Staff reported at the City Council’s June 7 work session that Fort Worth has hired a firm to help identify short-term rentals, which are typically available for rent for one to 30 days through such mobile apps as Airbnb.
“The company we have hired, Deckard Technologies, are able to track any posting in any platform,” according to Daniel Leal, assistant director of the city’s development services department. “If a new platform comes up, they will be able to catch that. That’s one of the many reasons we chose them.”
Among the goals identified by the city for potential regulations:
- preserve residential quality of neighborhoods and protect from commercial encroachment;
- ensure health and safety of guests and residents;
- support tourism in a balanced way;
- preserve residential housing supply;
- collect hotel occupancy tax from legal short-term rentals; and
- minimize impact on staff and recover costs for code enforcement.
Next steps for the city include seeking proposals for a service to handle registration and administration of legal short-term rentals. Staff is tentatively planning to bring proposed operating standards and potential zoning options for short-term rentals to council in August, according to an informal report to council.
City staff anticipate that registration for short-term rentals would become effective early in fiscal year 2023, the report stated.
