The town of Oneonta’s short-term rental committee has suggested capping the type of “investment” property in the town.
The group presented a recommendation at the Town Board’s Wednesday, Oct. 14 meeting to cap investment short-term rentals at 3.5% of the town’s total residential housing stock, with old approvals grandfathered in and with some exemptions.
Chaired by Deputy Supervisor Trish Riddell Kent, R, the committee was facilitated by former Otsego County Planning Director Diane Carlton and composed of then Board member Teresa DeSantis, some town Planning Board members and others.
“I feel like we’ve really done our due diligence now,” Riddell Kent said Friday, Oct. 16. She said the committee focused on finding a balance and worked collaboratively, reaching several compromises.
The ad hoc committee began meeting and collecting data in March. It built off a prior effort from 2025, for which then Board member Kim Fierke presented results in the fall.
Carlton said the latest U.S. Census data showed 2,286 housing units in the town, and said the committee identified 101 active short-term rentals.
With a 3.5% cap, the limit would be about 80 short-term rentals — meaning if the Town Board were to enact it, no additional investment short-term rentals could be approved by the Planning Board until the short-term rental quantity decreases and or housing stock increases.
Carlton said the cap was “astronomically, the most important thing” in the recommendations, as well as the exemptions.
Under the recommendations, investment short-term rentals are properties used for the purpose of short-term renting, while “non-investment” short-term rentals would be the owner’s primary residence. The committee suggested eight-year exemptions from the cap for new residential construction and repaired dilapidated homes.
Members of the committee said the measures could incentivize growing the town’s overall housing stock and direct the economic benefits of short-term rentals to locals while allowing developers to recoup their expenses.
“We originally only wanted five years,” Carlton said, but the group compromised.
The committee recommended setting a 250-foot barrier between property lines of short-term rentals, also with the exemptions, to reduce clustering of rentals.
Some short-term rental owners the committee heard from were strongly opposed to any regulation, while other residents were upset by the changing character of their neighborhoods and difficulty in finding residential housing, Riddell Kent said.
“It’s not that we want to stop” short-term rentals, she said. “We just don’t want it to get out of hand.”
Riddell Kent said she did not want short-term rentals to overrun the West End and that the town “cannot ignore the outcry from (Oneonta) residents” about the increase in short-term rentals. She said most of the residents the committee heard from were supportive of regulating short-term rentals.
The Town Board’s Legislative Committee is expected to further discuss the recommendations.
“Hopefully (the Town Board) will take these recommendations and work with the town attorney to codify” them into law, Carlton said.