street address of the people who have submitted complaints about troublesome rentals many of them i know about because i am retired from data analysis i've tracked all the enforcement cases on the city website in excel and paired them with existing applications i have a question for miss need or mr oswald how are enforcement complaints recorded because 72 of 113 have already applied for permits and we're actually input into the database without even checking your active str database isn't that amazing i just want to close with something that some of you might know in the 1800s the u.s census tracked people who were considered borders in many homes this has been going on for nearly 200 years in our country and i say why should we not be allowed to do what all americans have done historically simply because of a few bad apples thank you for letting me speak and i can offer my data anyone in the city upon request thank you caroline we'll go to lola followed by dan hi hi hello there um hi thank you so much um i sat through all of that which is very interesting and i'm so glad i did because it just confirmed um the need to speak up and um i am a sonoma county native i um live in the neighborhoods of monosito heights low salivos um altavista so i'm in one of the neighborhoods that has gotten a lot of attention for these short-term rentals and just to be clear i do not rent my homes but i live in the neighborhood and i am friends with all of the residents here and i'm here on behalf of many of them who um have a lot of frustrations but also a lot of really great ideas um on how this can work and after all of the commentary that we've all heard it sounds like um what is at the heart of this which i know the majority of our community and all of the council members feel the same is um we're trying to preserve our neighborhoods we're trying to look out for the people who live here and um what's happened it seems is that a lot of these mom and pop operators have fallen through the cracks in the effort to um simplify and create and design a permitting process which is complicated very much needed um and difficult and and i have only recently started following it as it became quite apparent that there was some issues with these short-term rentals so what's happened now is a lot of these long time what you call legacy operators um are not allowed to have a permit and many of them um have been operating short-term rentals in our neighborhood beautifully and have never had any issues and do so so that they can remain here those are the very people that we all want to protect that you want to protect many of them are you and in this process there wasn't a lot of community outreach i've talked to several of them and there was no community outreach no one was contacted they've paid their taxes they could have been contacted they were not someone mentioned there were some articles in the press democrat and an update on the website but not everyone reads the press democrat every day and every article and knows to go to the website so i would just urge city council and the subcommittees to regroup reprioritize residents who live in this community who work in this community who live in their homes um they only operate in the home that they live in it doesn't have to be so complicated it sounds like it's getting way out of control and um i'd really like to prioritize the community members here but thank you lola let's go to dan followed by carl did we lose dan all right we'll go to carl and then we'll come back to dan hello i i don't see a clock so i don't know if i should start yeah go for it okay hi my name is carl yeager um i think uh one of the council members asked for compromise i think this forum the way you're doing it does not lend itself to compromise a lot of people are talking at one another and i know you all are here to learn and here and that's great i would recommend a town hall with a professional moderator where people could actually have working sessions this is a complicated issue so you ask for compromise create the forum to do it um if i understand the uh council member mcdonald's questions and the answers to them we have one we have three quarters of an fte put into um enforcement if we had created a regulation or an ordinance that had focused in on noise nuisance and safety we would be in a very different place right now we created a very complicated urgency ordinance that was rushed in faster than staff has been able to implement it way behind in issuing permits if i heard the answer to another one of council member mcdonald's questions there isn't really a fine structure for people who haven't even applied but are doing it illegally so and i'm not sure i got i heard that answer correctly and so i do not operate an unhosted rental but i'm here to talk to four of my colleagues especially working class and middle class colleagues who do um there are some people like school teachers who can afford to stay in santa rosa if they leave for part of the summer when they are not working and rent out their home there are retirees and senior citizens who when they go visit their grandchildren can afford to do so because they can rent out their home sometimes if you have a law that focuses in on noise nuisance and safety creates education around how to have an unhosted rental and do it well creates true enforcement i believe in enforcement and heavy fines for bad actors like that should be the norm i think those those that do it well are tired of having the bad actors get all the play instead i think this this law has pitted neighbor against neighbor it there's a lot of hyperbole and a lot of stuff going back and forth that's a very very harmful i too have had guests that have been harassed a nurse who was a nurse a woman of color who was here to help the sick and dying in our hospitals harassed by people on my street we don't want that that's not what we want i would say that if you think about a cap of 215 out of 69,515 housing units in santa rosa you're way out of proportion there are people who need this economic benefit let's instead focus on helping them do it well helping neighbors understand each other and have a regulation that focuses in on the problem i would grant that there's probably been more staff time spent on floor plans than there has on noise news and safety thank you very much for your time i really appreciate it and i appreciate how hard the staff is working they've all been great with me thank you carl let's try to go back to dan and after dan will go to claudia he needs to okay can you hear me now there we go okay sorry i don't know if it's my iphone ipods okay so three minutes uh yes hello this is dan guvino and i live in santa rosa i'm a certified vacation rental manager with wine country getaway and i manage a few non-hosted properties in santa rosa i also head the santa rosa short-term rental association facebook group well we are in favor of a fair short-term rental regulatory package there have been several issues with the initial urgency ordinance the biggest issue being that absolutely no input was taken from professional management companies on best practices to address issues such as parking noise and large gatherings employing the hospitality trade best management practices solves any negative issues neighbors may experience this is in direct contrast with amateur operators who don't care about the neighbors in the larger community please keep this distinction in mind when you address the professional short-term rental community from the analysis of the staff report an adoption of a new urgency ordinance set a limit of 250 non-hosted permitted permits is proposed a report claims certain non-hosted activities continue to generate police and court enforcement complaints related to noise occupancy and large events a total of 126 str related complaints were received with 73 open court enforcement cases still pending it is interesting to note that report fails to provide any granular details in the type of complaints it will be great to hear exactly the breakdown of how many complaints arise from noise parking parties and court enforcement issues perhaps staff can disclose this granular details today from our direct engagement with cited hosts we have determined that a large number of complaints are related to listing descriptions nested in their tot number maximum number of guests etc most hosts are not aware of what exactly to disclose to the marketing channels as the permit application fails to provide this guidelines also note that this type of listing inaccuracies are of a lower seriousness compared to noise or party complaints my recommendations for the city council is to temporarily vote no on the cap of non-hosted permits let us work together with you on implementing the solutions we know work best also there are some fire rebuild homes still in the process of construction that are in good standing but may be denied a non-hosted permit by the proposed cap limit we are currently working very hard on bringing together the hosting and neighbor communities so we can just diagnose and provide best solutions to the issues that might be experiencing on another note please keep in mind that some homeowners want to subsidize their their cost of travel whether they're on a business trip or on vacation by leaving their property their primary residence in the hands of professional management the binary non-hosted versus hosted permit configurations as they stand today offered no opportunity for these homeowners it is important to consider an additional two type of hybrid permits such as the one implemented by the city of San Francisco to allow 90-day maximum nine experiments for folks on their primary residence it is open to uh lastly please join that santa rosa short terminal association facebook group it is open to all and it's a main purpose is to bring together host and concerns neighbors so we can start on this when in contact with the city government on addressing current and future issues related to the short term rentals i thank you for allowing me to speak thank you dan we'll go to claudia followed by david okay there there i am can