THROUGH THE WOODS: Our friends are returning

By DOUG LAROCQUE

NEW LEBANON – Earlier this year the New Lebanon Town Board voted to go ahead with an engineering study for the construction of a splash pad at Shatford Park. The preliminary estimates placed the cost on the high end at about $75,000. Included were funds for a test well, as the town’s only current well would not be able to feed a splash pad with the desirable water pressure.

Fast forward to the November 14 meeting of the town board. The estimated final cost for a splash pad is now pegged at $300,000. On top of that, the test well came back as unusable. It was quite a case of sticker shock and disappointment. Town Supervisor Tistrya Houghtling presented the board with three scenarios as she saw it. Follow the engineer’s recommendation, they find a site to drill a second test well. The cost of the first well came in well under the approved expenditure and could be worked into the finances. They could spend their money instead on making repairs to a water feature that currently exists but is unusable and considered dangerous or table the entire splash pad idea all together.

It was mentioned the town used to have a second well but gave it to a neighbor to use after the town was deemed responsible for contaminating their well. It was proposed to consider retesting the contaminated well, to see if that contamination still exists. If not, perhaps the town could reclaim their second well. The board agreed it was worth looking into, and decided to hold off on the splash pad, at least for now.

Other ideas that came forth were simply purchasing some lawn sprinklers or even continuing using the nearby stream. Board members Norm Rasmussen and John Trainor, sort of tongue in cheek, said sprinklers and streams worked well for them as kids, maybe they still could.

Before moving to adopt next year’s spending plan, Supervisor Houghtling brought forth five changes to the preliminary town budget she said were spawned by comments made at the budget’s public hearing. All were relatively minor in the scope of the entire budget. The added expenditures will be covered by transferring funds from the unexpended fund balance. The changes brought the total budget to $2,726,349. The tax rate will drop from $2.89 per thousand assessed valuation in the current budget, to $2.43 per thousand next year, a decrease of 46 cents. Part of that is because the total assessed value of parcels in the town increased by $58.2 million. The unexpended fund balance is $323,575.

Earlier in the year there was an incident at the town hall that threatened the security of all present at the time. It was resolved with no injuries. It did cause Supervisor Houghtling and some board members to consider enhanced security measures. At the October meeting, it was decided to put out bids for four bulletproof doors and a ring camera system. The ring system would cost the town anywhere from $29,435 to $41,000 and included monthly service charges. The concern with the ring system was most desks would have a camera. While one person may decide not to allow the person at the door entrance, someone else might. That could potentially be a problem. The bullet proof doors protect the employees in their rooms, even if a person bent on doing harm makes their way into the building.

The bid for the four doors came in at $46,100, but that does not include installation. There is currently one such door in the town hall, protecting the judge’s chambers. Ms. Houghtling said her recollection was it cost about $1,500 to install that door, but quickly added, “don’t hold me to that.” The board decided to reject the ring camera bid and go with the bulletproof doors, but not to actually purchase them until a new bid for installation was put forth and the dollar figures received.

Also at the meeting:

*The Town Board appointed Robert Long to the post of Community Center Coordinator, effective December 1, the date the Community Center is slated to open. The appointment is only until the end of the year. Long would have to reapply for 2024. The appointments for the coming year will be made at the board’s re-organizational meeting in January

*The board introduced a local law that would see changes made to the town codes that would allow the construction of new or expansion of current self-storage facilities, under some new and more stringent guidelines. A public hearing on the proposed law will be held prior to the board’s December 12 meeting. The Town Board also declared themselves lead agency for the required State Environmental Quality Review Act, often known as SEQRA

*The board agreed to 2024 contracts with the Chatham Rescue Squad for ambulance service and the Lebanon Valley Protective Association for fire department services. They also recommended Steve Powers re-appointment to the Columbia County Climate Smart Task Force.

By DEBORAH E LANS

Part 2

GHENT – As Chris Brown, the Housing Development coordinator for the county, puts it: regulating short term rentals is probably necessary to address their harmful effects, discussed in Part 1 of this article (December 14). But, doing so will require carefully “balancing the costs and benefits of short-term rental hosts, our local workforce and visitors who patronize our businesses.”

