Moratorium Minute
Last week, on January 11, 2022, the City of Aspen Community Development staff presented a moratorium update to Aspen City Council. The purpose of the discussion was to inform Council and the community about staff’s progress on the new residential development and vacation rental permitting process within Aspen city limits, as well as receive guidance about prioritizing identified problem areas:
- Vacation rentals (aka short-term rentals).
- Pace and scale of residential development.
- Affordable housing production.
- Development procedures within the Land-Use Code.
Staff also consulted with Council about their ideas about engaging the community in the development process. Council showed their support for a robust public engagement plan that will include outreach to stakeholders in the community, allowing opportunities for everyone to provide feedback about potential solutions for how our community will evolve over time. In addition to public comment, staff will base their recommendations to Council on research collected from other mountain communities and our own Aspen history. We believe that being well informed about our past will help guide us through the process and that the process will help us shape the built environment for the future as we consider the relationship between climate and development in new ways.
Council and staff are scheduled to reconvene to present their plan of action moving forward, including community engagement initiatives, at the February 1, 2022 council meeting. To watch recorded and live council meetings, visit aspen.gov.
Community Development will continue to inform the Aspen community about the progress related to Ordinance 27, the moratorium on residential building and vacation rental permits, through a variety of mediums including this e-newsletter, the Community Development Update. We encourage our subscribers to share this information with interested parties and invite others to subscribe to this e-newsletter on our website.