you hear me now yes we can okay excellent um this is claudia castrow um i'm a short term rental owner of the sonoma wine nest um i've just been on the call and listening to everyone and just had a comment in regards to something that was not brought up i think the gentleman who talked before i think maybe talked a little bit about it um there was a lot of people on either side of the issue but i haven't heard anything on the qualifications of what an owner or manager has to complete um i've been in real estate for nearly 20 years and i'm working on getting my broker's license for about seven of those nearly 20 years i was in property management and for about two to three years after that i had a small business helping short term owners on how to rent their property in those years i found a lot of owners who did not know what they were doing this caused a lot of problems as you can imagine such as unclear leases and communication to their renters when we had a real problem affording a home my husband and i decided to purchase a home in one of our favorite places on earth which is sonoma county um however it wasn't without a lot of knowledge to this day we've had our str since 2015 and have never had any complaints from our neighbors knock on wood as an str owner i have had a successful renter but only because of the knowledge i gained from property management helping other owners and real estate laws that i had to learn and pass on tests just to get my license my question is if anyone in the council has any information on the background of the managers and owners that are being talked about um is there any information that you guys have on any of these short term rentals what's their background what's their qualifications i have a five page lease crafted by a broker and six pages of bike tnc is taken from professional bike companies strs are is a business that takes a lot of knowledge and i'm just wondering if the city is working on helping owners to understand and learn the business to mitigate the complaints instead of just applying for a permit um i have a good relationship with my neighbors because they were happy to have the squatters who were living in the garage with multiple cars always parked on the grass along with a lot of trash that was removed when we actually purchased the property today we have gardeners it looks nice so anyways i was just wondering if the issue of qualifications to attain a permit has been brought up because these bad actors that are being talked about could possibly be just untrained unqualified business owners thank you so much thank you claudia and we don't get into a back and forth during the public comment but we can ask that question once we're done and have staff respond let's go to david followed by emilia hello um some of the guys can hear me my name is david uh i think i bring a unique perspective to this call and that i've been a resident of santa rosa for two months so uh pretty sure the newest resident which hopefully uh still qualifies let me just speak after hearing everyone else talk but i want to kind of rebut a point that i heard a way earlier from people that were still talking in the room about people that come to these short-term vacations not caring about the community i'm a first-time homeowner and the reason that my wife and i moved here is because we had such great experiences visiting airbnb in the area um and so far in our short two months here it's been an absolutely lovely experience uh listening to this call though has been kind of disheartening to be honest uh just hearing like from my perspective the sensationalism and fear about airbnb rentals i think everybody can agree that nobody wants you know 10 person parties loud noise next door as new homeowners that's something that we're worried about we're still getting to know our neighbors somebody's gonna be a long-term renter right next to us in fact i just watched them move in today and you know i'm hoping they don't make a lot of noise but at the same time uh the housing market the way prices have been it's as a new homeowner one of the things we were thinking of is hey maybe we can afford to go on vacations if we're able to rent our home out when we're traveling to subsidize the costs and instead what i'm hearing is we're building a culture of if you got in line early enough uh then you have this privilege of renting your home if you saved your spot uh because you had your home before these policies were put in place and i don't think that's very inclusive and i think if the goal of the council and the city of santa rosa is just to preserve a status quo um then maybe that's the best policy just limiting it to the people that have already gotten their stake but it seems to me like the solution would just be combating the actual problem as a lot of people have said the noise the parties and not just panic limiting um how many people can apply for an sdr permit so i think a lot of people have brought up the data is really i'm sorry to say but like half baked in terms of why we're copying at 215 just because the number of people in the queue uh how many complaints i mean we weren't able to produce the number of infraction there's actually been we weren't able to say how many duplicate complaints there are so i just want to reinforce like it'd be much better to actually take some time study what's best uh listen to the professionals and listen to some opinions of people that have just moved in as opposed to just panicking out of fear and saying let's let's cap these rentals and um you know preserve what we have and not opening up to anybody new thank you thank you david we'll go to amilia followed by richard hi everyone i hope you can hear me yes we can okay great first of all thank you for having me i am uh bernadette's neighbor who spoke earlier and i've been listening for over two hours and appreciate all the comments thus far i've been in santa rosa or santa rosa for four and a half years and have been a vacation rental owner for over five i know everyone on the street where my vacation rental is i've never had a complaint and i've had over 105 star reviews uh for our vacation rental we screen all of our our guests even though the city approved for up to 12 guests we only allow six at a time and two children and we know every neighbor including the family across the street who has a two-year-old child we're super strict about who we allow in and we walk every guest who comes to our house through the house and explain very clearly that there are cameras all around it and what the quiet hours are hence we've never had any complaint what i don't think is fair is that we not only pay 12 taxes we bring in tons of business for the restaurants and wineries and and uh stores in our neighborhood through our vacation rental but we don't know where that 12 percent goes we don't understand why if there is a complaint that there is not support for homeowners on the weekends this is absolutely unfair for someone like me who has saved all their money to be able to buy this house has spent so much money redoing it and has great joy welcoming these people they've never been a disturbance and i don't think it's fair that these bad apples even though i'm sure i'm being listened to as a block sheep are ruining our neighborhoods we should have strict laws but we should not restrict it to these hundred plus privileged people who have gotten in early like myself it should not be that way and i agree like many other people in this room who have spoken that we should not allow people just to get these permits without education i went through certification i passed the course i pay my fees on time i pay my taxes on time i've never had any issues the cleaner we've had for our house has three children one of them is severely disabled and she depends on the money to clean our house so i hope you will consider people like me who actually are contributing to our community and not causing a disturbance thank you for listening thank you amilia we'll go to richard followed by alina richard are you able to unmute let's go ahead try alina and we'll come back to richard my name is alina and i'm a homeowner in santa rosa and i'd like the opportunity to have the flexibility to list um my property as a non-hosted short-term rental from time to time um when me and my family are on vacation before moving here we've rented a few arabian bees in the past in the county of sonoma and have had amazing experiences um we've solicited multiple businesses um restaurants uh multiple wineries and um it's been an amazing experience um when we've come to stay we treat these homes like there are ours just as we would hope someone else to caps on the quantity of s dr just creates a limited supply that would increase the cost for people who also want to visit this amazing and already expensive place to visit and limits the flexibility of people to earn additional income from their properties and limits the jobs created for many trades i also want to comment that when the complaint tracking is not accurately tracking the number of original complaints and duplicates are ambiguously considered significantly less as a way of record keeping this doesn't really speak to me as having accurate enough record keeping to create ordinances off of that would impact people's lives there doesn't seem to be a sound basis of data to make these impactful decisions on and it sounds like this ordinance takes a broad approach to just generically limit strs to address code issues instead of coming up with creative and specific solutions that won't so aggressively impact strs and many people's lives i think speaker dan said it very well um let's focus on enforcement and the bad actors instead of targeting all strs i ask you to please not approve this urgency ordinance thank you thank you alina let's try richard again so can you hear me now there we go okay my name is rick bay we'll live in the end of the height section above summerfield road in march we had a short-term rental move in directly behind our property and we do we have had a number of problems with the short-term rental however we weren't aware of the