An amendment to the San Marcos city code will require residential property owners who rent the homes to register their long-term rental property with the city starting in 2020.

Shrouded by several hundred pages of the newly approved land development code, the multi-page rental ordinance amendment—approved by City Council at Tuesday's meeting following Code SMTX's approval—says all property owners who rent their residential property within city limits for 30 days or more will be required to give the city the home's address, the number of rental units and the number of people each rental unit is designed to occupy, among other things.

In San Marcos, 71.7 percent of occupied homes—about 15,349 units—were rentals in 2016, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

Requiring the property owners of the estimated 15,349 rental units to register their rental property with the city would be a change from the current ordinance, which says only those rental properties that have received two or more city code violations within a 12-month period and the property owner fails to correct the violations within the time frame required by the code official would be required to register their rental property. It also applies to those property owners who have received two or more citations within a 12-month period, or five or more code violations within a 12-month period regardless of whether the owner corrects the violations within the required time frame.

Before Tuesday's vote, rental property owners could also voluntarily register their property rentals.

Jeff Caldwell, the city's human services director, said about 200-250 rental properties are currently registered, although he didn't know how many of those were voluntary and how many were required to register because of citations or violations.

The new rules don't apply to property owners if they live at the property and rent other rooms within the property to tenants unless the home receives two or more citations within a 12-month period.

The new rule kicks in Jan. 1, 2019, and rental property owners have until Jan. 1, 2020 to complete their applications and must renew their applications every year as long as the property continues to be used as a rental.

The purpose of the new ordinance, according to the code, is to "safeguard the life, health, safety, welfare and property of the occupants of long-term rental unit(s) and the general public by establishing minimum standards and registration requirements."

It also serves to identify and notify owners regarding minimum building standards, complaints and property maintenance codes in a timely manner.

Failure to register a residential rental property will result in a Class C misdemeanor, punishable by a fine not to exceed $2,000, and each day that the property owner is not in compliance constitutes as another violation, according to the code.

Council members took issue with some of the vague language listed in the ordinance, including the word "registrant", and whether that referred to a property owner, property manager or tenant.

Questions of enforcement also came up as council members asked how the new ordinance would be regulated. The amended ordinance says a code official, the neighborhood services department and other authorized city personnel can enforce the ordinance.

City manager Bert Lumbreras said the ordinance change originated at the Planning and Zoning Commission, and City Council requested the change be made.

Since rental property owners aren't required to begin submitting applications until January, council asked to discuss the ordinance in a future work session to better understand how the new law would be enforced and how much it would cost the city.

Council Member Ed Mihalkanin voted against this and several other changes to the city code, as well as on adoption of Code SMTX and amendments to the comprehensive plan at Tuesday's meeting.