In other words, regulation should be crafted to address the undesirable effects of short term rentals in driving up long term rental and home buying prices, the diminution of available rental and housing stock, noise and parking issues but it should do so without harming tourism or those homeowners who need the added revenue to retain their homes.

That’s a tricky proposition.

A handful of experts have written on the subject. The first, and most important take-away: before regulating, the town (or county or state) must clearly identify the goals it wishes to accomplish, as blanket prohibitions and over-broad regulation may do more harm than good. The second take-away: any regulation must be enforceable. The terms of the regulation must be clear and the municipality must have the resources to enforce them.

A number of approaches have been floated. A Harvard Business Review study suggests, for example, that cities like Hudson might encourage the development of STR properties in distressed neighborhoods or that communities might set aside a portion of the tax revenue raised by virtue of the higher property values generated by STRs to reinvest in affordable housing. To address gentrification concerns, the total amount of space, or number of units, available for short term rentals might be limited, thereby encouraging the development of long term rentals alongside STRs.

A Maine Law Review article surveyed regulation nationwide as of 2019. In Arizona, state law prohibits municipalities from banning STRs but allows them to regulate STRs for reasons of health and safety. The state collects occupancy taxes and remits them to municipalities. By virtue of state-wide laws, STR hosts and visitors are freed of the burden of trying to understand patchwork legislation.

At the other extreme, Santa Monica, California effectively precludes businesses or investors from operating STRs, limiting STRs to owner-occupants. Hosts are required to live on-site during a rental, must be licensed, and must pay a registration fee and an occupancy tax.

Rockland, ME, a coastal tourist town, created three types of STRs: the first, both owner-occupied single family residences renting out a single room and two-unit properties renting out one unit and occupying the other; and two classes of single or two-unit residences not occupied by their owners. A permit for the first class requires only minimal review. The other two require planning board approval and the total number of units that can be permitted is limited. This approach is consistent with the findings of several studies that the negative effects of STRs on the rental and housing markets are minimal in the case of owner-occupied properties, as distinct from investor-owned ones.

Many cities have approached regulation by limiting the number of days that a property can be listed for rental or actually rented. Others limit the number of renters allowed in a unit or the number of cars permitted to park at or near the unit.

Finally, many towns require registration and compliance with safety requirements.

A detailed study appearing in Management Science recommends against limiting the number of days a site can be rented as dampening tourism without assisting the long term rental or sale markets. The study instead proposes either a flat tax or, preferably, a “convex tax” that imposes a higher rate on expensive units. Such an approach allows less advantaged owners to benefit from rentals and disincentivizes the owners of expensive units (often, second-home or vacation home owners) from short term rentals, as these are the units that are the root cause of the cannibalization of long term rentals and home sales.

All of which brings us to the question: what is happening in New York, in the county and in our towns?

The state Senate has passed a law, as proposed by Senator Michelle Hinchey (D-41st), that would create a registry of STRs, impose basic safety requirements and subject STRs to taxation under state and local laws. The bill has languished in committee at the Assembly for most of 2023. The bill would allow municipal regulation of STRs to continue and would exempt STR operators from state registration if their towns require registration.

The county Board of Supervisors, which has been deferring action in order to see whether and what the state will legislate, is considering whether to impose county-wide regulation.

About half of the county’s towns and villages, and the City of Hudson, have enacted some form of regulation for STRs. Virtually every town and village that has not done so reported to The Columbia Paper that it is actively considering whether and how to regulate.

The regulations in place to date are all relatively new (the earliest were created in 2020) and so their effects are not yet known. They are quite varied, ranging from simple registration laws, to laws that require registration and safety measures, all the way to laws that limit the number of STRs, contain detailed permitting processes, and impose residency requirements. The chart summarizes the laws in place. Note that when a site plan or special use permit is required, a public hearing will be part of the permitting process.