complaint process which is actually a pretty clear process we have found out about the process educated ourselves gone down to the city planning office and we have filed two complaints in the last 13 days so the complaint process seems very straightforward uh and what we don't know is how effective it's going to be is very unclear both at the city planning office and from the comments i've heard tonight what the enforcement's going to be i have not heard and it's probably too early to find out have there been any enforcement's have any has anybody lost their permit i'm curious what happens with the complaints for instance when we talk about verifying word verifying was used uh just uh half an hour ago or so i don't understand nor do i think anybody understands but what verified means how do you verify a complaint so say we're sitting in a a not a council meeting but an operating office complain officer and he's got four complaints four complaints for the same property for the last year he looks at somebody who's made a complaint he has no way of knowing whether that's a valid complaint or not i think we need to figure out a way to really codify what a complaint actually is it strikes me that if more than one complaint comes in for one incident there might be likely to think it's more valid but there's a lot of fuzziness here i heard one person i think it's the the mayor who said maybe we ought to uh just uh give them one shot without it you know maybe they don't know well it's hard to imagine anybody getting a permit who doesn't know what the qualifications are and if they don't they shouldn't have gotten the permit so i guess in in in uh in summary what i want to say is geez it looks like a very straightforward complaint process it's actually very easy to do my question is and can't be answered right now but how is this going to get enforced how's it going to be verified and how is it going to be enforced i'll be looking forward to that answer thank you hey richard we'll go to ian and wendy followed by chris hi thank you for allowing me to speak my name is wendy sewell and i lived in santa rosa for over 20 years i own a permitted short term rental in the skyhawk neighborhood in 2017 i could see flames out of the bedroom windows as i scooped my then six and eight year olds out of bed and tucked them into their car seats trying not to let my voice shake as i explained to them that we needed to leave our home it took two weeks for us to be allowed to go back 2019 found us evacuated again thankfully we got to return just in time to trick or treat in our neighborhood the following fall i was so scared to be in my own home i couldn't sleep every gust of wind had me panicking my kids eyes would open wide at the sound of every siren every breeze i packed up my house and got it ready to be a short term rental i promised them we'd come back some time in the future when it felt safe and that we could always come back to visit and stay in our own home spend time with our friends and play in our favorite parks we left our home september 24th 2020 september 27th the glass fire burned down 13 homes in our neighborhood and charred the beautiful hills surrounding our home our first guest that we hosted was my friend and her family who lost their home to glass they stayed for seven weeks a few more guests enjoyed our home before we got a call from friends who are also neighbors they could not find a place to stay while their home was being repaired from glass of smoke damage once again our home was able to provide a refuge they stayed for several months i cannot live in san aroza full time right now i need time to heal time for my home to feel like the sanctuary that it was meant to be but i want to be able to keep the promise that i made to my kids that we can still go home we can still spend time in our beloved community since we left in 2020 we have been nomadic when you think of people staying in short term rentals i want you to think of my family because that's where we live our guests may not all be nomadic but they're looking for the same things we are a clean place that's well kept up a comfortable home a place to make beautiful family memories i really hope that san aroza can continue to be that place for many more families just as it was for mine i hope my guests and others get to continue to experience what a warm and welcoming community san aroza is and i hope that one day i will feel safe coming home for good thank you thank you wendy we'll go to chris followed by chuck hello can you hear me yep hi i work for a property management company who currently manages short term rentals in san aroza and so today i wanted to talk about our experience with the ordinance and specifically what i believe is the most important aspect of the ordinance which is the enforcement of the operational standards and requirements as mentioned in the presentation four there's 136 complaints related to short term rentals and 70th the open code enforcement cases as a result of that however there was not presented any type of context behind those numbers and what those numbers speak to whether those actual complaints and issues were justified whether you know whether they related to a hosted rental or a non-hosted rental or whether the complaints are even just simple mistakes such as not forgetting to put to disclaimer about quiet hours and properties airbnb listening currently the data that's being used i feel like it's not completely accurate and well contextualized to be making the claim that short term rental activities and especially non-hosted short term rentals negatively impact public health and welfare currently i can say that confidently five of those cases that are open and listed should be closed as they relate to properties that my property management company currently operates for two of those cases my company has signed letters from the city dating august 5th that no violations were found on the properties and that the code cases should be considered closed however to date and the online registry for the city those code cases still show is open and currently being investigated for three more of those open cases the listed allegations which were dated back in november shortly after the urgency ordinance just passed those allegations are for unpermitted short term rentals and as of today we have submitted legal permitted applications for those properties and two of those complaints were made actually after we had received permits under the current urgency ordinance so we had already had the permits for about a month or two and then saw that we received complaints for having an unpermitted short term rental those cases are still open and they shouldn't be open as they easily would have been resolved by a quick look of the city's list of permitted rentals which i assume they have with this current permitting process the city is going to be using and presenting data to make decisions which would add restrictions to residents private property rights and create a negative narrative of short term rentals in santa rosa especially that it's not hosted rentals and i think it should be with more accurate data and better contacts to better contextualize any issues that are attributed to short term rentals as of right now i don't think the data presented to use that though the conversation is currently being dominated by anecdotal evidence and emotion and is backed up by very little data in fact and this will only lead to grading regulations which aren't effective and don't solve the issues and create for the divide in the santa rosa committee instead of creating the goal with councilmember sloyer correctly identified in the economic development subcommittee meeting on the 17th of grading regulations which work for the entire community of both short term rental owners and neighbors alike thank you and look forward to the discussion later thank you chris we'll go to chuck followed by jeff we have chuck okay can you hear me there we go um and i would just like like to make one comment that um one of the things that and it's been referenced before as far as the data goes i think it'd be very enlightening to identify the complaints as to whether they're one bedroom two bedroom four bedroom five bedroom six bedroom what i would venture to say is that i would imagine that a high percentage i would suspect to be over 75 percent of the noise complaints are coming from five bedroom uh places that are renting for several thousand dollars a night in by definition or a party house because if you're charging that kind of money it's not for a family it's for a number of people a number of several couples and it's a party house and so i think that you know some of the conversation here is maybe not really focusing on where a high percentage of the problems are and you're likely to penalize people that shouldn't be penalized and that's that's my comment thank you chuck we'll go to jeff i'm jeff bean i'm a 66 year resident of san rosa i live in the mcnaughtle neighborhood for many years the one bedroom home next door to me has been a traditional rental home the most recent tenants were drug addicts they were up all night arguing and fighting drug deals for a common occurrence the police recalled on numerous occasions this was not a short-term rental this is a traditional rental i'm sure that there are many problems with traditional rentals yet i don't think you would limit the number of rental houses allowed in san rosa as a solution well we currently we recently bought that little one bedroom home next door to make it a short-term rental this would be a non-hosted short-term rental even though i'm right next door only 20 feet away possibly closer than someone with a hosted rental would be if someone can have a hosted short-term rental i think someone in my situation should not be denied a short-term rental permit i'm right next door thank you thank you jeff we'll go to jeva followed by rc i'm jeva and i have a comment regarding the city of san rosa where i've called on three different occasions prior to purchasing our home in order to make sure that no mandates were in place and that if we had to go back