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Grandfather must die
The success of Airbnb and the like have transformed the way we travel—mainly where we stay when we are away. It is also transforming communities such as ours.
There are about 10,000 residential homes in Prince Edward County. About 900 of these are not homes at all—but instead are commercial businesses providing shortterm accommodation (STA). Nine per cent is a large portion of our housing stock to be removed and set aside for a transient population.
Most of the 900 whole-home STAs (homes that are not the owner’s principal residence and dedicated to accommodating the visiting public) once housed families and neighbours. Now they serve visitors—eager to partake in the natural beauty of Prince Edward County.
To be sure, they serve a need not met by commercial hotel and accommodation providers. (Disclosure: I help to operate a commercial guest suites provider in Wellington.) Visitors generate economic activity that feeds business and drives employment.
Whole-home STAs also bring challenges. Neighbourhoods are dark for months. Then in late spring, residential streets explode with an everchanging cast of visitors—cars line both sides of the street. Holidaymakers revel into the wee hours—to be replaced by another sun-seeking horde a few days later.
Neighbourhood etiquette—those subtle cues contributing to social cohesion—is fraying. We risk becoming more insular and self-absorbed. Minor transgressions spiral into detachment. It becomes easier to cash in and move on. And so the neighbourhood unravels.
The sharing economy has grown quickly over the past decade. Of course, the County has long boasted Bed and Breakfast accommodation, where visitors share a portion of the owner’s home. But today, they represent a small fraction (eight per cent) of accommodation providers compared to the businesses that operate whole-home STAs that have proliferated in the past decade.
Generally speaking, Shire Hall has managed this file well—wrangling what was a wild-west free-for-all into a somewhat orderly and structured sector. It continues to refine the rules incrementally.
To see meaningful attrition in the wholehome STA business, however, will require the elimination of grandfathering. That is, the ability for such property owners to forever ignore land planning rules governing their home simply because the rules weren’t in place when they purchased it and converted a residential home into a commercial STA. It is considered legal nonconforming.
In an earlier version of this week’s rule changes, Shire Hall had proposed moving density limits (how many STAs would be allowed in a neigbhourhood, from land planning to licensing rules), a workaround aimed at giving Shire Hall a tool to refuse to renew a license to an STA once the property was sold.
But this provision was dropped in the rule changes presented to Council this week. It is too bad.
There were threats of legal action by folks who have seen their property values rise relative to their neighbours, who wanted to retain that value on the sale. They have a lot of incentive to litigate—to preserve their value. Shire Hall may have deemed the potential cost too great.
But Shire Hall must not close this door. Prudence may have caused our municipal leaders to balk at drawing this red line. Another jurisdiction, however, will find a creative way to do so. Shire Hall must be ready and prepared to act once the precedent is set.
Whole-home STAs are commercial businesses. They don’t fit well in residential neighbourhoods. When such businesses consume nine per cent of our housing stock, they fray the neighourhood fabric. They displace families. They put our school at risk. Our health care.
These businesses seized upon this opportunity before jurisdictions were able to scramble to establish rules and regulations. They are being rewarded for their agility. Fair enough. But not forever. The cash engine must be idled once the house trades hands.
It must go back to the community.
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