Longboat OKs lawsuit in short-term rental case

Out of state companies ignored more than a dozen fines over Country Club Shores home, town says.

By Eric Garwood
| 9:11 a.m. June 4, 2019

Longboat Key
News

Town Commissioners on Monday gave their OK to a lawsuit against a pair of out-of-state companies over what Town Attorney Maggie Mooney called “unrepentant’ violations of the town’s short-term rental regulations.

New magistrate

By the end of September, Longboat Key’s Code Enforcement Board — made up of seven volunteer members selected by the Town Commission — will be phased out in favor of a special magistrate.

The decision, made in June 2018 as part of other changes in how the town handles code enforcement, was punctuated this week with agreement to terms with Milan Brkich, a retired lawyer who spent 17 years as an assistant county attorney for Sarasota.

Town Commissioners this week agreed to the terms of a three-year contract with Brkich, paying him $275 an hour for a minimum of two hours for code enforcement meetings or hearings. In addition to the three-year contract, the possibility of two one-year extensions were included.

Brkich wil not be an employee of the town and serves at the pleasure of the Town Commission.

Brkich retired from Sarasota County in 2017 after a 34-year career in the legal profession. In addition to his work in the County Attorney’s office in Sarasota, he served in a similar capacity in Charlotte County.

According to a town memo from Planning, Zoning and Building Director Allen Parsons to Town Manager Tom Harmer, the intention in making the switch is designed to “promote, protect and improve the health, safety and welfare of the town’s citizens by providing an equitable, expeditious, effective and inexpensive method of enforcing town codes and ordinances.’’

Anyone in receipt of a citation from the town — much like a traffic ticket — has the right to challenge the assertion they broke local rules. That challenge, instead of going to the Code Enforcement Board, will now be assigned to the special magistrate.

Mooney said Equity Villa Fund LP, a San Diego company, and Equity Residences LLC, have been fined more than a dozen times over their rental of a home at 537 Schooner Lane. Mooney said the owners of the home have not responded to the fines and continue to rent for less than 30 days, a violation of the town code. That home was among the first to be fined when the town began issuing on-the-spot citations in 2018. About a month into the new procedure, it had already racked up six citations.

Messages left with Equity Villa Fund LP offices were not returned.

The lawsuit was filed in the 12th Circuit on Tuesday, according to court records. Attorney Arthur Hardy of the Sarasota firm of Matthews Eastmoore would represent the town in this matter, Mooney said.

Both Equity Villa Fund and Equity Residences were given 20 days to respond to the town's lawsuit.

The owners of the home, purchased for $639,100 in 2013, have advertised it for a week or less on popular vacation rental sites, Mooney said. It also appears on The Home Collection at a Glance page of Equity Residences’ website, along with homes in other vacation spots in Florida, the Caribbean, Hawaii and California.

“They have been issued citations to no avail,’’ Mooney said. “They continue to flagrantly and blatantly disregard our code. We all know our short-term vacation rental ordinance is one of our longstanding, grandfathered provisions here on Longboat Key and it’s sacrosanct.’’

Mooney said it was likely that no matter what path the town took — either through the Code Enforcement Board or the soon-to-be installed special magistrate — legal proceedings would result.

“We think all roads lead to the courthouse,’’ she said.

The town’s lawsuit would seek no damages or back fines, but rather seeks injunctive relief to declare the owners in violation and stop them from continuing. Mooney said the owners will likely argue that the town’s code is invalid and state law takes priority.

“Our ordinance has a long-standing history,’’ she said “It predates the 2011 preemption by the state legislature, but we expect that argument will be raised by their counsel and we just need to address that.’’

That date is important, for all short-term rental rules passed after 2011 were nullified when the state Legislature passed a law allowing short-term rentals anywhere across the state.

The town’s fine process is $100 for a first offense, $250 for a second offense and $500 for a third offense.