The walls are closing in on unpermitted short-term rentals in B.C., and now enforcement officials in the Gulf Islands will have a powerful new tool at their disposal: data from a mandatory province-wide host and platform registry.
Islands Trust planning services director Stefan Cermak told Regional Planning Committee members Wednesday, Sept. 4 that staff will soon be able to access the B.C. government’s new short-term rental data portal — a first of its kind in Canada, created to support local governments with monitoring and enforcement of short-term rental regulations.
“I was just informed this morning that indeed, after much haranguing, we will get access to that,” said Cermak. “What that means and what the implications are I’m not 100 per cent sure, but we will be signing an information-sharing agreement with the province, and we will have access to that data.”
Short-term rental platforms with 1,000 or more listings in B.C. are already required to share information about their listings directly with the B.C. government on a monthly basis; that data is not disclosed to the public, according to provincial officials, but must include a host’s name, address and contact information, as well as listing details, booking histories and business licence numbers if available.
Cermak said the province had previously told the Islands Trust they would not have access to the portal, due to lack of business licensing for rental hosts, but after some back-and-forth have apparently agreed to grant it. Cermak said staff would be consulting with bylaw enforcement officers to see “how that plays out.”
Different islands may still see varying degrees of enforcement, depending on how they’ve prioritized short-term rentals. Gabriola Island, for example, not only prioritizes enforcement on non-compliant vacation rentals but was the only Local Trust Committee (LTC) to opt-in through the province on a principal residency requirement for them, which means enforcement could be conducted through provincial channels.
Meanwhile, Salt Spring Island’s LTC dropped proactive enforcement against short-term rentals back in April, citing confusing rules and limited staff resources. Salt Spring trustee Laura Patrick has said opting into the principal residence requirement without addressing “underlying problems” in the island’s regulations would likely not help the housing shortage on her island.Short-term rentals are not permitted on Salt Spring, although bed-and-breakfast operations as home-based businesses are allowed on much of the island.
According to B.C. officials, smaller platforms with fewer than 1,000 rental listings will soon be required to share the same information — “by late 2024,” according to a provincial information sheet, meaning that by early 2025 the province expects all short-term rental hosts and platforms to be in the database. Not playing by the rules could result in administrative monetary penalties and court-filed compliance orders, according to the province.