Short-term rental ordinance dies due to lack of a motion
A short-term rental ordinance up for vote quickly died when no motions to adopt or deny were given after the Ellijay City Council heard concerns and comments from local residents while meeting Monday, Aug. 16.
Prior to the meeting’s public input, Mayor Al Hoyle asked attendees to keep their comments directed to the council and limited to five minutes.
“Citizens in attendance are expected to follow the same rules of decorum as the councilmembers do,” he said.
Several who offered comments about the proposed city ordinance, which was up for its second reading after a first reading last month and revisions to a previous draft before that, were property owners who felt it was too restrictive.
The mayor and councilmembers Sandy Ott, Katie Lancey, Tom Crawford, Kevin Pritchett and Al Fuller also heard comments from Pam O’Dell, director of the Short-Term Rental Owners Association of Georgia (STROAGA).
North Avenue resident Tom Griffith described the proposed ordinance as a “de facto ban” on short-term rentals due to “all the excluding factors” it includes.
Among those factors is the ordinance stating that owners of residential property within 500 feet of a proposed short-term rental can object to that use, Griffith told councilmembers.
“Why does one citizen’s thought to object trump one citizen’s desire to operate? It’s really pitting one against the other and siding with the one that wants to ban,” he said.
Griffith asked that, if the ordinance passes, the council also consider similar stipulations for long-term rentals.
“I believe the majority, if not all, of your property owners downtown would rather have a short-term rental house that looks like it’s right off Pinterest than a house that looks like it’s out of the third world that’s run down, not taken care of and sometimes has more inhabitants than it should,” he said.
O’Dell, who lives in Blue Ridge, agreed with Griffith’s opinion of the proposed ordinance as a “de facto ban” on short-term rentals. She told councilmembers and Hoyle that the ordinance needs work and parts of it conflict with state law.
O’Dell asked for further action on the ordinance to be tabled and for the council to allow STROAGA to work with them to create a new ordinance, which she said the organization has done in several Georgia communities.
“We cannot only help you write an ordinance, but if you should have problems with short-term rentals, and some communities do, we can help you with the platforms,” she added. “The platforms are basically Vrbo and Airbnb. The three of us work together in Atlanta, in Milton, in Brunswick, all over this state.”
O’Dell said a similar situation happened in Blue Ridge concerning a short-term rental ordinance.
“What we warned them about actually happened, but it happened faster. They passed an ordinance that was essentially a ban, which is what you’ve got. The people who owned some of those rentals said, ‘I’m going to sell. It’s not worth my investment,’ and they sold. Some very opportunistic people who did not have the community’s interests in mind sold out to hotels,” she added.
Barbara Simmons, owner of a short-term rental property on Gilmer Street, said she feels like she’s been put “through the ringer and hung out to dry” by the proposed ordinance.
“There’s no way this home jeopardizes the public health, safety, welfare and aesthetics of the citizens of the City of Ellijay,” she said.
Simmons told the council that there are issues of those types that need to be dealt with concerning long- term rentals, including trash piled up in yards and too many cars in driveways.
“There are (long-term rental residents) that trap rats and throw them in the street. There are residents that kill wildlife such as rabbits in their backyards. These are issues I think need to be addressed, as well as short-term rental issues,” she said.
Jerry Davis, a downtown Ellijay resident and current member of the Gilmer County Board of Tax Assessors, began his comments not by talking about short- term rentals, but what he sees as new construction and historic preservation violations in the city not being held to accountability.
“I have no animosity or hate or anything like that. I have concerns for the city of Ellijay,” he said.
Davis then directed his comments toward Hoyle.
“I do not think we are being served with a mayor that works one hour a day and gets paid $22,000 to do that plus benefits,” he said.
Hoyle thanked Davis for speaking, but did not offer a reply to those comments.
In a workshop that preceded the meeting, Davis asked Hoyle what councilmembers, the city attorney and the mayor were discussing in the mayor’s office before the meeting was called to order.
Hoyle and Crawford said it was small talk. Hoyle replied that the group wasn’t meeting.
“They just kind of all walked in there at the same time, but the meeting is still not called to order,” he replied.
Davis said that still can’t be done with a majority of councilmembers. Hoyle told Davis he was right, and he appreciated Davis pointing that out.
When the council’s time to vote on the short-term rental ordinance arrived, Fuller began to offer comment, but was reminded by city attorney Kayann Hayden West that a motion would first have to be given for discussion to take place.
No motion was given, either in favor or denial, and, according to Hoyle, the item died due to that.
When asked if the council can revisit the ordinance, Fuller said they can, but the whole process would likely have to all start over again.