The city of Morro Bay has been a visitor serving destination for many decades and much of the city was built on tourism.  The city is now talking about severely restricting the number of vacation rentals by taking away licenses based on a lottery system.  This action along with some other restrictions would devastate dozens of owners, people who work in the community like housekeepers and maintenance providers, and severely impact many local businesses that rely on tourist dollars to survive.

Please support vacation rentals by signing our petition, let the city hear from all concerned voices.  Thousands of guests each year rely on vacation rentals to have access to the coast and a nice vacation to Morro Bay.  These families are not a negative impact on the city and its neighborhoods, the vast majority are nice people who respect the neighborhoods. 

For a quick introduction to us and our cause, please visit: www.sharemorrobay.com

Who we are:  We are the local property managers and vacation home owners, speaking out for all the interested parties in the vacation rental community.  This action could result in dozens of jobs lost and significant harm to the many businesses that rely on tourism along with their employees.

Morro Bay is an incredible beach town that has been a tourist destination and a coastal escape longer than most can remember.  A small group of residents who do not desire sharing this area are looking to severely restrict vacation rentals, or even eliminate them altogether.  Vacation rentals are a critical supplement to the hotel community, for many families a hotel is not a viable lodging choice and they will simply vacation somewhere else.

The city collects over $600,000 per year in transient occupancy tax from vacation rentals and the overall benefit in total spending is well over 9 million per year.  This money is critical to our city and our local businesses and helps provide a higher quality of life for Morro Bay residents and guests alike in improved services from the city.  Vacation rentals are an essential part of our town.

Those arguing to ban short term rentals claim they create extra neighborhood nuisances, such as excessive noise and parking problems, but there is no evidence to back this up. In fact, a research study conducted by The California Economic Forecast, analyzing nuisance reports across the counties of Santa Barbara, Ventura, and San Luis Obispo, said:

“We found no statistically significant difference between the nuisance complaint rate for short term rentals and all other homes.”

The report also concludes:

“The negative allegations aimed at short term rentals could not be substantiated by the statistical evidence.”

The nay-sayers also claim that short term vacation rentals affect long term housing supplies, but this is also false. Another research study, analyzing short term rentals across Santa Barbara county, said:

“We did not find that the supply of housing was significantly affected by the incidence of short-term rentals.”

And:

“Very few homes are used as short-term rentals full-time and would not be converted to long-term housing under any short term rental ban.”

Please help us maintain reasonable numbers of vacation rentals in the city of Morro Bay, help us protect the local economy and continue to serve families who visit.  For those families it may be their one chance to spend some time at the coast, let’s not take that away from them.  Let’s base decisions on data and not fiction. 

Please sign our petition today and let your voice be heard.