The Summit County Board of County Commissioners will be doing their final reading of their STR ordinance on February 15, 2023.

There is information in this article on how you can provide comments or participate on that day.

Background and Updates

The Summit County Board of County Commissioners completed their first reading of their STR ordinance on January 24, 2023. Here is the email that I sent to them prior to the meeting:

Dear BOCC:

I have previously provided my input regarding attrition time to absorb the overage of STR licenses per your suggested caps by looking at past sales activity.

The estimated wait time for a STR license in each basin using 2022 sales numbers is as follows:

Lower Blue Basin (Wildernest and Silverthorne) – 6.33 years
Snake River Basin (Dillon Valley and Summit Cove) – 17.21 years
Ten Mile Basin (Frisco) – 21.75 years
Upper Blue Basin (Breckenridge Area) – 7.19 years

After providing this information to you in November, an additional column was added to your chart where your predictions for license wait time were added. Your chart indicates either 2025 for Lower and Upper Blue Basins or 2030 for Snake River and Ten Mile Basins. Your much lower numbers are apparently based upon predictions of people just giving up their licenses using past history as the guide. What I notice is that my timelines are 2-4 times longer than your predictions. As I mentioned in the Countywide Planning Commission meeting, if wait times are an important factor in your regulations, and they certainly should be, you really need to dig into these numbers. If people hold on to their licenses because of your restrictions, you are essentially restricting people in the Ten Mile Basin, i.e., unincorporated Frisco, from getting a STR license for almost 22 years! That’s crazy.

 

The application of your chosen caps affects different basins in very different manners. This is an arbitrary and capricious decision not based in fact or methodology, but based on feelings and guesses.

 

Here are some quotes from the SDN from October 20, 2022:

Potter reported that the basins chose the percentages through debate, discussion and an ultimate consensus.

That process, however, made commissioners weary.

“I think that’s what we were trying to avoid this whole time — is picking a number that felt right. Because if that’s the case, I have lots of opinions on what I felt like it should be, but we didn’t go down that road,” Lawrence said.

 

Pogue agreed that a more thorough strategy should be used to find that perfect number and said she would like to hold out for a more concrete methodology. Blanchard asked questions about whether or not infrastructure, budget, or enforcement went into determining the percentage.

 

Potter ultimately admits that you will be accused of choosing a number based on what feels right:

 

“I think one of the things that we might ultimately have to accept is there is no perfect methodology that we’re going to get to,” Potter said. “In some way, shape or form, there will be accusations of taking a number in terms of what felt right.”

 

Well, that’s certainly how it appears to me and to many of my clients. With such a HUGE disparity on how the caps will affect different properties in your jurisdiction, you aren’t basing your decision on a methodology or strategy, it’s just a guess and that is not good governance.

 

The STR license caps have negatively affected the real estate market in areas where you have instituted the moratorium. I previously shared that hundreds of millions of dollars, if not over one billion dollars of value will be lost due to your regulations. Most property owners do not live here and do not get to vote for or against you. While you think you are helping the community, the unintended consequences of your actions will ultimately prove how our community relies heavily on the real estate and STR industries.

 

Finally, your preferential treatment of licensing for primary homeowners is arguably a violation of the Dormant Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. 

Sincerely,
Amy Nakos

Here is a video I created to discuss the BOCC’s latest move

On January 31, 2023, the BOCC had another work session without public comments. Here is a link to their agenda.

In this meeting they decided to up the 26 maximum bookings to 30 bookings as they felt is was more in line with their 135 night maximum that they established earlier. They also are holding off on approving the Type III license and will revisit likely at the end of this year.

Final Reading February 15th

The final reading is February 15, 2023.

9:30 AM – 10:30 AM
208 Lincoln Ave
BOCC Hearing Room
3rd Floor, Breckenridge, CO 80424

Public comments will be taken at 9:30 am. Public comments will be taken about short-term rentals and are limited to 2 minutes per person.

Attend and provide public comments and invite others to join you at the Special Public Hearing by the Board of County Commissioners. After this meeting, the BOCC will be deciding whether or not to adopt its proposed ordinance – very important meeting!

In-person Attendance is Highly Encouraged!

Zoom registration: Click this link to join the meeting via Zoom.

Other Ways to Participate and Share Your Input

Sign a Petition

If you are interested in signing a petition against these regulations, click here.

Email Comments

Email comments to the Board of County Commissioners (be sure to identify the street, subdivision or address for context):

Josh.Blanchard@summitcountyco.gov
Tamara.Pogue@summitcountyco.gov
Elisabeth.Lawrence@summitcountyco.gov

Share with Colorado Representatives

Copy or forward your correspondence also to Colorado State Representative and Colorado House Speaker, Julie.Mccluskie and remind these state representatives what is happening in their jurisdiction of Summit County. If you live in Colorado, include any other state representatives and senators you know.

Julie.Mccluskie | Julie.Mccluskie.house@coleg.gov | 303.866.2952

Submit Editorial Comments

If you have not already, please submit editorial comments to these local newspaper publications and kindly request they be published before February 15:

Denver Post: They must be less than 250 words. openforum@denverpost.com. For details, see their link: Submit a letter to the editor – The Denver Post
Summit Daily. They must be less than 300 words (also a good goal for staying under 2 minutes with talking points, too). Request your editorial be published prior to February 15. Submit your letters to the editors via email to: letters@summitdaily.com. For details see their link: Letters to the editor | SummitDaily.com.