The measure is aimed, in part, at rentals brokered through websites such as Airbnb and Vacation Rentals by Owner, or VRBO. Their explosive popularity has pitted the companies and a newly organized network of hosts extolling the economic and personal benefits of such rentals against housing advocates, some neighborhood activists and hotel unions worried about the effects of their rise.
Under the proposed rules, Angelenos could rent out a spare room, back house or a whole house or apartment for short stays, as long as it was their primary residence. Unlike neighboring Santa Monica, which recently adopted some of the strictest regulations in the nation, L.A. would allow someone to rent out their own home while out of town.
However, Angelenos could not rent out any home that was not their main residence for short stays, nor any unit that is covered by rent control.
By imposing those restrictions, City Councilman Mike Bonin argued the city would protect genuine “home sharing” while cracking down on speculators who buy up properties to rent out like “rogue hotels.”
The phenomenon of commercial owners renting out entire homes or apartment buildings through Airbnb and other websites has stirred up alarm among housing activists worried about rental units being taken off the market and neighborhood groups concerned about noise and other nuisances.
“We cannot tolerate how a growing number of speculators are eliminating rental housing and threatening the character of our neighborhoods,” Bonin said in a statement Tuesday.
Bonin introduced his proposal along with Council President Herb Wesson, who argued that L.A. “should be at the steering wheel” as technology makes it easier for people to rent out their homes. The proposed regulations would also require such rentals to pay the same kind of city taxes as hotels, though the proposal gave no further details on how.
The new proposal won praise from the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, an advocacy group focused on labor and environmental issues, which raised concerns earlier this year that Airbnb and similar rental companies were harming housing availability.
“It protects actual sharing … and they’re really taking seriously the threat posed to affordable housing by some of the more commercialized operations,” said the alliance's research and policy analyst, Roy Samaan.
Airbnb, which has previously countered such criticisms by saying that the vast majority of its L.A. hosts are the "primary residents" of the homes they list, issued a brief statement Tuesday in reaction to the proposal.
"Home sharing allows people to turn what is typically one of their greatest expenses into a tool to help make ends meet.... This proposal demonstrates L.A. is embracing home sharing and the peer to peer economy," Airbnb spokeswoman Alison Schumer wrote. "We look forward to connecting our community with policymakers in the weeks and months ahead."
Schumer later added that while it is early in the process and many details remain to be determined, the L.A. proposal appears promising.
A representative of the Los Angeles Short Term Rental Alliance, which includes local rental owners and operators, called the proposal “a nice start” but said the group had some concerns with the plan.
“It’s a little too much of one-size-fits-all,” said Robert St.Genis, director of operations of the short-term rental alliance. Vacation rentals are “part of the fabric of Los Angeles, and they’re getting shortchanged.”
St.Genis said the group's members were concerned about how the city would define a primary residence for people who split their time between different places. For instance, he argued that a family who lives in Australia eight months out of the year and returns to L.A. for the rest of the time should be able to rent out their Venice home to vacationers while they’re away.
Bonin and Wesson also want the city to throw its weight behind a proposed state law that would require Airbnb and other online rental platforms to report the addresses, number of nights rented and other information about such rentals to cities and counties.
Airbnb has balked at the idea. In a blog post, Airbnb public policy head David Owen warned that it would force the company to "hand over broad swaths of confidential, personal information to bureaucrats who will sift through it in search of potential violations."
But state Sen. Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg) and other backers counter that cities would not be privy to sensitive information such as renters' names. Bonin said the information would enable L.A. and other governments to make sure such rentals comply with local laws.
The proposed law “gives us the information with which to exercise local control,” Bonin said.
Scores of people showed up at a Tuesday council discussion about the proposed state law, SB 593, including Airbnb hosts and neighborhood activists critical of short-term rentals.
Several hosts told L.A. lawmakers that renting their homes through the online platform had helped them survive economic hardship, praising it as a valuable way for people to open their homes and share a slice of their lives with travelers.
“It’s not the city’s job to stifle this kind of innovation,” said Harvey Slater, a rental host who testified against backing the state law. “It’s their job to actually figure out a way to make it work for everybody.”
But residents upset about whole homes and apartments being rented out as “de facto hotels” said the state law was needed to ensure Los Angeles could enforce any regulations it passed.
“No one is opposed to home sharing,” said Linda Lucks, a Venice resident. “If you have a room to rent out, no problem.” But, she quickly added, “kicking out residents and long-term tenants who’ve been there for years in order to make a bigger buck is not home sharing.”
Under existing city codes, renting out rooms or a whole home for short stays is already illegal in most residential stretches of Los Angeles. But city officials have said it is extremely challenging to enforce the rules, partly because many websites do not list rental addresses.
Both proposals -- to back SB 593 and to regulate short-term rentals citywide -- were referred to council committees for more discussion.
©2015 the Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
