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Mil Creek staff outlines rental registration framework; council raises legal and capacity questions
Summary
City staff proposed a rental protection ordinance to register long-term and short-term rentals, generate housing data and fund code enforcement. Council members expressed interest but raised constitutional, inspection, capacity and fee-burden concerns and asked staff and legal counsel to further vet implementation.
City staff presented a concept for a Rental Protection Ordinance (RPO) at the May 12 council workshop that would register long-term rental units, create a database of rental properties and landlords, and provide a stable fee-funded revenue source to support code enforcement.
Director Jeff Ryan told council the city contains about 9,224 housing units, of which roughly 3,685 are renter-occupied (about 40%), citing the county and the 2024 American Community Survey. Staff said registration would require annual business-licensing-style registration for long-term rentals, and a separate regime for short-term rentals (short-term rentals would be inspected annually and could be required to post registration). The presentation outlined a three-year catch-basin construction program and other staff capacity needs as background context for program costs and resources.
Staff presented sample fee scenarios (per-property and per-unit fees) and modeled how other cities’ fee structures would scale to Mil Creek’s stock. Depending on fee levels, modeled annual revenue ranged from tens of thousands up to approximately $133,000 under higher-fee scenarios that were derived from comparators. Staff suggested typical per-unit fees in the $16–$20 range could fund a dedicated code-enforcement position and program administration while minimizing per-unit cost to tenants.
Councilors and the city attorney (Terry) probed inspection authority, enforcement tools, and constitutional limits. Terry cautioned that requiring municipal inspection access to private dwellings raises legal issues and that an ordinance would need careful drafting; some programs use landlord-arranged inspections, third-party licensed inspectors or condition enforcement on business-license compliance. Council members emphasized capacity questions—whether the city would add staff and how the program would affect existing code-enforcement workloads—and whether fees would disproportionately burden renters. Several members favored regulating short-term rentals (Airbnb/VBRO) as businesses while taking a cautious approach to mandatory interior inspections for long-term rentals.
No ordinance was adopted. Staff proposed further legal review and a follow-up workshop focused on code-enforcement staffing, a detailed fee proposal and the draft ordinance.
