Residents of Newport Beach have a new way to resolve complaints and non-emergency issues related to short-term rental housing: A live answering service available 24 hours a day, every day.
The service can be reached at 949-718-3443.
Answering service operators will communicate complaints to the property owner or a designee as soon as they are received. The service will also help the City track the volume and types of short-term rental issues that impact neighborhoods.
Residents are encouraged to call the answering service for any non-emergency issue that occurs on a short-term rental property, such as loud parties, noise, parking, trash concerns, and occupancy limit violations. All emergency calls should still be placed to 911.
Under new regulations adopted by the City Council in July, short-term rental operators are required to provide a local contact person, either the property owner or a designee, who can immediately respond to complaints.
When calls are placed to the answering service, operators will then call the local contact person, who is required to respond to the complaint within 30 minutes. However, if the local contact person cannot be reached, the answering service operators will contact the Newport Beach Police Department for disturbance, noise and parking issues, and Code Enforcement for all other matters.
The answering service is part of a package of short-term rental reforms approved by the City Council in recent months. These include a prohibition on rentals to anyone under 21 years of age, occupancy limits that align with building and fire codes, and a requirement that property owners list their permit numbers in all advertising.
The new regulations were prompted by a growth in short-term rental housing in recent years through websites such as Airbnb, and a subsequent increase in community impacts.
Property owners with questions about the service are encouraged to call the City of Newport Beach’s Revenue Division at 949-718-1997, or e-mail lodging@newportbeachca.gov.
For more, please visit the City’s short-term rental information page.