ILWACO — In 2020, the Pacific County Board of Commissioners voted to adopt new language that banned new shorter-term family vacation rental permits in R-1 zoning districts. In 2021, the Ilwaco Town Council is hunting to do the exact.
In a preliminary, free of charge-flowing discussion at a Jan. 11 typical meeting, councilors were largely in agreement about the require to take motion on the challenge. A general public hearing is tentatively established to be held for the duration of one particular of the council’s two on a regular basis scheduled conferences in February.
Like quite a few coastal communities up and down the southern Washington and northern Oregon coast, brief-phrase rental disputes have a background in Ilwaco. Most a short while ago, the city council unanimously turned down a conditional-use permit for a vacation rental on Reservoir Highway in 2018, a permit that the Ilwaco Setting up Commission recommended on a 3-2 vote that the council approve.
Councilor Kristen Mathison, who led the discussion at very last Monday’s meeting, claimed the council experienced hoped to tackle the difficulty in 2020 as the city worked as a result of updating its Comprehensive Prepare, “and then, of class, the pandemic took place.” She explained she’s bringing the issue again to the forefront since of the substantial contingent of citizens in 2018 who urged the council to update the city’s municipal code, which allows getaway rentals as a conditional use in R-1 zones.
“Mostly what men and women stated [in 2018] is that they moved into R-1 with the expectation that there would not be family vacation rentals there,” Mathison explained. She also reported that she’s been explained to by constituents that likely prospective buyers are puzzled by the language in the city’s zoning legal guidelines. “It’s truly vital that our zoning guidelines are pretty obvious for our investors in our local community.”
Mathison also framed the discussion all-around the issue of reasonably priced housing, noting that area housing charges proceed to rise and that a lot more holiday rentals in R-1 zones mean fewer housing alternatives for prospective total-time residents.
“Just to say ‘Well, they can just create somewhere else or they can transfer absent,” all those aren’t selections for folks in our group. They will need us to protect their housing, and so I’m going to advocate for that with just not permitting [vacation rentals] in R-1,” Mathison claimed.
Councilor Dave Cundiff echoed his help for a moratorium on holiday rentals in R-1 zones, indicating it aligned with his “guiding star” for why he sought a seat on the town council in the initially location, which is to make Ilwaco “the most hospitable ecosystem attainable for 12 months-round residents.”
“I really don’t want to see lengthy-term people or yr-round people squeezed out by holiday rentals, individually,” Cundiff reported. “I am inclined to be really supportive of this, pending what we see from the public hearing process, and specially what we see from the community hearing approach from yr-round people.”
Councilor Matt Lessnau pointed out that the Discovery Heights owners affiliation forbids holiday rentals in the gated subdivision, whilst the Sahalee community has covenants, submitted several a long time ago with the county, that Lessnau interprets as also disallowing quick-phrase and transient housing.
“That form of reduces the place we’re anxious about with R-1, but I also are inclined to agree that R-1 isn’t the most effective place to endorse trip rental housing,” Lessnau said. “There are a lot of people on the lookout for aspect-time assets in the spot for that function, and are now seemingly discouraged with [the county’s new ordinance], so I’d be fascinated in acquiring a dialogue and seeking into this a little little bit additional.”
Mathison stressed that she does not want to get rid of holiday vacation rentals, and believes that there are loads of viable regions in Ilwaco, these types of as the downtown space, that can aid shorter-expression housing.
“We really want to establish our downtown main. That’s an place we’ve had vacancy struggles with … and there is just some definitely charming properties down there that could be fantastic for [vacation rentals],” Mathison said. “And that would make it possible for for us to have an region for that to materialize without the need of pushing out our people.”