to work in southern california after the um two-year hiatus of working remotely we had that option to rent our home part-time as need be within few weeks of me confirming that there are no str restrictions on the day of our closing of the home the city passed on the same day as it discussed the str restrictions the city simply could not have had enough time nor data to have made a decision of this magnitude um and did not give the city due process in order to restrict and create um consequentially um affecting numerous community members and of course as we had no idea we had to apply for these permits in time in order to reserve our rights because the city negligibly did not inform the community and it did not allocate the proper amount of time for us to get the permits for example right now the city is voting to cap 215 permits out of over 650 000 homes in the entire city which is less than 0.3 percent of its housing meanwhile other neighboring cities like hildsburg have it capped at three percent exponentially more other cities are five percent this really shows the lack of relevance of understanding the microeconomics of what is at play and what the fact that there's truly not real data and no relevance in our case we were first told that we can rent our home then we were told we cannot because our neighbor who has the ability to share her home um because she lives on the property she likes to travel so then she was forced to get a non-shared permit because few weeks out of the year she travels truly compromising our ability to enjoy our home meanwhile the city collected our $1,200 permit fee under the pretense that we will approve us but behind our backs you forced our neighbor to change her permit to a non-hosted permit within the proximity permitting seems like a real scam i know you're working hard but you have created a real mess in this hasty decision having done the due diligence on our end to confirm the legalities the city has managed to provide that their value for people is nilch thank you yava we'll go to rc followed by shawn and i do see a hand that's popped back up you only get one bite at the apple in the public hearing so we'll go from rc to shawn okay i think i unmuted is that correct yep we can hear you great thank you thank you uh members of the city council of santa rosa thanks for the opportunity to comment on agenda 15.1 so i work for a short-term rental property management company avance day and we have a strong interest in the well-being of the community as well as the any other community that we operate in you know despite commentary to the contrary the city short-term rental industry allows numerous visitors to enjoy the city of santa rosa and adjoining areas and these visitors drive a tremendous amount of business and tax revenue as as we all know but you know the vast majority of avance day's customers are families who may not otherwise be able to enjoy santa rosa if not for the ability to share a rented home and these diverse families provide santa rosa the opportunity to showcase its welcoming welcoming nature and as we do in other jurisdictions we encourage comprehensive and balanced regulations finds and penalties for bad actors but we encourage an open and transparent process with community input before considering another urgency ordinance and we frequently ask get asked to participate in rulemaking as we see the regulatory process play out across numerous cities and so we are quite easily able to participate and help cities with their drafting of ordinances now we've heard some very challenging stories that largely sound like irresponsible operators of short-term rentals are running amok our company's name was used i can only speak for us but it's disappointing to be lumped in with irresponsible operators because each of our homes maintains ring cameras and noise monitoring sensors and we have a dedicated internet of things team iot team that knows about noise issues parking issues and occupancy issues before any enforcement officer would even have time to arrive and we are as diligent as it can be in deterring bad behavior and we share our process with cities so they can see it live and can we promise that there will never be any responsible guests no does everyone have the same resources we do know but we care about being good neighbors and our reputation and it's disappointing that people largely diverse families are purposefully heckled and harassed during their stays you know while we support reasonable non-hosted permit caps and and regulations designed to rein in bad actors this process generally requires broad community input the city staff has been diligent as they can be in researching but they only have the bandwidth to do so much i'd respectfully suggest that the council takes the step to adopt an urgency ordinance that focused solely upon fees that allow the city to set up a proper enforcement process and mechanism in an attempt to limit the bad actors and we're all working towards the same goal of a safe and prosperous city of santa rosa and i appreciate the i appreciate the opportunity to collaborate with you all thank you thank you rc we'll go to shawn followed by synthia hello thank you council members for you know having this open forum my name is shawn hermese i'm a local real estate agent and each of the home that we've owned in the past after we moved out we had some short term and some long term rentals and now we have three short term rentals over the hundreds of people that have stayed over the years we've had no police interaction and we've done our best to keep only good guests coming and visit and i think it's great to have an ordinance so people that do misbehave are penalized properly uh as the str community involved with the sonoma county coalition of host and also with other individuals that have proposed a new ordinance or suggested ordinance with noise monitoring and and hefty fines for people who do misbehave because it is incumbent upon the managers and the owners to make sure that whoever is staying abides by the rules and lets everybody else around them have quiet enjoyment of their home from some figures that we found is there's about 800 to 1200 homes that are second homes that aren't even occupied throughout the year and a lot of that stock could be used up for short term rentals excuse me go sorry kids um so with that being said having a cap having only less than 0.3 percent of all the short term rentals in santa rosa be the sixth number which seems kind of you know uneven compared to the other surrounding communities so i just asked the city council to really consider meeting with uh people who are in good standing people who do have a good reputation create an ordinance that makes sense for the whole community at large that way well not only can we be an economic engine for the county but also let other people families that it's the most affordable way for them to come and visit we've had doctors contractors nurses through the years that we've been hosting and we just like to continue this especially for some of the older clients that have you know financial issues and this is a great vehicle for them to share their home either an extra bedroom or a whole house if they go on vacation so i really hope that you reconsider and how you fashion this ordinance and meet with some of the you know good good participants in the str community because we're here and we want to make sure that the bad actors are punished and lose their opportunity while the good ones still can stay around thank you thank you shawn we'll go to synthia followed by prosan hello good afternoon good evening my name is synthia air mocio and my career is being a short rental manager exclusively for non-hosted homes in san aroza in fact i've hosted over 800 times in my short-term rental career and since 2016 i started short-term renting at my home that was burned in the tubs fire and ever since then i now managed multiple properties because it's been such a positive experience i'm at this meeting today to make you aware of how positive it's been for me and also to the city of san aroza my business which is the short-term rental business has employed more than 15 full-time house cleaners a full-time assistant and i've helped launch a gardening business that maintained the homeowner's lawns so as you can see i've taken my you know my um step into making sure that our neighborhood looks good everyone on my team depends on their income because of these short-term rentals i've partnered up with various wineries including harvest moon bowman sellers paradise paradise ridge and hannah to experience a unique experience for those that are staying in these homes here's a fact that came from one of the staff at paradise ridge i was just told last week that out of all of the hotels in the area i have part i have partnered and sent my home guests i have brought in more business at that winery than any other hotel in san aroza 90 of the homes the people that visit these these uh wineries are here to visit these small wineries i've also partnered up with several restaurants in the area we give them a vip and a discount basically i've dedicated my last six years to create jobs create careers create my team to manage these homes at the highest level of management so my dream personally has come true which is to be a participant to drive a strong economy i am an economist by any high by higher education so my mind and my life is trained to find the maximum output out of anything my goal is to keep visitors spending their strong money within the san aroza city limits i believe in a strong economy and i also believe in entrepreneurship so here's my question for you san aroza has over 65 000 homes and we are tonight focused on 198 of them possibly maybe perhaps possibly 215 if it's passed that's less than 1 percent as a matter of fact that's 0.3 percent so basically that's 0 percent because 0.3 percent is 0.3 percent so let's talk about those 0.3 percent now out of 198 homes in san aroza the city can't give us exact numbers on complaints how many homes have had a complaint so far since december 3rd and what kind of complaints are