‘We’ve regulated ourselves to death’: Lawmakers strip cities’ power over Airbnbs

BOISE (Idaho Statesman) — A bill designed to slash regulations on short-term rentals is heading to Gov. Brad Little’s desk despite concerns from opponents around how unfettered Airbnbs could affect neighborhoods around Idaho.

The state Senate on Monday advanced a House proposal demanding that cities and counties treat short-term rentals like any other homes, stripping almost all local requirements for inspections, parking, fire safety and licensing.

“This has been worked on the past three years, and I think this bill gets it right,” cosponsor Rep. Jordan Redman, R-Coeur d’Alene, said during debate on the House floor in February. “We’ve seen cities in this state regulate short-term rentals so significantly that they effectively ban them. This is about protecting Idahoans’ private property rights.”

House Bill 583 bolsters a 2017 law generally barring cities from passing laws to limit short-term rentals like Airbnbs and VRBOs. The original law allows local regulations only to “safeguard public health, safety and general welfare.” Since then Airbnb advocates claim that some cities — particularly those in tourist-heavy areas — have implemented de facto bans through burdensome requirements and expensive demands under the guise of public health.

“The message of that (2017) act is pretty clear: These uses are important to our state,” said Sen. Todd Lakey, R-Nampa, who brought the house bill to the Senate, during debate on Monday. “You’re to treat [short-term rentals] the same as any other residential use, and you’re not to treat them differently. A number of cities did not get that message, or did not like that message.”

Opponents, including the Association of Idaho Cities, still don’t like it. They’re worried the bill could undermine residential zones and deny cities the tools they need to confront problems at rentals if they arise.

The new language targets nearly every angle cities have found to work around state law and leaves the barest features of public safety behind. Cities can, but don’t have to, require smoke detectors, carbon monoxide alarms and fire extinguishers. They can also require the owner to provide portable egress ladders and a diagram of the home with exits, fire extinguishers and first-aid kits marked for renters. And they can limit the capacity of a home to whatever the building code states it would be if it were occupied by full-time residents.

Requiring major changes — particularly any that would require significant money — would be expressly banned. That outlaws modifications to the home itself, including extra parking or sewer capacity, fire sprinklers, additional entrances or exits, or upgrades to meet current building codes. The bill also bans administrative requirements like licensing, inspection, additional insurance thresholds, professional management mandates and conditional-use permits. Caps on the number of short-term rentals, as well as any limits on their concentration or rules around owner-occupancy, would be banned.

“We’ve regulated ourselves to death,” said Rep. Dale Hawkins, R-Fernwood. “Let people who own land do what they want to on that land.”

The bill, which strips power from local governments in favor of state law, gave some conservative lawmakers pause. But most reached a consensus that cities and counties had put too many restrictions in place.

“We talk a lot about local control here,” Redman said. “The local-est control is the property owner.”

Sen. Mark Harris’ district includes the resort town of Lava Hot Springs in Eastern Idaho — “ground zero” for the state’s debate over short-term rentals, he said. The city had some of the strongest restrictions in the state, more or less treating Airbnbs like any other business until the Idaho Supreme Court struck down aspects of its ordinance in 2025. Harris voted for original law in 2017 but said Monday that the strengthening legislation took too much from cities looking to keep workers nearby.

“To me, the pendulum has swung too far to the other side,” he said.

Harris pointed to Teton County on the Wyoming border, a recreation hotspot and one of the most expensive places in Idaho.

“It’s too expensive for normal people to live there,” he said. “The nearest sheriff’s deputy lives 45 minutes away. School teachers can’t afford to be there. Is this a product of short-term rentals? I don’t know — but it doesn’t help.”

His prediction: “This issue is going to come back.”

Rep. Steve Berch, D-Boise, sees a similar “imbalance” in property rights under Redman’s bill.

Birch represents a chunk of the Boise Bench that he described as largely residential. He’s worried that the legislation eliminates protections for the “integrity” of a neighborhood, which Redman said is a common pretext for adopting local rules against short-term rentals. A neighborhood, he argued during February’s floor debate, could turn into a “quasi-business district” if checks on Airbnbs are removed. For Berch, who voted against advancing House Bill 583 in the House Business Committee, the changes would “put a thumb on the scale” in favor of people who want to use a home for business purposes.

“In fact, these short-term rentals are a business,” he said. “If it wasn’t a business, it wouldn’t have been sent before the Business Committee.”

That irony wasn’t lost on the Association of Idaho Cities. The group, which advocates for and lobbies on behalf of municipalities, opposed Redman’s bill.

Short-term rentals “are being operated to generate income, often with frequent guest turnover, and they can create impacts that look very different from a traditional long-term residence or even long-term rentals,” association Deputy Director Jonathan Wheatley told the Idaho Statesman in an email. “That is exactly why cities had been concerned with having at least basic tools to identify where they were operating and who to contact when problems arose.”

Though Wheatley’s group lobbied against the bill, it isn’t totally opposed to rolling back restrictions on rentals. The association supported Senate Bill 1263, a separate vision that would peel back some rules but still let cities mandate licenses and require property owners to designate a local contact in case trouble arises.

“That was especially important because short-term rental issues were often time sensitive and neighborhood-based,” Wheatley said. “Noise complaints, parking conflicts, trash, overcrowding, and late-night disturbances were typically resolved fastest when there was a clear point of contact who could respond quickly. S1263 had provided that pathway. … H583 had moved in the opposite direction by taking away the basic tools that made that accountability possible.”

Now he worries that conflicts will end up falling to police, straining local resources.

Printed in early February, the Senate bill has languished in committee and not reached the main floor.

On Monday, the Idaho Vacation Rental Association lauded the Senate vote for clarifying “the treatment of short-term rentals as a lawful residential use.”

“This legislation does not remove local tools or diminish community protections,” President Spencer K. Bailey said in a press release. “What it does is reinforce the idea that existing rules should be applied consistently across housing types, focusing enforcement on behavior rather than labeling one category of homeowner differently from another.”

Bailey’s group was not registered as a lobbyist on the bill, but 20 lobbyists representing 11 organizations worked on the legislation, according to state records. Those included lobbyists for Airbnb, Inc. and Idaho Realtors, who backed the legislation.

Short-term rentals are a popular enterprise among lawmakers, too: Across both chambers, some 20 lawmakers declared business entanglements with short-term rental properties, either as owners, managers or contractors working on rentals.

“Idaho has an opportunity to lead with thoughtful policy that respects homeowners while protecting the character of our communities,” Bailey said. “We remain committed to working with policymakers and local leaders to ensure that balance continues.”