If the Malibu Planning Commission had its way, there would be no more vacation rentals in Malibu.
On Monday, Commissioner John Mazza and Vice Chair Steve Uhring, with Chair Chris Marx, voted to recommend to city council a complete ban on the practice of short-term rentals in the city, with Commissioner Jeff Jennings the sole dissenting vote. Commissioner Mikke Pierson did not attend the meeting.
The reasoning behind the ban, according to commissioners, is simply that they never should have existed in the first place.
“Grandfathering? That’s not an issue to me because as far as I’m concerned, nobody has been—and you can call me wrong, but—nobody has been doing business following our laws, now,” Mazza said, “And if you say they have, basically, I don’t think so, because that’s what we’re doing here. We’re trying to come up with a law.”
Later in the meeting, Mazza questioned Assistant City Attorney Trevor Rusin about how Malibu’s laws treat short-term rentals today.
“Does it actually say short-term rental is allowed in residential zones? Does it say that anywhere? Or is that just something staff dreamed up?” Mazza asked.
“You’re dealing with something that’s being wrestled with all across the state,” Rusin replied. “You own a property, you can rent it out on a long-term lease. Everyone assumes that’s allowed. By owning, you can also rent it out long-term. Renting out for a shorter period of time? Is that a different use? Is that different? These are the questions that you’re getting into.” Rusin added the California Coastal Commission considers short-term rentals an “important, visitor-serving use.”
“My question is, do we have to change the law, or is it just because, like everything else in Malibu, we just never enforced anything?” Mazza replied.
Jennings argued that Mazza was looking at the issue from the wrong perspective.
“The attitude is that, if it isn’t permitted, it’s prohibited,” Jennings then said, adding, “In fact, if it’s not prohibited, it’s permitted … it’s not prohibited, so since it’s not affirmatively prohibited, it’s permitted.”
Marx sided with Mazza.
“But commercial use is not permitted in a residential community, and the debate is, is this commercial use or not?” Marx said. “And there you have a split definition where you can call this more like a hotel than a long-term rental, which is a residency.”
Jennings then called for a vote.
“Do we want to put in place a ban on short-term rentals? And if we do, then we can all go home,” he said.
Complaints to City Staff
That vote came after many hours of public comments and remarks of frustration by commissioners, who claim their comments never make it to council members’ ears.
Complaints arose following the proposed short-term rental and dark sky ordinances, which the planning commission discussed at length before staff presented final drafts.
“We spent four-plus hours here last time and there is not a single recommendation that we made that made it into the ordinance,” Uhring said, acknowledging that the council subcommittee made different suggestions but asking, “How does that happen?”
Blue explained how city staff—who are hired—handles comments from the planning commission—appointed but nonelected representatives.
“The primary policy direction comes from the city council, and we drafted an ordinance based around that,” Planning Director Bonnie Blue replied. “A lot of time, staff agrees with the planning commission and sometimes we don’t agree on the way to do things, so what we try to do is stay true to what the city council directed in terms of creating an ordinance and then address the comments and information that the commission provided and asked for.”
“If you’re going to pull stuff out, you’ve got to have a reason to do that,” Uhring replied, later adding, “You’re blowing us off for no reason.”
Marx stated his agreement.
“What’s upsetting to me is this discussion we had for two, three hours—we all spent our evening together working on it—and nothing’s here from it,” Marx said. “I’d rather turn [in a speaker’s slip], sit out there [in the audience] and give my public comment, because I think it would influence more than what we’re doing here.”