BLOOMINGDALE — Discussion over short-term vacation rental regulation has made its way to St. Armand.

St. Armand town Supervisor Davina Winemiller said the town board will discuss the possibility of adopting a “very simple local law” with “bare minimum regulations” at a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday at the town hall before the board’s regular meeting.

She said they’re considering a basic registration and permit process with the goal of ensuring STR units are safe and allowing the town to be able to contact STR owners in the case of emergencies or complaints from neighbors.

The board wants to “get ahead” of any future issues with STRs, she said.

Winemiller said she expects that STR permits will carry a “minimal fee” but said the board has not discussed where that dollar amount will be set yet.

“We don’t want to overstep. We don’t want to tell people what you can and cannot do on your property,” Winemiller said. “That’s never been our intention and it’s not our intention now.”

The town, after all, does not even have a zoning code.

Winemiller said the law may carry a few “no-brainer” requirements for STRs — that they are up to the state’s building code, have working smoke detectors, get an inspection and a new certificate of occupancy. All this only helps the property owner, she felt, so she doesn’t expect much opposition.

She said the law will likely require that each STR has a local contact the town can call in the case of an emergency or complaint — something like a water break at 2 a.m. or if there’s a problem with the neighbors.

Winemiller said she’s gotten calls from neighbors complaining about STRs before, but always after the fact. She said people have told her they don’t want to live next to party houses.

The nearby village of Lake Placid and town of North Elba imposed short-term vacation rental regulations in 2020, after several years of discussion and many public forums and hearings. The village and town’s joint law was recently revised. Saranac Lake ramped up discussions of STR regulations recently. The village is in the midst of marking up and changing its proposed law. Tupper Lake has been discussing the potential of imposing an STR law over the past few months, too.

While some local lawmakers have discussed passing these laws because of concerns that STRs are reducing the number of longterm apartments in the housing market, Winemiller said she’s sure they have some impact on the housing market in St. Armand, but it’s “not crazy detrimental” and not something the board is looking to get into with this law.

Winemiller said they have no interest in capping the number of STRs in the town or saying where they can be. Maybe if these units weren’t STRs, they’d be long-term rentals, she said, but she can’t say for sure since there’s no data on it.

Still she said, there are “quite a few” of them in town and that number is growing.

The vacation rental tracking platform AirDNA showed 14 active STR rentals in the Bloomingdale 12913 zip code on Monday. All but one of these were whole home rentals. Over half were listed on Airbnb only, around 15% were listed on VRBO only and around 30% were listed on both.

Quarterly data from AirDNA showed gradual growth in the number of STRs in the area from eight in the first quarter of 2021 to 15 in the last quarter of 2022.

To attend the town’s STR hearing virtually, go to https://meet.goto.com/308563709 or dial in by phone by calling 224-501-3412 and using the access code 308-563-709.