being submitted i've heard about the parking on monoceto heights but my homes are not at all on that side of town mine are all on the west side also it is my understanding thank you it's my synthia we'll go to prosan hello my name is rebecca prosan and i'm a property owner in rincon valley i have a elderly tenant who lives there and i am there from time to time we live next door to a party house you can't i define a party house as five bedrooms or more uh a ping pong table a pool and all the accoutrements of you know what i would want to do if i were going to a place with 10 of my friends to have a good weekend um we've had calls with avance day and i'm i'm only speaking because the person from avance day was purporting to be a good neighbor i've had calls with avance day i've tried to share schedules with avance day i have tried to work with avance day they have been less than uh less than truthful in their comments tonight um i've had to call the police when i've had friends over we've had people threaten super spreader events in the backyard with while i have an elderly tenant we've had tenants next door who have refused to um let the avance day people know that they have a dog and so they would have a dog in the winter in december after december third who was barking for hours on end and the police couldn't do anything because that actually isn't illegal try living next door to that try living next door to potential super spreaders try living next door to bachelorette parties try living next door to fraternity parties look i want i'm a property owner i want people to be able to share and use the property as they are but i also want people to be responsible and i don't trust that avance day and airbnb and all the other share better platforms are doing everything that they possibly can to end this problematic behavior um i've we've we've become first name basis with the folks at avance day we've also become first name basis with the cops the cops have said that they've had to come to that house not just for us but for our neighbors across the street for our neighbors on the other side in fact there was one night that our neighbors across the street called the cops on avance day because their tenants were literally blocking our driveway every time i've heard somebody talk about the fires tonight i fear that there is a time when there is a fire and the avance day people can't seem to figure out where to park their car and so they park on our driveway instead look i'm happy to work with people i want to work with people but i also want the use and enjoyment of the property that i own i'm also supporting the economy i also think that is a good idea please support this ordinance thank you so much adam deputy city clerk i think we had one prerecorded voicemail yes mayor my name is david long this comment is for the august night city council meeting agenda item 15.1 the public hearing for short term rental zoning code text amendments good evening mayor rogers and council members i applaud city staff and the council for their work to make some changes to the short term rental urgency ordinance changes sorely needed to improve enforcement capability and provide a much needed pause in the growth of non-hosted rentals enforcing any form of short term rental ordinance is difficult and will continue to fail unless the city takes proactive steps to reduce the number of non-hosted rentals in residential neighborhoods this has been proven time and time again in communities of all shapes and sizes throughout the united states and the world there is no reason for santa rosa to believe that they are unique and will fare any better in august 2021 the city conducted a survey about short term rentals that had nearly 2,500 respondents the second most respondents of any survey in the city's history in that survey more than two-thirds of the respondents favored not allowing short term rentals to operate in residential neighborhoods period staff and council would be well advised to take action that satisfies this super majority of residents short term rentals has become a polarizing issue in the city with real estate professionals investors and hosts on one side and residential neighborhood groups on the other in the final analysis one needs to decide what position is best for the overall health and well-being of our community this should eventually lead to ordinance adjustments that support preservation of traditional residential neighborhood character more strongly than transient occupancy tax revenue derived from commercial businesses masquerading as homes thank you for your time and energy in getting this one right all right and with that we will go ahead and close the public hearing i think uh 0.3 percent of our community called in or participated as well today are there any questions from council councilmember swatham thank you mr mayor i i did have a question about our current hours of operation for code enforcement several speakers mentioned it and i just like a little bit more information on what flexibility we may have because i believe it may be a meet and confer issue if we were to adjust those hi jesse can you take that one please yes thank you and thank you council member swatham we have been allocated some resources to hire two contract code enforcement officers and that will afford us the ability to provide response to after hours and weekend calls i'm i'm not positive on the extent that i can confirm uh where we are in the process other than i knew i know it's ongoing to to get that underway and i i've worked with my staff to have the contract at the ready once we get the okay great just just clarify when you said once we get the okay okay from whom is it city council direction you're looking for city manager my apologies that would be um realistically human resources okay thanks and jesse you know on our economic development subcommittee meeting earlier today we're talking a little bit about staffing within code enforcement can you just give a really quick sort of overview because i just after some of the comments that were made i don't want it to linger that uh that there's there's nobody doing the work absolutely thank you mayor so the to clarify the point seven five officer that's not the only officer we do have we have about three quarters of an officer's time that's being able to be allocated towards short-term rentals so we do have a staff of and again super pleased and happy that we do have staff filling positions historically since pre 2018 we have not had a full code enforcement contingent and we are nearing that now we have a new senior on the way and also a we've just promoted some folks so we are nearly at the point where we have full staffing and then this this additional need that is going to be filled is going to help account for backlog from nearly five plus years of low staffing and in other words not a full team and then one is going to be committed to responding and working through short-term rental complaints and the the process that we we intend on utilizing these contract staff is to literally because we can utilize them in the way that we propose is they can with two of them and I've spoken to their their company they can be responsible to respond to the after hours and weekends so code enforcement is is bolstering up and I'm confident that we're going to you know make strides in the in the very near future with with the additional resources we're we're getting on board I appreciate that and I also thought it was interesting earlier when you were talking about how it's not even just the budget it's not even just the staffing level it's finding people who are qualified and trained to be able to do this has apparently been particularly difficult absolutely thank you for bringing that up mayor the as as we all know there's the the supply chain issues and part of the supply chain is the talent chain as well meaning those individuals who are interested in utilizing their talents in a career in enforcement of any kind meaning building code enforcement building plan check code enforcement itself so that has been a challenge city-wide California-wide finding folks to fill these positions so hence the the pretty long process and how long it's taken us to get these positions filled code enforcement for sure and and development-wide as well and they're very close to hand-in-hand kind of the same industry right thank you mr vice mayor thank you mayor my initial question was asked and answered I did have an additional question in regards to videotaped or evidence that's collected by the neighbors it can this evidence be used why and or why not so I'll take the first stab at that and then I will defer to the city attorney if I have to due to the the the real possibility that any complaint and or code case the complaint that that becomes a code case has to be treated as a court case so much like again I won't go into waters that I don't understand fully but much like a complaint for a potential police investigation the complaint is a basis for an investigation then we do have to find the proper means for documenting actual evidence meaning at the current time per direction a video or photography sent in by other than authorized and and confirmed sources cannot be used but it is a foundation for foundation and basis for the an investigation thank you jesse for the clarification adam city attorney did you want to add anything no I think uh jesse explained it well okay there are no other questions council members what I'm go ahead put a motion on the table please right so ultimately there would be two motions I'm going to start with the ordinance so I'd move in urgency ordinance of the council the city santa rosa amending title 20 of the santa rosa city code chapter 20-48 short-term rentals to set a maximum number of 215 non-hosted short-term rental permits to be issued citywide and to clarify that enforcement penalties apply to permit holders and operators and good standing file number re z 22-002 and wait for the reading of the text second so I believe that was a second from council member rogers mayor can I ask a quick clarifying question will we be able