Short-Term Rental Re-Evaluation (G 2-22)

The Planning Commission work sessions have now been completed. All previous meeting information can be found below on this page.

This process has now moved into the next step of taking the proposed amendments to the McMinnville Zoning Ordinance through the public hearing process. 

This part of the process, you can follow on the Short-Term Rental Standards Amendment (G 1-23) page. 

Short-Term Rental Re-Evaluation & Moratorium Timeline

The Planning Commission discussed the neighborhood’s request with planning staff and agreed to recommend a moratorium on short-term rental permits until the City has the opportunity to reevaluate the city regulations for Short-Term Rentals.  

As of July 12, 2022, McMinnville City Council passed a six month moratorium of Short-Term Rentals that will be in effect from September 1, 2022 to December 29, 2022. In this time, the Planning Commission and Planning Department staff will re-evaluated the McMinnville Municipal Code as it pertains to permitting Short-Term Rentals.

The McMinnville City Council hosted a meeting on November 16, 2022 to consider extending the moratorium on the issuance of short-term rental permits from December 29, 2022, to June 29, 2023, to allow more time for the Planning Commission to evaluate the existing code and make some recommendations for code adjustments as applicable. This extension was approved. 

Background

Lodging is represented in many forms in McMinnville.  In commercial zones, lodging is an allowed outright use and does not need any permits.  Any rooms for short-term stays is considered lodging.

In McMinnville’s residential zones (R1, R2, R3, R4 and OR) lodging is allowed in the form of Short-Term Rentals and Resident Occupied Short-Term Rentals.  Both Short-Term Rentals and Resident Occupied Short-Term Rentals are only allowed in single dwelling units.  Short Term Rentals, where the whole house is rented out as lodging - defined as less than a thirty day stay, need to be separated by 200 feet (property line to property line).

Short Term Rental permits have been an active dialogue in McMinnville for many years:  

In 2008, the City approved Ordinance No. 4902, adopting regulations that allowed vacation home rentals in residential zones and the office-residential zone as conditional use permits.  At this time the permit was permanent and a 660-foot buffer from other vacation home rentals was required. 

In 2012, the City removed the spacing buffer between vacation home rentals largely because the Planning Department had not received any complaints about vacation home rentals in the four years since they were initially allowed.

In 2014, the City amended the code to transfer the approval of vacation home rentals from the Planning Commission to the Planning Director.  At this time they became a Type I permit and not a conditional use permit. 

In 2017, a neighborhood approached the Planning Commission about reconsidering the vacation home rental codes as their neighborhood, which was a historic neighborhood in close proximity to the downtown had seen many homes converted to vacation home rentals recently.  The Planning Commission hosted four work sessions and a public hearing and made a recommendation to differentiate between Short Term Rentals where the whole home was rented out as lodging and Resident Occupied Short Term Rentals, where the occupant of the home rented out a room as lodging.  They also recommended to reinstitute a 200-foot spacing buffer between Short Term Rentals.  This recommendation was adopted by Ordinance No. 5047 on April 10, 2018 and became effective on May 10, 2018. 

The City has been approached again to review the regulations for short-term rental permits as some neighborhoods (mostly those that are closest to the downtown) are seeing a lot of homes converted to short-term rentals and people in those neighborhoods feel as though the lack of long-term residential occupants in these homes is detrimental to the neighborhood’s quality of life and sense of community. 

At the same time, planning staff was starting to field many phone calls from people looking for short-term rental opportunities, anecdotally noticing that call volume for this particular permit had increased exponentially in the past two years. 

Current Numbers

Currently there are 68 permitted Short-Term Rentals in residential zones in McMinnville and 29 permitted Resident Occupied Short-Term Rentals.  For perspective, there are approximately 13,000 housing units in McMinnville (including multi-family and housing in commercial zones).  However, most of the Short-Term Rental permits are still in the neighborhoods closest to the downtown, and in the past nine months, 16 Short Term Rental permits were issued, compared to an average of five new permits per year previously. There are three additional pending Short-Term Rental permits applcations as of September 16, 2022 (all submitted prior to the August 2 deadline).

Past Public Meetings

January 19, 2023 - Final Planning Commission Work Session
December 15, 2022 - Planning Commission Work Session
November 16, 2022 - City Council Meeting - Extended Current Moratorium to June 29, 2023
October 20, 2022 - Planning Commission Meeting
September 15, 2022 - Planning Commission Work Session
July 12, 2022 - City Council Meeting - Moratorium Decision

For any further questions regarding the Short Term Rental Re-evaluation, feel free to reach out to the Planning Department directly at planning@mcminnvilleoregon.gov or (503) 434-7311.