BCPOA commissioned the following analysis of the June 13 version of the proposed Short Term / Accessory Dwelling rental amendment from Erin Arnold, former deputy county attorney for planning matters.
A few things have changed in the latest version, but many of the issues remain.
The Planning Department has posted Staff Reports for the revised Short Term Rental/Accessory Dwelling Rental amendment proposed by the BC Property Rights Coalition. Copies follow below. The hearing will be on Dec. 12th, and the agenda is posted at https://media.avcaptureall.cloud/meeting/8ab2ba61-929f-4704-b2bc-460786bbb44b
The first document is the revised amendment itself, with analysis by planning staff, as well as the letter of submission from the coalition and a lot of historical material. The second document is the staff response to the proposal to continue this application for a few more months, which they oppose.
Normally comment should be directed to planning@gallatin.mt.gov, but in this instance you can send your letter straight to the Planning Director, at
The following table is a quick-reference for comparison of three options:
The following is an excerpt from the 2017 Zoning Advisory Committee public meeting on Short Term Rentals. It’s an AI transcript, so a few words may be off, but the essence is correct I think.
I haven’t cross-checked who’s speaking here, but presumably some combination of Richard Lyon and Tom Fiddaman (Zoning Advisory Committee members and BCPOA directors) and Chris Scott and Randy Johnson (Planning Department staff supporting the zoning update).
But at the same time, since we do have a conditional use permit for Bed&Breakfasts, which you trouble to obtain at one time, there’s some value, I think, having a level playing field for various kinds of accommodations. So you don’t have to serve it. The bootleg layer and a license later competing with one. You’re suggesting that any short-term rentals should fall under conditional use requirement? Well, that’s one proposal. The majority of the draft, for example, is to make a conditional use permit. So that takes us to the options. So maybe I should have covered that for a quick moment at this time.
So at the moment, short-term rentals are in a legal gray area because they’re not a listed use in the canyon. And the way the zoning works is that each district designates uses that are allowed within it. You know, so you can have single family residents and agricultural operations and whatever else. And then there are maybe additional conditional uses for which you need a permit required hearing. So the matter of right uses, you can just go get a land use permit or any other permit at all. You just do it and there’s no remaining standards, but there’s certain knowing components of that. Next there is a conditional use permit. To get that, you need to meet whatever standards are set and then get a permit through a hearing. And the nice thing about that is it creates some visibility of what’s happening and gives neighbors an opportunity to comment on the permit. And the commission can impose additional conditions, you know, restrictions on hours of operation or whatever they think it takes for them to negate impacts on neighbors.
And then anything else is that’s not listed is implicitly forbidden except that maybe similar enough to an existing to a list of use that you get what’s called finding similar use and get permitted that way. So cell towers could come in by finding similar use to a microwave tower. No one has actually done that for a short term rental. So they’re not mentioned, no one to obtain a similar use finding, but it’s not good. They wouldn’t get one if they asked for it.
And to our knowledge, no one has complained about one. That’s right. I was going to follow up with that. I made sure to ask our code enforcers as well. Whether or not we’ve even received a complaint of a short term rent. Yeah, Nicole Olmsted of code enforcement, we haven’t. Other than one that was it was a tourist license that was through environmental health. And I think it was a matter of getting them to get that, but nothing related to zoning. Right. Yeah. So there’s in if you read through the comments that I compiled, there’s a little bit grumbling about things that have happened. But no one has actually filed a zoning complaint over short term rent. And there are typically a dozen or so on VRBO and Airbnb and other places.
So options. We could just be silent on this and continue to ignore it until it’s an easier issue. We felt like that was kind of an abrogation of our responsibilities as the advisory board. We have a session for everyone around the other. So the legal limbo doesn’t continue. We could allow short term rentals without any additional standards or regulation. We could allow it and require a permit, which would at least create some visibility on what’s going on. And I could be either a land use permit, which you can think of going out and filling out a form or could be a additional use permit that they could hear. And consent some standards. And finally, simply, they are [banned] outright, which is what Hebgen Lake have done, except in a commercial district.
