MARFA — As Marfa city officials move forward with a proposed short-term rental ordinance, they’re cutting ties with one company that promises to help governments enforce such rules. At a city council meeting on Tuesday, council voted unanimously to end its contract with Host Compliance.
While Marfa city officials hope to better regulate the local vacation-rental market, they said Host Compliance’s focus seemed to be on larger cities and that the ongoing coronavirus pandemic was upending the contractual relationship. As City Attorney Teresa Todd explained: “There were times we reached out and we just didn’t get responses.”
When asked about these criticisms, a spokesperson for Host Compliance said in an email that while they were “disappointed that our partnership with The City of Marfa is coming to an end,” they wished the city “the very best.”
“Ensuring that our customers have the support they need to be successful is a top priority,” the spokesperson added. “Whenever this goal isn’t met, we do everything we can to identify the problem and take the necessary steps to make it right.”
Marfa’s roughly $21,000 contract with Host Compliance started after the company gave a presentation last December on the problems posed by unregulated rentals in town.
In its 2019 presentation, a company representative promised solutions to Marfa’s issues with “short-term rental registration, compliance monitoring, fraud, audit and enforcement challenges” and offered services to monitor rentals to assure they were complying with existing city ordinances.
The company ensured it would track the local rental markets, monitor hotel occupancy tax collection and assist Marfa in enforcing short-term rental ordinances. But one year into the contract, city officials were dissatisfied with the service.
Rather than working with Host Compliance, the city hopes to hire a new employee to act as a liaison with short-term rental owners and help enforce any new rules on them. “We’re not getting value out of this,” Councilmember Buck Johston said of the Host Compliance contract. “I think COVID has been a factor. It’s shaken everything up.”