On Split Vote, Planning Board Endorses Limiting Short-Term Rentals

The Planning Board on Thursday voted 3-2 to endorse chair Dave Iverson’s short-term rental (STR) regulation proposal, setting the stage for a Special Town Meeting showdown against local charter boat captain Brian Borgeson’s citizen warrant article.

By the same margin, the Planning Board voted to recommend taking no action on Borgeson’s proposal, which will head to the Special Town Meeting as Article 1. In an official comment explaining their vote, the Planning Board wrote of Article One that “this article would resolve zoning issues related to short-term rental litigation that this town and some residents have faced. However, the majority of the Board felt that it was not restrictive enough and did not include adequate limitations.” The Board adopted the comment unanimously.

“Over the past six years, we have supported full codification, and we have tried very hard to get that passed, and it has not passed,” Iverson said. “A segment of our population that found it difficult to vote for codifying a use without a certain amount of regulation should be addressed.”

Iverson’s article, billed as a compromise, would cap how long a dwelling can be used as an STR at 49 days between June 15 and August 31, and 70 days in any calendar year. It would also limit the number of changes of occupancy permitted during the peak summer season to seven and require that all STR contracts last at least seven days during the peak season. For properties with two or more dwellings that are rented separtely, each day that each unit is used as an STR would count towards the maximum of 49 days during the peak season, and 70 days for the year. Hosted stays, in which an STR operator lives in the building they are renting, or in another building on the same lot, would be exempt.

In addition to Iverson, Planning Board members John Kitchener and Hillary Hedges Rayport voted to support the proposal.

“This will help reduce investment-only STRs going forward,” Kitchener said. “This is putting some reasonable guardrails around [STRs].”

Planning Board vice chair Joe Topham and member Nat Lowell voted against endorsing Iverson’s article, instead expressing their support for Borgeson’s alternative, which would allow STRs by right across the island, except in the commercial-industrial district, without any further regulation beyond what currently exists.

“The new future of earning a living, or extra money, is going to be renting,” Lowell said. “If we’re so adamantly opposed to this renting issue, we’re taking the ability from year-round residents of the future to be able to sustain their property.”

One major reason for opposition to Iverson’s article is the potential economic impact on Nantucket. A report from Finance Director Brian Turbitt estimates that Iverson’s article could cost the island around $2.5 million in tax revenue per year.

“That reduction, we have to find dollar for dollar, to make that revenue up,” Turbitt said. “There, on the revenue side, honestly, are very limited ways to make that $2.5 million up…it will require substantial changes to the functionality of government.”

“There’s going to be a price to pay for, I think, either one of these if they pass,” Iverson said. “I see a 1.5 percent deficit in the budget not being an overwhelming price to pay.”

During a lengthy public hearing before the vote, a number of stakeholders in the STR debate spoke in support of both articles.

“We support residents being able to rent their properties and their homes, but we do believe there should be some level of reasonable restriction and limitation to that,” Nantucket Land and Water Council executive director Emily Molden said. “[Article Two] will help reduce the incentive for further properties to be purchased and redeveloped in this fashion solely for short-term rental purposes. So while I think we would support, and maybe even prefer, something that is even a little more restrictive, we do believe that Article Two will address these concerns in a way that will really help to moderate the industry going forward and still allow community members to rent their homes.”

Iverson has emphasized from the beginning that his article is born out of months of negotiations in an effort to forge a coalition of two-thirds of Nantucket residents who would be willing to vote for the compromise, even if they don’t agree with every provision. Supporters include the Nantucket Land and Water Council and political action groups Nantucket Neighborhoods First and ACK Now.

But commenters were split Thursday, and most of those who spoke opposed Iverson’s article.

“We need to think how many more people we’re going to put into food insecurity, how many more people are going to struggle to pay their rent,” island resident Amy Eldridge, who works at Holdgate’s Laundry, said. “I don’t want to be away from my family any more than I have to, but I may have to go supplement my income to offset what you guys are planning to do here tonight.”

In addition to Eldridge, opponents who spoke out against Iverson's proposal on Thursday included Kathy Baird, who is the secretary of the Advisory Committee of Non-Voting Taxpayers and co-founder of Nantucket Together, and a number of real estate agents and attorneys, such as Steve Cohen and former Nantucket Association of Real Estate Brokers President Penny Dey.

“Article One is simple. It addresses Judge Vhay’s concerns. It codifies all rentals in the zoning bylaw, subject to existing and future regulations, most likely done through general bylaws. It, in other words, maintains the status quo,” Dey said. “It’s a fact that 93 percent of all vacationers to this island who rent come for less than 32 days. They simply cannot afford any longer to come for longer than that. Where are these people supposed to go?”

There was also some opposition suggesting Iverson’s article should be more restrictive than it is.

“We’d like to see you make an amendment to Article Two and bring the number [of STR days allowed] down, during the peak season, to 30 days,” Robert Frame, a long-time Nantucket resident and real estate broker, said. “If you would like our support on Article Two, I would ask that you think about amending the times. Drop it down.”

Now that the Planning Board has settled on its recommendation, the next step is Special Town Meeting, which is scheduled for Tuesday, November 4th at 5:00 P.M. after Borgeson filed a petition requiring the town to hold a Town Meeting within 45 days last month.

“We need to solve this once and for all. This has put friends against friends, this has put neighbors against neighbors,” Borgeson said. “We need to get something that works for the people of Nantucket.”

The November Special Town Meeting comes with a heightened sense of urgency surrounding STRs following the June 2025 Massachusetts Land Court ruling in island resident Cathy Ward's lawsuit against her neighbors and the Nantucket Zoning Board of Appeals, which has thrown Nantucket's zoning regulations pertaining to STRs into uncertainty. and raised the possibility that they may not be legal at all.

In her suit, Ward claimed that her neighbors’ use of their property as an STR violated Nantucket’s zoning code and is an illegal commercial use in a residential zone. Land Court judge Michael Vhay has now sided with her twice. The town has appealed his latest ruling, and the parties involved reached a deal in July to pause enforcement of Vhay's decision while that appeal is pending.