Subsequent to this meeting, the Zoning Advisory Committee drafted a fairly permissive STR standard, which became Section 15.16 of the draft General Standards by 2018. BCPOA supported the draft through the 2021 zoning update (and objected when it was not included). If you read the letter in the Chronicle claiming that “the Bridger Canyon Property Owners Association and commissioners decreed that STR rental were BANNED immediately on February 8, 2024”, rest assured that it is pure fabrication. BCPOA didn’t ban STRs, and has no legal power to “decree” anything. From the meeting notes above, and various other proceedings, STR operators were on notice of the dubious legal status long before 2024.
Gallatin County planning has posted the final text of a proposed zoning amendment, to be heard June 13th. This was submitted by Wendy Dickson for the BCPRC (not BCPOA).
Update: The BCPOA board opposes this amendment.
You should read the full text and narrative for details, but briefly the effect is to:
File, accessed 5/8/2024, 4pm:
Direct link to the file at Gallatin County Planning Department, if you prefer:
The Planning Department’s staff report on the amendment is now available:
Commenting: the Planning Department has requested that comment be directed to the Director, at
Bridger Pines has submitted a text amendment for the B4 zone in the Bridger Bowl Base Area.
The amendment would move Recreational Housing and Overnight Accommodations from the zone’s list of Conditional Uses to the list of Permitted Uses. These are essentially Short Term Rental classifications. The primary implication of this change is that a hearing would not be required for issuance of a permit, diminishing the visibility of these proceedings and the opportunity for participation, but also reducing the cost (in time and money) associated with such permits.
The proposed change and supporting documents are in the 4D_Bailey_ZTA_PZ_Complete Staff Report associated with the Feb. 8th hearing agenda.
The BCPOA board has not yet had a chance to discuss this application.
The Lewis appeal was moved from the Jan. 11th P&Z Commission hearing to the upcoming Feb. 8th session (Thursday). We described the issues in the
section of a previous post.
If you want to comment, you can always submit written testimony to Planning@gallatin.mt.gov – details and some advice under the Submitting Testimony heading here.
You can also comment at the hearing, in person or via Zoom.
Update: the survey results are currently on hold, pending development of a valid way to remove some duplicate entries. A couple of people availed themselves of the untracked form to submit many responses, making the results invalid as a measure of general canyon sentiment. About all we can say at the moment is that on the first couple days, when responses were heavy, outweighing repeat submissions, the results looked a lot like they did in 2016, with perhaps a small shift toward a more favorable view of STRs.
Regardless of the outcome of the Jan. 11 hearing, we think it would be better for the zoning regulation to be explicit about STRs, so that permissible uses and distinctions from related classifications like Guest Ranches and Overnight Accommodations are clear. Therefore we’re interested in your opinion, not only for the pending matter, but also a future zoning amendment. Please give us your feedback in the following survey:
https://forms.gle/BK4xySf7iAWQh6sC6
The form has three fairly brief parts. Page 1 repeats some questions that we asked in 2016, when the zoning advisory committee originally drafted an STR standard. Page 2 considers some additional questions related to the recent and pending hearings. Page 3 seeks feedback on the current draft, which is now 5 years old.
Please take a look soon, because we’re just a week out from the hearing.
Several classifications that provide for accommodations have been present in the zoning for a long time. In the Bridger Bowl Base Area, the B-districts provide for Overnight Accommodations and Recreational Housing. In the AE district (most of the Canyon), those aren’t available, but there are Guest Ranch and Bed and Breakfast classifications. All of these are conditional uses. Nothing in the regulations mentions short-term rentals by name.
In 2016-2017, the Zoning Advisory Committee (BCZAC) held a series of public meetings to discuss STRs, including a well-attended one at the fire station community room. We also ran a survey via the BCPOA email list. Following those sessions, BCZAC drafted a standard that created a Conditional Use Permit for short term rentals.
In 2021, the Planning Department submitted a zoning amendment incorporating the BCZAC work, but omitting the STR and PUD sections. BCPOA opposed these omissions, but supported the amendment as a whole, for many other beneficial improvements to the zoning language.
The county’s current interpretation of zoning regulations is that STRs are not permitted in most zoning districts:
If short-term rentals are not mentioned in the specific zoning district regulation, they are not permitted anywhere in that zoning district.
The only exception in Bridger Canyon is Overnight Accommodations and Recreational Housing in the Base Area. See the STR FAQ for details. BCPOA had nothing to do with the drafting of this interpretation, and in fact just discovered the county’s web page yesterday.
