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Belton staff recommends consultant to find unregistered short-term rentals, improve tax collection
Summary
Staff reported 20 active STR permits, identified payment delinquencies and recommended hiring a third-party vendor to locate unregistered listings and improve hotel-occupancy tax compliance; council directed staff to explore options including county coordination.
City staff told the council that Belton has 20 active short-term rental permits and that some operators are delinquent on hotel-occupancy taxes and permit renewals. Staff displayed a map of permitted locations and described the challenge of identifying unregistered listings across dozens of booking platforms (Airbnb, VRBO and many others), noting that platform remittance to Belton is not automatic in many cases.
Because discovery and enforcement are time-consuming for city staff, the presentation recommended hiring a consultant or vendor to help identify unregistered STRs, bring them into compliance and improve collection of hotel-occupancy taxes; staff noted several local governments have outsourced this work. Council discussed whether Belton could participate with Bell County’s procurement or piggyback on a county contract; staff said discussions with the county are already underway.
Staff said about four existing permitted properties were struggling with renewals because of unpaid taxes and that platform-host misunderstandings are common: some hosts expect platforms to remit taxes to the city. The council encouraged exploring county coordination and vendor demos and asked staff to return with cost estimates.
What happens next: staff will evaluate consultant options, explore county participation and return with proposals for council consideration. No new regulation was adopted at this meeting.
