SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. – The next meeting of the South Lake Tahoe City Council takes place on Tuesday, February 10, at 9 a.m. They meet in the council chambers at the airport and online viewing options are available.

Outgoing City Manager Joe Irvin will receive a Key to the City to start the meeting. He has one week left at the City before heading to the City of Malibu as their new city manager.

The agenda highlights:

There are currently 128 units of affordable housing completed at the Sugar Pine Village, with 60 more to be completed this summer and another 60 in the next phase. The John Stewart Company and Related Companies of California will provide a
Presentation on how they select tenants for housing, and required compliance.

After the 2025 Vacation Home Rental (VHR) ordinance was approved, Council said they’d like to revisit it to see if adjustments needed to be made to the 150-foot buffer and other new components of the new rules. They attempted to approve updates in October, but the council had just gone through the department of then-Mayor Tamara Wallace and were left with a split among the four members.

The updated ordinance they will vote on Tuesday has two versions for a first reading:

Version 1:

  • 150-foot buffer is replaced with a cap of no more than 1,200 VHR permits in residential areas;
  • A minimum age of 25 is established to rent a VHR;
  • Attached condominiums are allowed to get VHR permits unless the applicable homeowners’ association rules prohibit VHRs;
  • Requires advertising platforms to include “family-friendly” language for VHRs in residential areas;
  • Appeals of permit denials go to an independent hearing officer instead of the Planning Commission
  • Commercial and recreational areas are regulated with rules applicable to the Tourist Core Area Plan; and
  • Room night reporting is required

Version 2:

  • 150-foot buffer is replaced with a prohibition of properties with VHR permits being adjacent to each other.
  • All other changes are the same as Version 1

In addition to the changes requested above, staff made several additional edits included in both versions that are consistent with these changes:
– To complement the cap, provisions were added to establish a waitlist when the cap is reached.
– The prohibition on permit transfers is clarified to match existing practice, where a permit may be transferred into a family trust in which an owner is a trustee for estate planning purposes.
– The preferred application period provision has been deleted as that period has closed.

In the last year, since VHRs were once again allowed in non-tourist core areas, 562 permits have been issued, for a total of 1,069 permits citywide, including active permits issued before July 2025. Under the 2025 Ordinance, 270 permit applications have been denied because the property was within the 150-foot buffer of another permitted property.

Staff is proposing to amend the Tahoe Valley Area Plan to include the South “Y” Industrial Tact Community Plan as a noncontiguous portion of the Area Plan. The City has experienced a shift in commercial trends since the South “Y” Industrial Tract’s most recent amendment in 2008, and updating the policies within this area will align with the City Council’s Strategic Plan Priority 4 to Grow and Diversify the Economy.

For the full agenda and instructions on participation, visit https://www.cityofslt.gov/84/Watch-City-CouncilCommission-Meetings. Councilmember Scott Robbins will be participating in the meeting from Cabras, Baja California, Mexico.