BYRON SHIRE Mayor Simon Richardson has announced that Council will prosecute illegal holiday lettings in the near future.
He says, “We have pressed the button on commencing the process to commence prosecutions for unauthorised short term holiday letting.
“We have worked with goodwill over a long time with both Victims of Holiday Letting (VHOL) and the Holiday letting Organisation (HLO) to find a way forward to make sure this visitor accomodation sector is well managed so neighbours are considered and protected and to ensure its’ growth has some sort of ceiling also.
“We largely put plans in place to achieve this, however we have needed State government support and sign off for many months now to enact our Action Plan – and they have dropped the ball and failed this community by remaining silent and becoming bystanders to the increasing challenges of holiday letting.
“So we have no choice but jump back into the trenches and fire off litigation missiles.
“Council will not sit idly by and let holiday letting smother our towns- hopefully the State Government will shortly stand alongside us and support us to provide leadership in this field.”
The Council Resolution authorised the General Manager, in cases where a reasonable suspicion of unauthorised short term rental accommodation and unauthorised tourist and visitor accommodation is taking place, to issue Notices to the following to provide information and answer questions about property use: Real Estate agents, Letting Agents, Website Hosts and Tenants
Council confirmed that in order to preserve the availability of long-term letting in the shire for long-term residents that the moratorium on prosecutions has been lifted.
Council now intends to prosecute in the most effective manner where merit exists any and all instances of unauthorised short term rental accommodation occurring in the shire.
Council will now compile a confidential list of properties against which it may commence legal proceedings based on the establishment of a prima-facie case of unauthorised short term rental accommodation and unauthorised tourist and visitor accommodation, and that this list is compiled as soon as possible.
I rang BSC Thursday 6 July 2017,and was told they can do nothing untill State Govt moves on the matter
So il feeling pretty shattered
Yesterday 5 July 2017
BSC said some one would be contacting me
To list the short term rentals I was effected by.
Seems the RH and LH in the office have differing instructions