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Dana Point to Enact STR Program Inside, Outside Coastal Zone

BY BREEANA GREENBERG

The City of Dana Point officially has programs to regulate vacation rentals within and outside the city’s coastal zone following the Dana Point City Council’s meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 7.

The council voted, 4-1, with Councilmember Michael Villar opposed, to accept a short-term rental program approved by the California Coastal Commission in late November 2022. The program only permits and regulates vacation rentals within the city’s coastal zone.

The CCC approved a program with a cap of 115 non-primary, multi-family homestay, and mixed-use parcel non-primary short-term rentals within the coastal zone through a coastal development permit. There will be no cap on primary or homestay short-term rentals. The cap of non-primary homestays will decrease by one with each homestay and primary permit that the city grants.

A condition of the CCC’s approval requires the city to study and track the STR program’s performance to assess whether permit caps need to be changed.

On Tuesday night, the City Council was faced with three options regarding the CCC-approved vacation rental program: accept the coastal development permit as written; accept the permit and ask for an amendment; or deny the permit, meaning there would be no

MonsterWave Puzzles Donates

Portion of Proceeds to Local Charities

BY BREEANA GREENBERG

For every puzzle MonsterWave sells, the South County-based company is giving 50 cents to local nonprofit partners, giving back to the surf breaks depicted in its puzzles.

After their first two months of sales, MonsterWave’s Kurt Snibbe and Norm Petersen delivered their first donation regulations on short-term rentals in the coastal zone, according to City Attorney Patrick Muñoz.

Mayor Mike Frost added that the process of going back to the CCC for an amendment could take between nine and 12 months.

Councilmember Jamey Federico said that formal and informal surveys have shown demand for permitted short-term rentals.

“What happens if we don’t take any action on the CDP in the coastal zone tonight? We’ve heard the opponents of STRs many times say there are hundreds of illegal short-term rentals in this town,” Federico said.

“If we do not do this, we will not be restricting short-term rentals down to 115 in the coastal zone; they will be unlimited,” Federico added. “And tomorrow, those hundreds of people who have illegal short-term rentals and the hundreds more who want to have shortterm rentals, if they’re smart, they walk into City Hall and say, ‘I want a permit,’ and we cannot say no.”

Federico said that without passing an ordinance that evening, those interested in operating a short-term rental could run it as a “legal nonconforming” use.

Former Councilmember Paul Wyatt voiced concern with the fact that an HOA must obtain a coastal development permit to establish a ban on vacation rentals unless its covenants, conditions and restrictions (CC&R) had a prohibition on STRs predating the Coastal Act of 1976.

Federico said he understood the risk to some HOAs, adding that he “will go with them to the Coastal Commission when they apply for their CDP to get their long-standing—very long-standing—restrictions on (vacation rentals) certified by the California Coastal Commission.”

During Tuesday’s meeting, Dana Point City Council also voted to approve new STR regulations for vacation rentals outside of the coastal zone, adopted through an urgency ordinance that requires a four-fifths vote.

The urgency ordinance also bypasses the need for a second reading of the ordinance to officially adopt the program.

In late July, Dana Point City Council failed to pass a short-term rental program that would have permitted the rentals outside of Dana Point’s coastal zone after it previously approved a vacation rental program for the coastal zone only.

Matching the CCC-approved program, staff proposed one regulating vacation rentals outside the coastal zone. The program includes a cap of 115 vacation rentals, making the combined cap on STRs within and outside of the coastal zone at 230 units.

The vacation rental program would be broken down into two phases. Phase one of the program would permit up to 25 new permits outside of the coastal zone, bringing the total to 85 permits. Based on citywide tracking measures, City Council would later evaluate the possibility of permitting an additional 30 permits outside of the coastal zone, bringing the total to 115.

According to the CCC’s staff report from its November meeting, the 115 cap in the coastal zone amounts to approximately 2% of the city’s housing units, higher than Laguna Beach’s STR program cap, which amounts to 1.5% of its housing stock, or San Diego’s cap that amounts to 1% of housing.

The cap of 230 total short-term rentals represents approximately 1.39% of the checks to the Doheny State Beach Foundation and San Onofre Parks Foundation in early January.

MonsterWave donated $291 to the San O nonprofit after two months of sales of the puzzle that depicts the Old Man’s surf break. With just one month of sales of their Doheny State Beach puzzle, the two donated $155.50 to the Doheny State Beach Foundation.

“I’ve grown up surfing at San Onofre, and we felt like this was a way to give back,” Petersen said. “Kurt raised his kids surfing at Doheny, so that was a logical one for that puzzle. And then, as we move up the coast and add items, we’re going to do some type of charity giveback for each puzzle.”

“It’ll be something local so that a local break that we’re depicting will then have some local charity involved,” Petersen continued.

Snibbe and Petersen plan to release a puzzle depicting Laguna Beach’s Main Beach this spring. The two will dedicate a portion of the proceeds from the upcoming puzzle to their local charity partner, the Pacific Marine Mammal Center.

“We’ve already worked it out; our donation will go to the Pacific Marine Mammal Center,” Petersen said. “Their work is to rehabilitate seals and sea lions, I guess whatever else they find on the beach that’s sick and then nurse them back and then release them.”

Before MonsterWave releases the Main Beach Puzzle, it will launch a puzzle depicting Huntington Beach. The Huntington Beach puzzle is expected to be released in mid-spring, as well, though they are still working on finding a charity partner.

Petersen explained that in about three weeks, MonsterWave will launch its next surf break-inspired puzzle of Lower Trestles, which will also benefit the San Onofre nonprofit.

As Snibbe and Petersen release new whimsical puzzles portraying famous surf breaks up and down the California coastline, they aim to commit a portion of their proceeds on each puzzle sold to local charities.