to discuss the item now that it's on the floor did you okay I want to make sure I thanks all right council member Fleming yes um prior to getting into discussion I wanted to offer a friendly not a friendly amendment but a competing um motion that we set the number at 198 rather than 215 let me say okay there's a motion and a second do we need to do it as a competing motion or for me I am comfortable with the staff suggestion of 215 and the methodology how they came up to that number and why that was chosen so it sounds like it'd be a competing right so we have a substitute motion that's on the table with the second to keep the number at 198 that'll be the first motion that's discussed if that fails we'll revert back to the original motion which was 215 uh council member Fleming did you want to make comments sure I'd be happy to make comments about that first of all I want to say that you know I listened to each and every commenter today and I heard a lot of compelling and to my mind sincere and heartfelt information from multiple perspectives I don't want to even say both sides I thought that there were some really interesting um and um just really thoughtful folks who were not necessarily you know the traditional um you know one way or another kind of people and so I want to thank the community for coming out for me where this this falls is that I think that what we see in other communities is that when the number in particular gets set um high as we see in the county then they have to go back and say we're not going to allow any of these going forward um and then you have to wait decades if not longer for these uses to be taken off of the market and so while I appreciate that most um operators are good um and I do appreciate the need for additional income that many people have here and living in Sonoma County it is not an easy place to afford to live um I do believe that having hosted rentals is the way to go about obtaining that additional income and that um while I say that I acknowledge that that doesn't work for every person in every situation and that is one of the challenges of creating regulation is that we cannot adequately accommodate every single person in every single situation so I'm not suggesting that this is going to work for everybody um the the other issue for me around limiting it to 198 rather than 215 is that while many folks pointed out that there's a very low percentage of short-term rentals in the city of Santa Rosa well they didn't point out is that the concentration of them in certain parts of Santa Rosa is very high and the issues for me and my constituents in particular have to do with you know the quality of neighborhood life on the reduction in students attending schools the draw on government resources in terms of you know enforcement here and in particular fire safety ingress and egress and so when we do do the the permanent ordinance I look forward to taking up these issues but for the issues in front of us today well in particular I'll just stick to the number um 198 to my mind is the number that we're required to do when we do the permanent ordinance we certainly could change it but what it doesn't do is it doesn't set up further in future entitlements before we address this issue fully and comprehensively which I believe is what this council intends to do so it prevents us from creating additional problems that in the future we would need to fix I don't know that will end up settling on 198 but for today this is the number that we are stuck with and so I say let's not further dig in our heels let's be methodical and thoughtful and we'll see what happens next thank you council member let's go to council member rogers thank you mayor um I just wanted to say I support the 198 number for multiple reasons but I would like as if possible um if not here in the future but to look at the definition of what hosted and non-hosted is because if for the most part people are within their homes and it's a hosted rental making it a a non-hosted rental because they're away for one or two weeks a year I think is pretty extreme and it limits the number of um rentals that they can have in a neighborhood as we heard from one of the people that commented during public comment so that would just be my suggestion all right thank you council member council member mcdonald I think the thing about lowering it to 198 I guess my point of clarification that I'd like to make is that if a license or permit is revoked does that then push somebody else in the queue up so that it would be allotted to 198 I just want to make sure that we know what we're approving because I feel like there's pieces of this whole ordinance that are not clarified and we could get that when we talk about the ordinance as a whole but that would be something I want to know for this particular motion mayor rogers would you like me to address that yes please do so if we did set the cap at 198 it would um allow for all permits in the queue however if somebody does fall out if they're denied for over concentration or whatever that would mean however many of those permits there are we would accept new applications up to 198 unless you guys chose to to do something different is that answer your question all right council member Sawyer thank you mayor um this is of course is a very difficult um issue because of the realities of problem of private property rights and you can't legislate common sense or respect of neighbors um what i'm touched by is let me preface I firmly believe that if we did not have situations where we have over concentration or if we had um a some rules in place that were really after the bad players seriously after the bad players and a way to track the complaints and be accurate about the complaints we wouldn't be having this conversation right now because people wouldn't even know because the people that are that the people wouldn't know that they have a problem because the people that are that are occupying the short-term rentals would not be a problem and i think the vast majority of short-term rentals are not a problem it is a very small number which makes me uncomfortable in in in restricting um the unhosted short-term rentals i believe that the vast majority of unhosted short-term rentals are actually operated well i don't know how many are not i don't know what the number is of those that are really bad actors but like i said before they are the ones they are my target and i would want to concentrate my efforts and code enforcement's efforts and in any effort on the point on the part of staff to weed out those bad actors remove their ability to to have short-term rentals at all and with with um and expedite that that effort immediately that being said you know i am comfortable with to give them the benefit of the doubt those extra up to 215 which came out as a recommendation from staff um i just i i think it is unfortunate um that the that those that are doing a good job and actually providing providing a service here in santa rosa and given the small percentage of our housing stock being dedicated to short-term how to short-term house or short-term rentals um i'd be i'm actually looking to support um council member schwedhelm's original motion i just find it's very frustrating because i i think that there are a lot of people that are being vilified because of the the really unfortunate behavior of a few that i would like to not allow them to be operating in santa rosa and to start that process as soon as possible thank you council member council member schwedhelm thank you mr mayor excuse me for me i've really appreciated the number of members of our community who've participated in this discussion and i also really appreciate oftentimes many people don't realize the challenge being one of the seven of us who are making this decision because for me it's not a black and white issue so for me what i was looking for is a nice balanced approach which i think staff has presented before us in addition to the feedback from um the subcommittee and so with that balanced approach and i was really encouraged by what jesse said about the code enforcement because again the fine the find is not in my opinion is not to get additional funding for the city but it's to get compliance and the part i would like as we move forward and continue on these discussions is a little bit more information about who was fine and is it did it create the desired change we want so if someone does you know is 500 bucks enough encouragement to comply with our ordinance or should it be 2,500 bucks for the first one i don't know but i'm looking at that intent and that enforcement code enforcement is that when someone has done something in contrast to or in conflict with our ordinance how do we get them into compliance right and i know we heard some speakers talk about education i really like the fact that there are property manager out there that apparently they figured it out and there may be some others that aren't so how do we blend those two together to make this so it's a win-win for everyone and again with the uh the 215 a lot of work has been put into this staff is you know it is somewhat subjective just like 198 subjective so for me i'm only supportive of the 215 number but i really do appreciate all the work from so many different staff members that have gone into what is before us today thank you councilmember mr vice mayor thank you mayor you have to hear an every everyone speak it sounds like we're putting san rosas against san rosas and even worse neighbors against neighbors and there's a comment that i that that a that a speaker said where i'm paraphrasing but pretty much where we're we were running before we were crawling and i take responsibility for that uh it's definitely new territory for for a lot of cities especially ours after the fires and the loss of the hotels just a couple on the hillside and it's definitely us trying to adjust to the need of of the visitors who come to the great city of san rosa to do business visit family see the beautiful place that we are now i'm looking at the number of 215 or the 198 and again are we pitting neighbors against neighbors