NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — A councilor's effort to streamline a controversial short-term rental ordinance came to naught on Tuesday when it was sent back to committee.

 

Councilor Ashley Shade's stripped-down ordinance would have required only two things — registration and an inspection of any units that were not owner occupied.  

 

"This wouldn't be a complete ordinance. It would be something that would continue to be worked on by the administration to expand upon that," she said. "But these two particular points I felt we shouldn't wait on."

 

The original and lengthy ordinance has been debated and amended over the past two years and finally sent to the mayor's office for a joint conference on Friday with General Government Committee Chairman Wayne Wilkinson and Building Inspector William Meranti. 

 

They and Mayor Jennifer Macksey are hoping to wrestle the six-page document into something that will address the building code issues Meranti has raised and still be workable for STR owners. 

 

Her fellow councilors felt it "was putting the cart before the horse," in Councilor Peter Oleskiewicz's words, pointing to the already planned meeting. 

 

Shade said there should be some urgency with the tourist season starting up and that the shortened ordinance could be put in place while a more extensive version is hammered out. 

 

"These are the two main points that everyone has agreed that are necessary, that these are two things that we need to accomplish with the ordinance," she said. "The other fine details can still be worked out."

 

She had brought up the potential for an abbreviated version of the ordinance at the last General Government Committee meeting. It was referred to as being "recommended" but the committee took no vote on her proposal and Wilkinson said she could submit it to the council if she wished. 

 

On Tuesday, he said he could not remember an ordinance being place on the floor and voted a second reading without any real discussion. 

 

"I know Councilor Shade is very interested in moving this along, as I am also. It's kind of redundant to what we are going to discuss on Friday," he said. "I'm not in favor of it being voted on this evening. I would be in favor of sending it back to committee, the General Government, where we can add it to the discussion, but to be quite honest with you, it's already in the discussion."

 

He said he was not comfortable in circumventing the process.

 

Councilor Marie T. Harpin said she appreciated Shade's push to get it completed quickly and concisely, but thought it might cause confusion. 

 

"If we're going to send out two different ordinances, one first and then another one shortly after, it could cause quite a bit of confusion out there as to what is the ordinance and how come it says this at one time in May and then it changed again in August," she said. 

 

Shade said she thought it important to get something in ordinance now. 

 

"My goal at this was to introduce this now so at the very least the registration and the [certificate of compliance], the safety requirements, were in place by June," Shade said. "If we waited until the next meeting ... we're likely to not even have the ordinance fully in place until possibly mid to late summer because of the requirements by law to go through readings."

 

Councilor Keith Bona said it was unknown how many short-term rentals existed in the city and it might be impossible for the inspection department to register and inspect units in a short period. Some cities had rolled out their ordinances giving unit owners and inspectors six months to a year to come into compliance. 

 

Councilor Jennifer Barbeau said her understanding was that the building inspector could not issue a CC for a short-term rental without an ordinance giving him that authority. 

 

"I could again be not understanding but I have heard him say that probably 500 times," she said. "That's the challenge for me."

 

Council President Lisa Blackmer said the matter was probably moot because anyone coming for Solid Sound in May and graduations, and summer vacations, had likely already made their reservations.

 

Shade said she could read the room and offered to withdraw and file but Blackmer suggested referring to General Government to include in Friday's conversations. 

 

"We'll include it for sure," said Wilkinson.