Pleas from locals and displaced community members to tackle short-term rentals in West Marin appeared to strike a chord with county supervisors at a workshop on affordable housing Tuesday night.
“I agree that we need to look at short-term rentals…It was very interesting to learn what a big issue that is in West Marin,” said Supervisor Damon Connolly.
Supervisor Kathrin Sears also said that there was “obviously a real crisis in West Marin…I would like to spend a lot more time looking at our short-term rental policies and what we might do to address short-term rentals, in ways that might impact West Marin but also some of our other jurisdictions,” she said.
Short-term rentals were not the focus of the workshop; rather, county staffers, examining the countywide dearth of affordable housing, presented policy options focused on rent stabilization and just-cause for evictions. But the state’s Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act limits rent control to multi-family homes and allows rents to rise to market rate if a tenant vacates.
Kim Thompson, executive director of the Community Land Trust Association of West Marin, said that state law severely limited the impact of rent control on the coast. “We’re inviting you to hear that we need West Marin-specific solutions.”
The workshop represented the third and final in a series that started in October, though it drew the largest showing of housing advocates in West Marin.
“We are recent transplants to Sonoma County because we could not find housing for a family of four in West Marin,” said Maria Niggle, a social worker with the county’s Health and Human Services outpost in Point Reyes Station, who also leads the Latino leadership-advocacy program Abriendo Caminos. “And the housing that we did have was of such low quality that it was becoming a health concern for my children.”
The president of the Bolinas Land Trust, Arianne Dar, said that this past weekend alone, three families lost housing in Bolinas. She noted as well that this year, enrollment at the Bolinas-Stinson Union School District has declined 15 percent.
“I think in West Marin, we can redefine ‘NIMBY’ to mean ‘needed in Marin’s back yard,’” said Mark Switzer, the manager of the E.A.H. housing in Point Reyes Station, calling the situation “desperate.”
County staff also recommended renter-protection measures, such as incentivizing landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers. At previous workshops they recommended other measures, such as reducing fees or restrictions on second units. The board took no action on Tuesday.