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The land use code currently used by the town and village dates back to 2011. Kilburn Politi said it is common for this to be amended every few years. Some of the changes are simply a reflection of changing technology — the 2011 land use code references lighting with foot-candles, but the unit commonly used for LED lights is lumens.

The amendments to the code are being discussed by a subcommittee of the town’s development commission. The subcommittee has nine people who meet regularly to discuss changes to the code, which they plan to roll out in two parts. Any change will require a public hearing, so interested community members can expect opportunities to weigh in on the code amendments around May or June, Kilburn Politi said.

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New conditional uses

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The committee is recommending adding two types of conditional uses to the land use code. The first is temporary workforce housing. In a presentation to the town council earlier this month, Kilburn Politi explained that in neighborhoods where short-term rentals are no longer allowed, there has been a trend of people investing in properties to house temporary workers.

Village Deputy Mayor Jackie Kelly said many of these workers seem to be J-1 visa students who are staying for less than six months. Many of them work downtown and need to live in nearby neighborhoods. Kilburn Politi said while she doesn’t believe most of these houses are overcrowded, they do seem to be housing multiple people per bedroom.

“In trying to keep the occupants of this new type of housing that we’re seeing — health and safety, of course, is foremost in our mind,” Kelly said. “Giving them a safe place to stay and having a little bit of jurisdiction over that.”

To determine the proper number of temporary workforce housing units, Kilburn Politi said they will be working closely with the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism and with employers who rely on temporary workers to give insight into the current housing needs.

The committee also plans to add a conditional use for special event venues. This is based on a couple of situations the town has dealt with as a few properties have been hosting events such as weddings in areas classified as “rural countryside.” The properties in question happened to be STRs and the town was able to ask the owners to limit their gatherings to small groups because of the terms of their permits. However, if they hadn’t been registered STRs, it would have been more difficult for the town to enforce, Kilburn Politi said.

In both of these cases, the argument for a new conditional use is the same. Defining a specific conditional use is a necessary step to regulating certain types of properties and uses, village and town officials argue. This is similar to what they faced when the popularity of STRs began to rise around 2020.

Although the specifics of what each permit would look like are yet to be determined, the intention is to limit the number allowed for each conditional use. Since property owners would also need to periodically reapply for permits, there would be an enforcement mechanism if problems arose, such as neighbor complaints about noise or trash.

“As long as you’re tying something to a permit, you have a lot more teeth in it,” Kilburn Politi said during her presentation earlier this month.

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STRs and other changes

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When the town banned the use of accessory dwellings for “transient rentals” (a term for what is now referred to as a short-term rental) in 2011, Kilburn Politi said the intention was to encourage the creation of more long-term rentals. However, this has simply not been the case. According to building department data, only two long-term rentals were created from accessory dwelling units.

Instead, Kilburn Politi said they have heard from numerous people that the ability to host STRs in their accessory dwelling units — such as extra apartments over garages — would be a useful way for people to afford home ownership. With the new amendments, the committee plans to change the code to allow STRs in these types of units.

“All the good intentions that were meant in the 2011 code just didn’t come through,” she said. “So maybe this is another opportunity where we’re helping the local person by allowing them to generate some more income.”

In addition to more technical changes based on things like technology, there are some other smaller changes. The committee plans to repeal the whole section in the code that addresses election signage. They’ve been advised, based on numerous court precedents, that this signage is protected as free speech and they are therefore unable to enforce any rules addressing it.