councilman soyer said it perfectly if we had a system that enforced the laws with with teeth we would not be hearing about these issues we would be hearing a lot of the comments that we heard tonight where where neighbors were actually complimenting other neighbors for running an exceptional str program and i believe that to be the goal so i do not wish to add the vilification of the str folks against those that have to deal with the lessening of the quality of life in san rosa because ultimately that's who i believe we as council need to look after is to make sure that every person who sleeps here for not just a week for not just a day have peace in their home and that is also why i'm here happy to hear that that jessie oswald is creating and looking for additional staff to assure that our code enforcement has the teeth necessary to enforce the laws that we put forth uh and i look forward to the future i i do want to see a program that compliments each other instead of vilifies each other i think it's it's a program that could be run i've i've participated programs in other cities where i visit and it's absolutely awesome to arrive into a home opposed to a hotel or a motel and and again it's and i'm not even visiting san rosa i'm not even trying to leave san rosa so so just imagine those that have the the blessing to come here thank you thank mr vice mayor did you have more to add if you if you have more to add go ahead and do i'm i could wait but i i did have something around the 198 the thing about the 198 is that's who's currently operating right now so the 215 is just a what-if scenario and it was based on a thought that maybe when this started to come out that more people would actually then file for permits and they haven't yet so we're allowing more opportunity based on a number we don't know whereas the 198 we actually know right now so that's why i could be in support of that because we aren't harming anyone who's currently in the process we're just saying this is it until we have the opportunity to go back and actually do a full um engagement with the community um to go through the whole ordinance so i can see doing that part of that and then i can reserve my comments for the rest of the issues that i think we need to look out for enforcement and fines but i think for the 198 if that's the only portion that we're voting on for that resolution then we could do that and then if we go back and we vote as a whole i don't know how you want to do that part mayor well let's start with the motion that's on the table which is the 198 um and it included the rest of the proposed so if if you'd like to okay so if it's the 198 i would still have the same um concerns whether it's 198 or 215 what the concerns are is what the red the rest of the council has said is that we have an enforcement issue we have not been enforcing the um the complaints because we haven't had the staff to do that so that is on on the city of santa rosa as far as i'm concerned we have not we put something in place and we didn't have enough staff to actually enforce the rules but in addition to not having enough enforcement what i don't see is clarification around what is a violation if the noise is at what level what constitutes a violation and how are we verifying the violation so just as in any court case you have to have evidence and if this is how we're treating these specific things we would need to have evidence and that's either dispatching our um police or that's going to be dispatching code enforcement officers so that is why increasing the fines that would happen after a via a verified violation would occur could potentially help offset the costs of enforcement in my opinion so i think having some additional teeth in the cost of a violation would be something i would be in favor of so nobody says 500 bucks is nothing if you're making 800 or a thousand dollars a night on a on a on a airbnb so that's not going to probably be enough i would look to steeper fees as long as we're verifying the violation um for these bad actors and then in addition to that not just charging the person that actually is renting out the um the home but actually charging the person renting having some type of process like that which i know is done in other jurisdictions so if you're renting the place and you have a verified violation you're going to pay part of that fine so that way the people that are actually renting have some skin in the game and then the actual owner of the house has some skin in the game too but i don't think 500 a thousand and 2000 is enough and i think after this third one you don't get to come back in a year you just don't get to come back five years or ever it's just not tough enough policy in my opinion and i i think that there needs to maybe be a bit more work on it but if i was going to approve this tonight i would increase all the fines i'd get rid of people after the third strike and i'd make sure that we have enforcement officers out there on weekends and nights when the issues are occurring thank you councilmember councilmember rogers um point of clarification um the 198 are applications that have currently been submitted so those are an additional 198 with the ones that we already have um currently operating and these are are non-hosted so it's not as if we are um saying if people are in the process or if they already um purchase their home and they put in their application that we're not allowing them to complete their application um for me what the 198 is saying is that we're trying to work it out we want to get additional community feedback um and for right now we're going to stop with the applications that we currently have until we're able to completely work it out and see where it is that we're going with the short term with the short term rentals i work really hard i cannot imagine uh not being able to sleep when i need to sleep or not being able to enjoy my home that i've worked so hard um to purchase and or just to live it so um i think that we need to look at it from that standpoint too in addition uh i know that we're saying it's a very small percentage of homes but uh we do have a housing housing crisis um so some short term rentals if they're not five and six bedrooms i don't know who really afford that i can't um but they um they're taking away from they are taking away from our housing stuff so at some point we do need to have a limit about how many we're going to have in our city and the concentration um that is something that we definitely need to look at and i heard it mentioned but i don't really hear a resolution or what we're going to do about that because um we're looking at citywide and when i look at the map uh a lot of them are concentrated um in certain areas of the city so thank you councilmember soyer thank you mayor you know i think it points out given the number of hours that we've been dealing with this today and and we're only dealing with two issues um it points out the amount of work it's going to take to come up with a comprehensive ordinance uh that is going to work um to allow people peaceful enjoyment of their homes uh respecting private property rights and allow people to actually operate short term rentals in santa rosa um it is good there is a lot of work ahead of us um and this is why you know spring was sure it may not make everybody happy though that we won't have anything final until spring but this it points out the difficulty in getting from point a to point b um when we have the these couple of issues that we've been spending hours on and there are so many other issues that have to be dealt with and and people and compromise and people willing to um uh respect other people's opinions and having and having meetings and we look at the next steps it's really it it's one page that points out the amazing amount of work ahead of us the community engagement alone is going to be a massive undertaking with an issue like this when there are already people that are very uncomfortable with their with their living next to a a short term rental so um you know i i think it's just it bears repeating that this is going to be a very long process i think that the those that are in attendance that were in attendance this evening and thank you very much for coming and all the people that phoned in or that's zoomed in um they need to know that this this is not over this is just one one piece and even what we do tonight is changeable in the future so you know it's it's important for the for our entire community to understand the the gravity of the of the of the questions before this council and also the the amount of work it's going to take to come to some kind of resolution and something that that most people can live with again respecting the the peaceful enjoyment of their homes um which is the my major um hope that we end up with at the end of the day at the end of these many months is that people are no longer victimized by the unfortunate behavior of operators that do not have a handle on their on their tenants their short term tenants so we've got a lot of work ahead of us thank you council member and i'm going to echo some of the comments that were made for me 198 215 doesn't really matter if we don't have enforcement and you're hearing i think a desire from the council to get back to that holistic conversation for me i'll be supportive tonight uh first at the 198 and then if that motion fails at the 215 uh strictly because we clearly have not figured this out yet and we need to make sure that we are crafting rules before we have too many people in the process and change too many things uh i'm actually particularly concerned that if we were to have a cap that uh kicks people out of the process or has folks who are not in the pipeline uh able to get their vacation rental approved that we would potentially have a takings issue uh with our land use policy that people would have been dedicating resources towards uh a process that they'd be entering into and then we change and pull the rug right out from under them i think that that's a legal issue for the city and so until we actually have our rules in place long term i think that it's reasonable