Group of Clark County short-term rental owners say their property rights are being overly regulated

By Lauren Martinez

Click here for updates on this story

    LAS VEGAS, Nevada (KVVU) — In August, a short-term rental group filed a lawsuit against Clark County in hopes to put a pause on a new ordinance passed in June for rentals in unincorporated Clark County.

On Thursday, an injunction hearing was scheduled but was postponed to December 19.

Jackie Flores founded the group Greater Las Vegas Short-Term Retnal Association. With 700 members and counting the group has been at the forefront against Clark County’s rental regulations.

They’re challenging Clark County and the state bill.

“Our position is that both the state law and the Clark County ordinance just goes too far where it’s actually violating people’s constitutional rights and freedoms,” Flores said.

She said AB 363 makes it hard for people to get a license and once you get a license, it makes it easy for people to get in trouble for minimal things.

For months, commissioners had spent time hosting town halls getting public input on the regulations. Some regulations include no more than 10 people in a unit, minimum two-night stay reservations, rentals must be 1,000 feet away from each other and properties must allow county inspections without notice.

“They have a provision in the ordinance that says any Count Official can come to your private home at any time whenever they feel like it and for whatever they want and you have to let them in your property- you have to let them in your house and we felt like that was like you’re going way too far,” Flores said.

Flores went onto say Clark County was the only municipality in the valley that did not offer a compliance period.

“The city of Henderson, city of Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, they passed an ordinance for short-term rentals they provided a compliance period right after the ordinance was adopted,” Flores said. She said that was not offered by Clark County instead now they have a convoluted process to get licensed.

“Right now they have a pre-application period of six months. That period is just really you pre-applying but nothing really happening, and then after those six months then they’ll have at some point in time they still don’t know when a lottery then you move onto the next step which is application to the license,” Flores said.

Flores estimates 80% of the over 12,000 illegal short-term rentals will not be able to get a license.

“We’re already dealing with an economy that’s effecting a lot of families and so on top of that now they have to deal with this. They have a way to make money, they have a way to make ends meet and our government is telling them no and this is the wrong time for our government to be doing this. This when government should say you know what- this is an industry where you have a home and you can actually make ends meet, income for yourself well here’s the licensing process,” Flores said.

A six-month application period is now open until March 1 to enter the lottery to get a permit.

Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.