VACATION RENTAL COMPROMISE IS PROMISING

For more than six years, a series of city leaders have wasted their breath and everyone’s time trying to find a compromise over how to regulate San Diego’s estimated 13,000 short-term vacation rentals.

Rental supporters include owners who rely on the income they provide; people who prefer the oftenaffordable units to hotels; people who see their value in the new digital economy; and nearby business owners and workers who welcome and depend on visitor spending. Their value is easily articulated.

But critics include neighbors who hate the parties, parking, noise, trash and sometimes even violence that accompanies too many of these units; people who think police and code enforcement officers don’t do enough to prevent such neighborhood nuisances; people who believe the rentals’ rapid growth takes housing stock off the market during a housing crisis; and people who wonder why the city has never enforced a law that categorizes such rentals as illegal. These sins are easily articulated, too.

Nevertheless, The San Diego Union-tribune Editorial Board backs a mend it, don’t end it approach. We repeat that now to say a compromise proposed by City Council President Jennifer Campbell and unanimously endorsed by the city Planning Commission last year has potential, especially if paired with robust code and law enforcement.

Campbell’s proposal would cut in half the number of homes that could be fully rented out for shortterm stays of less than 30 days without an owner or resident on the site. Such rentals would have a twoday minimum. Of the approximately 6,500 such units citywide, 1,100 would be in Mission Beach, which for decades has been a hot spot for shortterm rentals. Outside of Mission Beach, such rentals would be limited to 1 percent of the city’s 540,000plus housing units. Licenses for the rentals would be assigned via a lottery, with a limit of one per person. The law would take effect Jan. 1, 2022.

The proposed ordinance has the support of Expedia, owners of the Homeaway and VRBO homesharing sites, and Unite Here Local 30, the union that represents hotel workers. On Friday, Airbnb also announced its support after previously seeking a higher number of rentals. Campbell, who is facing a recall campaign in part because of her proposal, deserves praise for building this coalition.

Substantial questions linger. The decision to carve out Mission Beach units amounts to a recognition that the city would face “takings clause” lawsuits if it devalued property by banning owners from continuing with rentals — a daunting threat that is among the reasons the city has never enforced a law banning short-term rentals. But such lawsuits could also be filed by owners of units elsewhere in the city who have rented out for years.

For now, the biggest questions involve who would get rental licenses. Can the city hold a fair lottery to allocate them? Should the council do as some suggest and divide the 5,400 units outside Mission Beach by council district for equity? Should it do as Airbnb suggests and award owners with histories of responsible oversight and management?

The City Council should carefully consider these issues with input from Mayor Todd Gloria and members of the public. But not everyone will be happy, and Tuesday’s council hearing on rentals should end with support, at last, for a new policy.