October 13, 2023 The Los Angeles County Treasurer and Tax Collector hosted a virtual information session for Topanga residents on Friday, September 29, to answer questions and address concerns about the Short-Term Rental (STR) Ordinance currently being developed for unincorporated LA County. It is important to note that this is the first in what we anticipate will be multiple local discussion on this issue. Roughly 50 people were in attendance, including County Counsel, Regional Planning, and Supervisor Horvath’s Senior Field Deputy, Sophia Soudani. The session was informative and useful, though several issues remain unresolved and/or unclear, such as contradictions between various Zoning regulations and the proposed STR Ordinance. In addition to some Code and regulatory contradictions, there are concerns around whether the proposed Ordinance sufficiently balances the rights of residents to use their homes as they see fit against public safety imperatives and community / “quality of life� concerns. It appears that people on both sides of the issue feel that the Ordinance needs some additional tweaking. The Topanga Town Council (TTC) believes strongly in the right of every resident and business owner to express their concerns and request that their needs be addressed (when possible). To that end, we plan to invite the County to participate in a follow-up discussion in November (Date TBA) that includes input from a survey* that we distribute to the community. We want to empower residents to take an active role in helping to craft proposed suggestions and solutions to some of the issues and challenges that the Ordinance poses. We believe that the current draft STR Ordinance can be improved to satisfy a much larger number of people. The Department taking the lead on drafting and revising the Ordinance is the Treasurer and Tax Collector’s office, in conjunction with input from Regional Planning, County Counsel, and the Coastal Commission (where applicable). * Please keep an eye out for a survey from the TTC that shall be sent out by mid-October. It will include approximately 10 free-form and option delimited questions. We hope to gather response by the end of the month and then host a follow-up discussion at our November TTC meeting. Feel free to send your questions or suggestions to: contact@topangatowncouncil.org.