BCPOA doesn’t have a formal position statement on STRs, and there’s some diversity of board member views. We have certainly never tried to ban them – in fact, we spent a lot of time and money trying to induce the county to adopt a CUP legalizing them.
Generally we think a ban would be difficult to enforce and possibly counterproductive, so it would be better to permit STRs with a few safeguards against nuisances and density creep. No matter what the standards are, we would like to see the adoption of explicit language mentioning STRs, to avoid the ambiguity that has led to the current appeal.
BCPOA isn’t a regulator; we’re an advocate for Bridger Canyon. From our bylaws:
The purpose of this corporation shall be:
- to preserve the rural character and the natural beauty and resources of Bridger
Canyon;- to guide and direct orderly growth and development;
- to maintain, through organization, a definite influence in all matters which may
affect residence or property rights and enjoyment thereof;- to disseminate information regarding zoning requirements and local issues, and
- to hold regular meetings for open discussions of problems of mutual interest and
concern
The zoning regulations are administered by the Planning Department. Conditional Uses, appeals, variances and amendments are elevated to the Planning & Zoning Commission or the County Commission.
In the November Planning & Zoning hearing, the commission revoked a Caretaker’s Residence CUP, on the grounds that use as a short term rental contradicted conditions of approval and did not constitute bona fide caretaking. This is the second similar instance of revocation in Bridger Canyon.
Materials and a recording of the hearing are here:
Switch to the “Past” tab. (See navigation screenshots below.)
On Jan. 11, the commission will consider a related question: are short term rentals (STRs) a permitted use for a primary residence. As you may recall, the 2021 zoning update omitted a section drafted by the advisory committee that would have provided an explicit classification for STRs, with some standards. That left STRs in a regulatory limbo: are they permitted, because they are an incidental use of a residence, as the appeal contents, or are they forbidden, because unlisted uses are excluded? The zoning provides a way to resolve these questions through an Interpretation of Use (see section 3.8.b. of the Admin regulation, https://gallatincomt.virtualtownhall.net/sites/g/files/vyhlif606/f/pages/adminreg_04_22.pdf ). That is essentially what will happen in the hearing, though it will be in the context of an appeal.
The county’s current opinion on this is clearly presented on its STR FAQ page. In short, unlisted uses are not permitted. In Bridger Canyon, short term rental uses are available only the Base Area, not the AE and RF districts that span the rest of the canyon:
Regardless of the outcome, we think it would be better for the zoning regulation to be explicit about STRs, so that permissible uses and distinctions from related classifications like Guest Ranches and Overnight Accommodations are clear. Therefore we’re interested in your opinion, not only for the pending matter, but also a future zoning amendment. Please give us your feedback in the following survey:
https://forms.gle/BK4xySf7iAWQh6sC6
The form has three fairly brief parts. Page 1 repeats some questions that we asked in 2016, when the zoning advisory committee originally drafted an STR standard. Page 2 considers some additional questions related to the recent and pending hearings. Page 3 seeks feedback on the current draft, which is now 5 years old.
We’ll share the survey more widely in a few days, but we’re giving email subscribers a first shot at it as you are most likely to have followed these issues over the long term. Please take a look soon, because we’re just over a week out from the hearing.
Update: see the subsequent post for more background on STRs.
The Jan. 11 hearing will consider two additional matters: extensions of a pair of Conditional Use Permits for a Guesthouse and Caretaker’s Residence. These classifications no longer exist except as nonconforming uses; they have been replaced by the Accessory Dwelling standard.
BCPOA considers these extensions to be a potentially troublesome precedent. Detailed testimony is here: BCPOA-Appert.final.231212.pdf
If you’d like to follow the hearing itself, the agenda is posted at:
Switch to the “Upcoming” tab. The Staff Report is available via the “Related Documents” link in the agenda. Direct links don’t work, so for convenience I’ve uploaded a copy here: 4.a_Lewis_Appeal_PZ_SR_Complete_1-11-24.pdf (45MB) – but for legal purposes you should consult the county site.
The Staff Report is a rather daunting document at 383 pages. However, you don’t need to read the whole thing unless you want the deep background. The key pieces are enforcement officer Megan Gibson’s report, pages 1-12, and the appeal brief, appellant exhibit 2, pages 16-24.
If you want to comment, you can always submit written testimony to Planning@gallatin.mt.gov – details and some advice under the Submitting Testimony heading here.
You can also comment at the hearing, in person or via Zoom.
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