I’m sure you’ve all heard about the tragic death of an 18 year old at a birthday party at an Airbnb rental in Bath Township on November 3rd. I know we have a number of these short term rentals in Ward 8, one in particular that has been the site of numerous parties. After receiving another call from a neighbor about this home, I started researching Akrons’s code of ordinances on short term rentals to see if it has safeguards built in to prevent a similar tragedy in Akron. ( I’ve got a link to the code on my cell phone).
Section 37, item 111.620 lists a number of regulations including that annual registration of all short term rentals is required, and a responsible person must be available 24/7 . The home I referenced above is owned by someone in Hawaii so you can see the importance of the local contact. While there’s other requirements, such as licensing fees in addition to the rental registration, what concerns me is if any of these are actually being enforced.
I brought this up publicly at the end of last Monday’s Council Meeting asking if we are aware of all their locations and asked if our 911 Dispatchers have these addresses in their databases. Are we collecting the $250 yearly license fees and are we seeing tax any revenue on the rentals? I asked that Housing, Zoning, Licensing, Finance, Law and the Administration get together to take a closer look at item 37 to make sure we’re protecting our neighborhoods. Mayor Malik acknowledged after the meeting that they will be doing this soon.