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Council amends city transient-occupancy code to align with state law; Airbnb to provide booking data
Summary
City council amended the transient-occupancy tax ordinance to match changes made by the General Assembly, requiring online intermediaries to provide addresses and gross receipts to the commissioner while easing monthly filing requirements for hosts who use intermediaries.
Charlottesville council adopted changes to the city’s transient-occupancy tax code to align local rules with 2025 amendments to state law and to receive improved booking data from online intermediaries such as Airbnb.
Todd Dijkers, city attorney’s office representative, explained the Commonwealth’s legislative changes and said Airbnb and other intermediaries agreed to provide address-level booking data and gross-receipt reports to local tax officials in exchange for a streamlined annual attestation process for hosts who book exclusively through an intermediary. Dijkers said the change is principally administrative: intermediaries already collect and remit most transient-occupancy taxes, and the new rule reduces repetitive 0 returns filed by hosts while giving the city a data feed to reconcile jurisdictional taxes and identify missed registrations.
Dijkers noted privacy constraints in state law updates (section 58.1‑3) that restrict sharing taxpayer data — meaning revenue data provided to the commissioner will be protected and not broadly published; staff said the change primarily improves transparency and auditing ability for the commissioners of the revenue and allows detection of rentals operating in other jurisdictions.
Council voted to adopt the ordinance amendment on a voice vote; the measure passed unanimously.
