ST. GEORGE — The Springdale Town Council has applied the brakes on new transient lodging applications for the next six months.
A task force has been created and will analyze options and recommendations to decide the best way forward when it comes to transient lodging. They plan to then submit a recommendation to the Planning Commission.
The task force includes Mayor Barbar Bruno, Town Manager Rick Wixom, Director of Community Development Tom Dansie, Councilwoman Lisa Zumpft, Planning Commission members Tom Kenaston and Ric Rioux, Hans Dunzinger, who is representing owners of transient lodging, and Teresa Silcox as a “resident at large.”
“We welcome feedback that is helpful and relevant to this process,” Bruno said. “The task force that we put together is working on that now. We have diverse feelings about the issue. We come from diverse backgrounds, and we’re researching what other areas in Utah are doing. We will come to some consensus. We hope that we have something to the Planning Commission by May.”
By general definition, transient lodging refers to “a building, facility, or portion thereof, excluding inpatient medical care facilities and residential facilities, that contains sleeping accommodations” and may include, but is not limited to, resorts, group homes, hotels, motels and dormitories.
Bruno said the consequences of Springdale’s rapid growth has resulted in:
- A decrease in the amount of long-term rental housing and exacerbating the town’s affordable housing problem
- A conversion of non-lodging commercial properties into short-term transient lodging, thereby detracting from the town’s village character
- A reduction in the diversity of commercial uses and services in the community
- An increase in the intensity of development on properties near residential areas
- Added strain to the town’s infrastructure
Bruno said the temporary moratorium on transit lodging will not be retroactive to existing units, nor will it affect applications for transit lodging already in process. The task force may not take the entire six months to decide what to recommend to regulate transient lodging in the future.
“We’re on a pretty short timeframe here,” Bruno said. “We need some long-term housing for employees of the national park, the town … and the businesses. Our valuable residents are being displaced because so many properties are being turned into transient lodging units. And we’ve lost some retail and a beautiful gallery, and they were all converted to transient lodging. So, we’re just trying to stop that.”
The task force is studying other destinations and gateway communities near national or state parks and how they handle similar issues. They will focus mainly on Utah towns since their regulations would already be vetted under the state’s regulations.
“Just because they can do something in Aspen, (Colorado), doesn’t mean that Utah code allows us to do it here,” Bruno said. “That (the moratorium) saves us a little bit of time and headache to know that it’s defensible.”
Zumpft said the task force has only met a couple of times and has a lot of work to do.
“We’ll be doing research and then give our recommendations to the Planning Commission to craft a recommendation to give to the Town Council by July 12th,” she added.
Bruno said Springdale’s master plan has land use ordinances trying to preserve the “village environment,” but added there are a couple of transient lodging developments where one has been built and one has been approved that are very large scale. And they are not consistent with what town officials want to see in that specific zoning.
“We want to look at what we call ‘village commercial zoning’ and see if we want to reduce the density allowed and maybe even the types and sizes of buildings allowed in that zone,” Bruno said. “So understanding that in the central commercial area, we are not as concerned about what goes in there. That’s what that zone is intended for. But we are trying to get our arms around the village commercial zone and what that should look like.”
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