for us to to put a cap in place for now it's a one shy one one shade away from calling it a moratorium i understand that there's folks who can fall out of the process that makes room for an additional person one way or another but i think that there is that commitment there that we need to figure out the enforcement piece before we continue to allow additional homes to be used as vacation rentals without clear guidelines and without clear enforcement there are a lot of other issues that i want to talk about as a council member mcdonalds brought up tonight is not the place for that the place for that will be in our community engagement and then ultimately when we bring a comprehensive ordinance forward later this year so with that the motion on the table is the staff proposal with the amendment of changing the number from 215 to 198 it does require five votes so madame city clerk if you could please call the vote on that measure thank you mayor councilmember schwedhelm no councilmember soyer no councilmember rogers yes councilmember mcdonalds yes councilmember fleming yes vice mayor alvarez mayor rogers aye that motion passes with six eyes and i'm sorry with five eyes and two nos by councilmember soyer and schwedhelm okay thank you and councilmember and then we have a resolution so i'd move a resolution of the council of the city of san aroza assigning existing service fees to short-term rental permit renewal applications and authorizing the director of planning and economic development to prove future fee adoptions and changes to the short-term rental renewal permitting process and wait for the reading of the text second we have any additional discussion let's call the vote councilmember schwedhelm aye councilmember soyer aye councilmember rogers councilmember mcdonalds aye councilmember fleming aye vice mayor alvarez aye mayor rogers aye that motion passes with seven eyes okay thank you council and thank you to everybody who participated it i know it was a long long process but really grateful for it and i hope you'll continue to be at the table and have these conversations there were a couple comments that were made about folks meeting with council members and staff both neighbor side as well as those who operate short-term rental we're all willing we're all happy to our contact information is on the website and so please continue to reach out we have no written communications tonight let's go to our last public comment for non-agenda items if you have a comment on an issue that we have not discussed tonight go ahead hit the raise hand feature on your zoom all right seeing none we'll go ahead and adjourn thank you everybody really fast i apologize councilmember schwedhelm was about to flag me down we've almost forgotten two meetings in a row and i apologize but we are adjourning tonight in the memory of two individuals who've had an incredible impact on our community the first is john flitner who was a former santa rosa city attorney who passed away a couple of weeks ago and we extend our condolences to his family and friends the other is ann gray bird who is the founder of the gray foundation and has also left behind an incredible legacy of advocacy here in santa rosa so tonight we will adjourn in their memories for john flitner and ann gray bird thank you everybody


What's up everybody? Jason here for jazzy'scasebrakes.com. Wax party promo break sold out guys. Woohoo! 2021, Panini, clearly Daunus football. Four box break, four random teams each. Number one just sold out. So first guys will do the break. We'll randomize the customer names. We're gonna add your names four times in here since you do get four random teams. All cards ship. We'll do the breaking at the end of the break. We'll randomize the customer names and see who gets a wax party promo spot. So there you go. There's a dice ruler. Customer names there. Customer team names. So let's roll it. And we got ourselves a three and a two five times. So remember the top eight right there. So four got in straight up and then Carl, Andrew, Alan and Michael got in right there. So there you go. Three and a two five times. One, two, three, four, five. Two and a three five times. Three and a two five. Adam Kuperman, down to Alan Murdoch. Five times. One, two, three, four. And it was a five. No, I know some of it's because you know what though the hype is real with him.  Like pay a premium basically. All right, so there you go guys. Five times. Five times. Kuperman, Texans, Alan, Packers, Carr, Vikings, Michael Robinson, Titans, and Seahawks. Young men, Las Palmodos, Steelers, Jason Triders, Youngmen, Patriots, Carr with the Bucks, Michael Hughes with the Rams, Carr with the Dolphins, Jason with the Lions. Michael Hughes, Browns. Adam Kuperman with the Colts, Carr with the Falcons, Jason with the Broncos, Youngmen with the Cardinals, Alan with the Saints. Young men with the Rechions, Andrew with the Raiders, Michael Hughes with the Bills, Michael Robinson with the 49ers, Alan with the Bears, Adam Kuperman with the Jaguars, Andrew with the Bangles, Michael Hughes with the Ravens, Michael Robinson with the Chiefs, Andrew with the Jets, Jason with the Panthers, Andrew with the Clanders, Adam Kuperman with the Cowboys, and Alan Murdock with my Eagles. All right, if anybody wants to trade guys, uh, let's go. Give you guys a quick trade window. Let me pause the video to see if there's any trades.


NATO considers option on sending troops to Ukraine. The North Atlantic Alliance allows the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine. This was said by French President Emmanuel Macron at a briefing after the conference in support of Ukraine, which was held in Paris. We have discussed this. So far there is no consensus on sending troops, but nothing should be ruled out on this issue in the future. Macron said, as the French leader noted, two years ago a number of European leaders said they would not supply Ukraine with tanks, aircraft and long-range missiles, but their stance has changed. Let's be modest enough to recognize that we have often been six to twelve months behind schedule. This was the purpose of today's discussion. Everything is possible if it is useful to achieve our goal, the French president said. Macron noted that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's request for increased support had been heard. The politician emphasized that Moscow had taken a hostile stance not only towards Kiev but also towards the entire West. I will not remove the ambiguity of today's debate by mentioning names. I say that it was listed among the options, he added. French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal has not ruled out the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine according to West France. We cannot agree that Russia should win this war, that an authoritarian country should take control of a democratic country by force. Because we stand behind Ukraine, he says, Attal emphasizes that Sweden and Finland are joining NATO because they see a threat from Russia. We have been supporting Ukraine since day one. We will continue to support Ukrainians, the Prime Minister adds. Ukrainian troops are facing 470,000 of Russian army, a stalemate in the US Congress over military aid and a lack of production capacity in Europe is leaving Ukraine with a war critical shortage of artillery ammunition. This was stated by Jack Wattling, a senior researcher at the Royal Research Institute of Great Britain, according to Time. There is already a shortage of ammunition along the entire front, which led to the recent withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the city of Avdivka, he noted. The expert recalled that the Ukrainian military is facing approximately 470,000 Russian soldiers who are attacking their positions if Ukraine had enough artillery. These attacks could have been easily repulsed as a few 155mm shells would have killed Russian soldiers as soon as they started advancing from their positions. But Ukraine is having to ration its units to fire only 2,000 rounds a day across a 750-mile front. Ukraine feels around 350 artillery pieces so that in many areas of the front Ukraine has no artillery at all. The shortage of guns and shells not only reduces Ukraine's ability to blunt Russian attacks but also makes Ukrainian artillery more vulnerable to Russian Landsat 3M drones and counter-battery fire. Russia has more than 4,000 artillery pieces in Ukraine and is firing around 10,000 rounds a day across the front. The expert added that without enough ammunition the Ukrainian military would have to take up more physical positions on the front to repel Russian attacks with small arms. Houthis shot down USMQ-9 Reaper drone in area near Yemen. The Houthis said they shot down a USMQ-9 Reaper drone off the coast of Yemen. According to US officials, the Pentagon is investigating the cause of the drone crash, the New York Times reports. The officials speaking on condition of anonymity confirmed that the MQ-9 Reaper drone went down. Iran-backed militants said that they had shut down a drone near the port city of Al-Hudaida in western Yemen. If the Houthis claims are true, it will be the second time the group has shot down a US drone since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7. The downing of a Reaper drone, the mainstay of the US military's air surveillance fleet, marks the latest escalation between the US and Iranian-backed groups in Yemen, Iraq and Syria. These episodes have intensified over the past two months, highlighting the risk that the conflict between Israel and Hamas could escalate into a wider one. One of the American officials speaking on condition of anonymity reported that the American general atomic drone was shut down near Hudaida. Another official said that the drone was shut down by a Houthi surface-to-air missile launched from the Hudaida area. In November of last year, the Houthis shut down another MQ-9 drone. The Houthi militants said that they had attacked the Rubimar cargo vessel in the Gulf of Aden, which was at risk of sinking. Since November of last year, Houthi attacks on trade ships related to Israel in the Red Sea have continued.