February 23, 2023 at 12:57 p.m.
St. Germain likely to adopt ordinance changes for short-term rentals
By Fred Williston-
During a town board meeting last Monday (February 13), supervisors voted unanimously to put forward the proposed changes for public review and comment.
Supervisor Ted Ritter drafted the revisions to the town's room-tax ordinance - which regulates lodging rentals - after the board had a lengthy discussion on the subject during its January 27 meeting.
The town has received a steadily-growing number of complaints since the short-term rental-boom began a few years ago.
Since St. Germain has no police force or constable, most complaint calls are directed to the town's elected officials. A majority of those calls, however, end up being fielded by Treasurer Jeanna Vogel.
Vogel said there are roughly 250 licensed lodging providers in the Town of St. Germain, and she guesses approximately 200 of those are owners of stand-alone houses or cabins.
"We don't have as many hotels and resorts as we used to," she told The Lakeland Times. "They're kind of a dying breed."
During January's meeting, Vogel told supervisors most complaints are in regard to rentals of private homes.
"Usually, it's a neighbor that's complaining because there's a parking situation, or a noise situation, or a dog is in their yard, or snowmobiling issues," Vogel said. "I had two last week where there were snowmobiles going through their yards."
Vogel estimated receiving six or seven complaint calls each month during the summer, and two or three per month in non-peak seasons.
In last month's meeting, Supervisor Kalisa Mortag asked Vogel why she doesn't immediately refer all complaint calls to the Vilas County Sheriff's Office.
"My understanding is that they will not always come, depending on the situation," Vogel answered. "The times that they did come, it was because a gun was brought out."
"And I'll be honest," she said. "I've had situations where some of these people have called me, and I could easily see it escalating into something that could turn very bad, very quickly based on what some people have said to me on the phone. That is a real concern."
"I think those are the rare instances," Vogel said, "But I think it's also a reflection of some of the frustration that occurs over time, because (complainants) have nowhere else to go."
Ritter asked "With 250 businesses, do you have any feel for how many of them use what I will call the national lodging marketplace, where there is no local (manager) on-site?"
Vogel answered "I would guess at least half of them do not have a local on-site, or close to it ... If I had to take a guess on the complaints that I get, I would say that at least 75% of them are in properties that do not have a local manager."
"So the private homeowner has signed up with one of the East-Coast, West-Coast, Gulf-Coast lodging marketplaces," Ritter said. "And the property owner lives somewhere other than here."
"It's not hard to envision how these situations develop," he said. "A neighbor is complaining, and there's nobody locally to deal with this. And now it's stuck in Jeanna's lap."
Ritter said "Right now, a property owner who had nothing to do with taking a booking, or lives who-knows-where, if Jeanna calls and says 'You know that house up in St. Germain that you're renting through Airbnb? We've got a problem. Can you deal with it?', right now, they can say 'No, I don't need to deal with it. It's not my problem'."
"Bear in mind," he said. "What you're dealing with here primarily are people who have absolutely no connection to the Town of St. Germain. They have simply purchased property - probably a waterfront home - for the opportunity to make a lot of money on it."
"They bought it to rent it," Ritter said. "And they contract with Airbnb or whoever, and they're pretty much hands-off. They pay the tax bill once a year and Airbnb keeps it full and sends them the money. And once a year, they might come up and check on the property."
At the end of January's discussions, Ritter asked the board for permission to draft ordinance amendments which would "Hold the property owner responsible for not having a local contact to address issues as they arise." The board consented unanimously.
Last week, Ritter presented the board with his revisions, which were brief but significant.
Instead of being titled "Room Tax", chapter 12 of the town's code of ordinances will likely be called "Room Tax and Short-term Rental Property Registration" if changes are adopted.
Ritter's draft states "Local contact means a person, named by the property owner and located within 50 miles of the rental property, who shall be available to be contacted by the Town and to respond to any issue needing corrective action which arises with the property."
Supervisors arbitrarily decided on a 50-mile limit after agreeing it would be reasonable for someone living in the Rhinelander area to serve as a contact person, but it would not be reasonable for someone living in the Merrill area.
If adopted, the ordinance will require short-term rental-property owners to register "local contact" information annually. Room-tax renewal applications are due each June.
The amended ordinance is now available in-full for review on the town's website, and it will be treated as a class-two public notice and published twice in a local newspaper.
Wisconsin statute only requires a class-two public-review and hearing process for zoning ordinances, but Ritter told The Times The Town Board of St. Germain takes those steps before adopting any new or amended ordinances.
"We go far above-and-beyond what the statutes call for because transparency is very important to us," he said.
"Even though the statutes don't require a public-review process, if a citation is being challenged in court, judges like to know that at the time this was adopted, the public had an opportunity to weigh in on it and comment on it. That gives the ordinance a lot more strength. It eliminates the potential attorney for the accused saying 'Well, the town just adopted this at eleven o'clock one night, and the next day they're writing citations'."
"We are trying to hold the property owner responsible for the conduct on that property," Ritter said. "For anybody who understands the issue here, they're going to understand the beef. This is really getting out of hand, and it's not just in St. Germain."
"The ordinance not only requires that you provide a contact, but (also) that that contact is expected to respond to an issue brought to their attention by the town," he said. "If they just plain don't respond, again, we'd write a letter. But if this becomes an ongoing thing, we would then write a citation and a summons to appear in circuit court."
Regarding citable complaints, Ritter said "Some of them are going to be a judgement call. And some of them are going to be a contact to the property-owner and say 'You know, we don't want to issue you a citation here. We want you to be aware, though, that there is an ongoing complaint regarding your property, and it's got some validity. Can we talk about this? Can you help the town resolve this problem?'. That's the approach we will always take."
"We've had enforceable ordinances since sometime in 2016. And we have yet to write our first citation," he said.
"There could be some rental-property owners who object to this provision in the ordinance because they don't want their contact (person) to be hassled by the town just because a neighbor isn't happy," Ritter said.
"This carries a pretty serious responsibility for the town to be able to sort these things out and understand when this is truly an issue that needs to be addressed, versus just an ornery neighbor."
"If we get a property-owner or someone speaking up who objects to this new provision in the ordinance, we'll explain that," he said. "But the important thing to understand is that you, as a property-owner - even though you may not even live in the town ... maybe you just bought one of these properties when it was for sale and thought it was a great opportunity for income and you contracted with one of these lodging marketplaces to keep your building fully-occupied all the time to maximize your income potential - it doesn't relieve you of your responsibility to the town. You are the property-owner; our ordinance holds you responsible, so you need to work with us here, or you're going to find yourself in court."
Ritter said she believes the amendments will "most likely" be adopted during the board's scheduled meeting on Monday, March 13.
Public comments can be made during that meeting, or directed beforehand to supervisors by mail, email, or telephone.
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