Scottsdale Police cracking down on short-term rentals

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — The Scottsdale Police Department is seeing a massive jump in short-term rental citations.

This fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, the department has issued nearly 30 times as many short-term rental (STR) citations as the previous fiscal year.

“If you’re making all this money in our community and being disruptive, then you need to do it the right way. It’s very fair,” said Sgt. Eric Bolles, with Scottsdale PD’s short-term rental unit.

Scottsdale Police said they’ve issued over 700 charges for nuisance parties and short-term related issues compared to just 25 in the previous year. Sgt. Bolles said it’s not just partiers that are the problem. The unit is also seeing a rise in unlicensed short-term rentals.

“We realize one of the biggest complaints from our citizens are all these houses popping up. They’ll go and do research and say there’s three by me, and they’re not licensed,” Sgt. Bolles said.

The police unit monitors which STRs are licensed, unlicensed, pending or expired through a map. Sgt. Bolles said there are nearly 3,200 licensed STRs in Scottsdale right now. They hope to help tackle these unlicensed STRs to ensure everyone is operating as they should.

Sgt. Bolles said the reason for the increase in citations is more dedication to their STR unit. So far, they have two officers and a police aide to help with the growing number of calls.

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