EAGLE HARBOR TOWNSHIP — The Eagle Harbor Township Board Thursday conducted a public hearing on a draft ordinance that has become controversial within the township and is raising concern in other townships in Keweenaw County. The hearing produced few supporters of the ordinance.

At issue is a draft of a Short Term Rental Ordinance that, if adopted, would restrict the number of short-term rentals in the township, as well as regulating those that already exist. The introductory statement at the top of Ordinance No. 2022-01, which was drafted on Jan. 27, 2022, states:

“The township wishes to preserve and maintain the residential community and participatory nature of Eagle Harbor Township, while balancing personal rights and responsibilities with community rights and responsibilities. It is the intent of the Eagle Harbor Township Short Term Rental Ordinance to make Short Term Rental activity permitted by this ordinance compatible with the existing and traditional residential uses made by resident owners and lessees.”

Township Supervisor Rich Probst said that the public hearing was optional but that the Board felt that it is important to receive input on the draft ordinance.

“And to let you know,” he said, “if we wanted to pass this thing quickly through, we would have already done it. But we felt this was too important to just run this through and we wanted to make sure we got public comment on it.”

The topic of STRs is becoming increasingly contentious, Probst said, not just in the Keweenaw, but nationwide and statewide.

“And rightly so,” he continued, “because we’re talking about personal property rights, and that’s for the people that want to rent houses and for the people that just want to live in and stay in their houses.”

Carol Bogart, township resident and STR owner, and one of the organizers of the focus group that drafted the ordinance, said that some people in the township have been “casting aspersions” on that Board, the Township Planning Commission, and “all of us” who have contributed to the drafting of the ordinance as “sneaking around in the dark of night, under the cloak of darkness, to draft a short-term rental ordinance; that the goal was to knee cap the competition.”

Nothing could be further from the truth, said Bogart, as everything has been transparent, meetings have been open and minutes published and there have been no attempts to exclude anyone from the process.

“As for the draft of the STR Ordinance,” she said, “it is just that: a draft — a working draft.”

The opening statement (above), she said is good. The process was started, she said, in order to prevent future problems, adding that the input from many who voiced their opinion that they do not want Eagle Harbor to become mainly a resort community like Copper Harbor.

“Are we trying to stifle competition?” she asked. “No. Not at all. We do, however, recommend common sense development with our residents in mind.”

Among other items, the draft ordinance would limit the number of STRs to 10% of the dwellings in the township. Currently, the percentage is 7%. The ordinance would also regulate occupancy, as well as regulating STR permitting, distances between STRs, advertising, and would also limit the number of STR permits any owner can have at one time and all STRs would be subject to inspection by enforcement officers or “any official appointed by the Eagle Harbor Township board.”

The ordinance, states the draft, shall take effect 30 days after the publication date thereof in the Daily Mining Gazette. The draft ordinance can be found at file:///Users/reporter3/Downloads/DRAFT_STR_Ord_01272022.pdf

Sam Raymond, also an STR owner as well as a township resident and founder and owner of Keweenaw Adventure Company, in Copper Harbor, said that in addition to being a five-star super host on Air B and B, with several short-term rentals in both Eagle Harbor and Grant townships, that had this ordinance been in place when his family decided to start renting his father’s Eagle Harbor cottage, his father would have lost the property.

“The insurance and the taxes were a financial burden,” said Raymond, “and he wanted to keep the cottage in the family as an inheritance and a legacy, and it was difficult to justify keeping it.”

Fortunately, the solution to this not uncommon debacle, Raymond said, came by converting the family cottage to an STR. The STR, he said, is not only covering the general cost and upkeep of the cottage, but it is also providing supplemental income to his elderly father.

While the Raymond family is in favor of an STR ordinance to track and address legitimate issues that may arise on a case-by-case basis, they are in opposition to the blanket, one-size fits all draft ordinance that presents itself as a violation of property owners’ rights.

“Frankly,” he said, “it is condescending to STR owners, unreasonably restrictive and arguably discriminatory.”