Eureka Springs sees rental problem return

Council to look at proposed ordinance

Monday, June 10, 2013

EUREKA SPRINGS - There are about 3,000 rooms for tourists is this town, but it’s hard for locals to find a place to live, said Alderman James DeVito.

The situation threatens the “identity” of the city, which is famous for artists and unusual folk, he said.

DeVito believes Eureka Springs, population 2,073, is at a crossroads. It’s time to choose between commercialism and quirkiness.

“The charm of our city, I think, is in jeopardy here,” he said. “In Eureka Springs, we’re known for our quirkiness. Well, our quirkiness is because of the people who live here, not our tourist base. We risk losing our identity.”

One of the problems, DeVito said, is “weekly rentals.”

Eureka Springs city code allows people who own property in the historic residential neighborhoods to rent houses, apartments or rooms to others on a weekly, monthly or longer basis.

But “tourist lodging” isn’t a conditional or permitted use allowed by city code for areas zoned R-1, which is “Victorian residential.”

According to the code, tourist lodging means a “dwelling in which sleeping accommodations are provided for and offered to transient guests.”

Tourists, by nature, are transient, said DeVito. But people are renting to tourists on a weekly basis in R-1 zones because they can make more money than renting monthly to locals. And some homeowners are renting places to tourists by the night, he said.

Those are houses, rooms or apartments that might otherwise be available to local residents or families to rent.

“If you keep allowing people to conduct commerce in residential areas, you dilute the value of commercial property,” DeVito said. “To me, we no longer become a town. We just become Frank Zappa’s nightmare: 2,000 motels.”

DeVito’s number was off a bit. He was referring to 200 Motels, a 1971 film co-written and directed by Frank Zappa about life on the road for a rock musician.

The matter of weekly rentals came up a year ago. But when a proposed ordinance went before the City Council in November, the council took no action. The ordinance would have limited rentals to no fewer than 30 days in residential areas.

Today, the City Council will look at the issue again. City Attorney Tim Weaver has drafted a proposed ordinance. Weaver didn’t return two phone calls asking what the proposed ordinance would say.

People who want to move to Eureka Springs find it expensive to rent a place, if they can find one, DeVito said. An option is to live in Holiday Island, nine miles to the north, or other surrounding towns and drive into Eureka Springs for work, he said.

“I think part of the charm of Eureka Springs is we’re a real town,” DeVito said. “I don’t want us to be like Aspen [Colorado] where you have to drive 65 miles to go to work.”

Bobbi Bins, a waitress at DeVito’s restaurant in downtown Eureka Springs, said she moved to town six weeks ago from Green Bay, Wis., and had trouble finding an affordable place to live. Apartments in Eureka Springs rented for $700 to $800 a month, Bins said.

She and her boyfriend rented a mobile home south of Eureka Springs for $400 a month instead.

Bins said renting is more expensive in Eureka Springs than in Green Bay, where she paid $375 per month.

“I was a little shocked at how long it took us to find a place and what the rents were,” she said of Eureka Springs.

There was only one apartment advertised in the local newspapers in early June, Bins said. There were references to miscellaneous rentals, such as mobile homes, monthly hotel rooms and camper-type trailers that can be pulled behind a vehicle, she said.

“Apparently, you can live in that for about $650 a month,” she said.

Pivot Rock Village Apartments on Eureka Springs’ north side has two apartments for rent, Cheryl Sharp, the manager, said Friday.

“It’s unusual for me to even have one of my apartments open,” she said.

Both are two-bedroom apartments and rent for $550 and $575 monthly, respectively.

But Pivot Rock road is two miles from downtown, and many people want to live in the Victorian downtown area.

People who have apartments for rent in the historic downtown area can get about $600 per week, said Bob Jasinski, co-owner of Angel at Rose Hall, a Eureka Springs bed and breakfast.

Jasinski said the city already has a “ban on tourist lodging” in the R-1 zone but Mayor Morris Pate won’t enforce it.

“The mayor’s a nice guy,” said Jasinski. “I think he’s just being misled by his laissez-faire attitude to violations that don’t upset his friends.”

Jasinski, a former Florida lawyer, drafted a petition asking for a court judgment to make the mayor enforce what Jasinski said is a ban.

Jasinski spoke before the City Council on May 29, telling them he had his petition ready to file. Jasinski said he had delivered a copy of that document to Pate and e-mailed it to the aldermen.

Pate said Thursday that Jasinski had yet to file the petition with the Carroll County circuit clerk’s office. Pate said he’ll respond to it if it’s filed.

“It’s to the point that we’re being verbally threatened at council meetings, threatened with lawsuits,” Pate said.

Jasinski said the city of Eureka Springs has lost tens of thousands of dollars in fees for code violations because Pate hasn’t enforced the law.

At the May 29 council meeting, Joe Joy said he and his wife, Dani, have been renting a carriage house for a year “under guidance from the city.” Dani Joy was mayor of Eureka Springs from 2007-2010.

“They’ve told us how to do it so we are operating within the law,” Joe Joy told the council. “We are operating as tenant landlords. We are not operating as innkeepers with transient or tourist guests. … As far as I’m concerned, we have a property right that you’re trying to take away from us, and we’re not going to stand for it.”

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 06/10/2013