opportunities for all Columbia residents, and promoting the
development of strong, healthy, engaged neighborhoods that
residents want to live in.
There was significant Commission discussion regarding the purpose statement and
the stated priorities. There was not Commission consensus that the language was
fully inclusive of all the actions/considerations that the Commission undertook in
arriving at the proposed regulations. There was discussion that the establishment
of the purpose statement and priorities would be useful in helping focus attention
on what issue drove the regulations to include particular elements and that such
conveyance would potentially reduce Council initiated amendments once the
regulations were moved forward to a public hearing. Several Commissioners felt
that the Council would do with the regulations as they saw fit and that establishing
a purpose/priority statement may be beyond the scope of what the Commission
was asked to do.
Mr. Zenner noted that he was uncertain that the purpose/priority statement was
appropriate for inclusion within the proposed regulations given they would be
spread access several different sections of the UDC. He noted that such a
statement may be more appropriate as the staff and Commission prepared
correspondence for Council’s considered regarding the complete regulatory
package. He noted that including such a statement in that type of correspondence
would allow for Council to express acceptance or disagreement with the issues the
Commission identified as driving the regulatory development which in turn could
lead to other topics being identified as important factors that may have been
overlooked.
There was additional Commission discussion regarding the purpose/priority
statement and it was determined that prior to acting upon it, Commissioner’s
needed time to absorb what Chairman Loe had proposed. Mr. Zenner was asked to
include the prepared statement in the minutes from the meeting such that the
Commission could review it more thoroughly and take the topic up again at a future
work session once members had assembled their thoughts about it.
The Commission moved to the topics contained in the staff report prepared for the
work session and noted that it was unclear if all the topics/issues noted in the
summary of actions had been voted upon. The Commission reviewed the
“dry-erase” board notes and identified that it appeared the issue of one STR per
entity was not voted upon. A motion was made to only permit one STR per entity in
all STR tiers.
There was Commission discussion on the motion which generally focused on how
this would apply to Tier 3 (fully commercial) STRs. Commissioners noted that Tier 1
and Tier 2 STRs would be self-regulating given the “primary residence” concept that
had been previously discussed; however, that Tier 3 STRs may need a somewhat
relaxed provision given they were only proposed to be permitted within
“mixed-use/non-residential” zoning districts. Concerns were expressed that
without having controls established on the number of STRs registered to a single
entity there could be de facto hotels being created in mixed-use districts via
conversion of traditional multi-family dwellings moving to STRs as well as
unintended consequences relating to the loss of affordable housing.