Supervisors shoot down a temporary ban on short-term rental permits in Carmel Valley.

Carmel Valley residents objecting to short-term vacation rentals in their community will have to wait longer for a resolution, after the Monterey County Board of Supervisors rejected an interim ordinance that would have temporarily restricted permits for such rentals in Carmel Valley and unincorporated areas of the Monterey Peninsula.

On Tuesday, April 25, the board voted 5-0 in favor of a recommendation by the county’s Housing and Community Development Department, which acknowledged that short-term rentals are “a significant public policy issue” in the coastal District 5 area and that permits for them should be referred to the county Planning Commission for review.

But that falls short of the temporary permit restriction proposed for consideration by District 5 Supervisor Mary Adams, whose Carmel Valley constituents flocked to the board’s chambers to voice their views during the meeting.

While some of the two dozen-plus speakers expressed opposition to the ordinance and its potential impact on the local tourism-reliant economy, the majority voiced support for a permit ban – citing the disruption of traffic and noise on the remote residential community, as well as how short-term rentals can eat into the local housing market.

With the ordinance’s rejection, the onus now moves to a new, permanent short-term rental ordinance that HCD hopes to bring before the Board of Supervisors by the end of the year. One outstanding issue is non-permitted rentals; according to HCD, there are only 29 permitted short-term rentals in unincorporated Monterey County, yet some 600 are advertised on Airbnb and similar sites.

Adams acknowledged that it had become clear in recent weeks that she did not have the four votes needed to pass the proposed interim ordinance, and bemoaned the board’s inability to find a solution to a long-running issue in her district, describing it as “the biggest failure of my entire career.”