Short-term Rental (STR) Bylaw
In November 2021, Council adopted the Short-term Rental (STR) Bylaw that will ensure safety and responsibility in the tourist rental market. The bylaw establishes clear policies to regulate short-term rentals throughout Kimberley that will enhance the visitor experience and improve our important tourist economy. The main goals of the bylaw are to:
- ensure building and occupant safety;
- reduce impacts to housing availability and affordability;
- reduce STR's impact on neighborhood character;
- reduce noise, parking and traffic problems and eliminate party houses;
- improve responsiveness to neighbor complaints;
- support compliant accommodation providers; and
- eliminate non-compliant unsafe or unauthorized accommodation providers.
Short-term rentals in Kimberley provide needed tourism accommodation in our community. The City of Kimberley currently allows short-term rentals in several of its neighbourhoods, most of which are located in the area surrounding the alpine resort. Most of these neighbourhoods allow for the short-term rental of entire homes and individual suites, but some neighbourhoods are limited to individual bedrooms within a home.
The City of Kimberley now requires operators of short-term rentals to hold licences for each short-term rental unit they operate to ensure that units are safe and operators are responsive to any concerns that may arise.
Visit Kimberley.ca for more information and access to the application guide and required forms.
Updated C-1 Commercial Zoning
The C-1 Commercial Zone, which applies to most commercial properties in Kimberley outside of the Plaztl, was updated in 2017 to:
- Support more uses and provide greater variety business opportunities;
- Add or modify some definitions in order to provide greater clarity and reflect a more modern economy;
- Explicitly protect existing single-family use to alleviate concerns with evolving insurance and mortgage practices; and,
- Perform some general amendments for better consistency throughout the Bylaw, including the renaming of the C-1 Central Commercial Zone to C-1 Commercial Zone
New Uses
- Craft Breweries and Distilleries
- Multi-Family Dwellings
- Trades and Contracting Services
- Light Manufacturing and Produciton
- Food and Beverage Production
- Commercial Indoor Storage
- Place of Worship
- Commercial Parking Lots
All new uses are required to mitigate for noise, odours and must be completely contained within the principal building.
Single-Family Dwelling Protection
Recent changes to financial and insurance regulations and practices have made existing single-family homes located in the C-1 zone difficult to sell or insure. A new clause in the C-1 zone allows not only for the continued use of single-family dwellings within in the zone, but the ability to maintain, upgrade and expand their use. This should elevate these properties values and make obtaining home-owner protection much more easier.
The single-family use is only discontinued if the use changes to one of the other permitted uses or if destroyed beyond resonable recoverable amount.
Basement exemption
Prior to this amendment, basements within zones under the Zoning Bylaw 1850 were included in the total gross floor area (GFA) which is used to determine a number of other calucations, including the floor space ratio (FSR). The new definition is now more consistant with the wording in the Alpine Resort Zoning Bylaw 2016 where basements - those areas more than 1.2m (4') below grade - are exempt from the GFA calculation.
Need more information? Please contact the Planning Services department at www.kimberley.ca/contact.