Finance director outlines new state short-term-rental law, options to opt out and next steps for county occupancy-tax administration

Chautauqua County’s director of finance briefed the Audit & Control Committee on new New York State legislation that changes how sales and occupancy taxes apply to short‑term rentals and what choices counties must make under the law.

Kitty Crow, county finance director, told the committee the state now requires booking platforms to collect and remit sales tax on short‑term rentals; that sales-tax collection by platforms began this month and revenue will flow to counties through the state sales-tax distribution. Crow said the county’s portion of that change was roughly estimated in the tentative 2026 budget — about $900,000 of county sales-tax share in staff estimates — and that the change will increase revenue compared with prior treatment where some short-term rentals were exempt from sales tax.

The state law also contains a registry component and places certain collection and code-enforcement responsibilities on counties if they “opt in” to the state framework. Crow said counties may opt out of the state-mandated registry by the statute’s deadline (the county would need to adopt an opting-out resolution by a date set in the law), but that opting out does not relieve a county of its local occupancy‑tax authority or of its ability to administer a local registration system. She warned that the state did not provide a single, statewide registry platform; if counties impose different registry systems, platforms would need to interface with multiple disparate registries — a complexity that could affect compliance and platform willingness to cooperate.

Crow explained the county already has several related efforts under way: a voluntary collection agreement with Airbnb that has the platform collecting occupancy tax on bookings, and a contract with a vendor (Decker Technologies) to implement an online registry and payment portal. She said the county is still evaluating whether to adopt the state’s registry approach or maintain its own locally controlled system and will work with the law department to align local law with the state statute.

Committee members asked for more detail and for a formal recommendation. Crow said staff would prepare a summary of the state law, a clean consolidated version of the county’s local ordinance, and a pro/con analysis of opting in or opting out; she recommended taking more time and planned to return with details in November or December so the legislature could avoid a rushed decision in spring.

Sources: Kitty Crow, Director of Finance; Pierre Shagnon, Chairman of the Legislature; Audit & Control Committee proceedings.