HOLMES BEACH – On Oct. 1, West Manatee Fire Rescue (WMFR) will begin mandatory annual inspections of all short-term vacation rentals in the fire district that includes Anna Maria Island, Cortez and portions of west Bradenton.
The WMFR inspections are separate from the vacation rental inspections conducted by the cities of Anna Maria and Holmes Beach.
Bradenton resident and Holmes Beach vacation rental owner Michael Wilcox volunteered his three-unit Casa Coconut AMI vacation rental as the first to be inspected and reinspected. Wilcox is a retired fire lieutenant from the Miami Valley Fire District in Miamisburg, Ohio and still holds an active Ohio fire safety inspector certificate. The former firefighter offered his vacation rental units as an official trial run for WMFR and he conducted his own inspection before the WMFR inspection took place.
“I came up with what I think are 19 violations in my three units and some of them are repetitive. I didn’t fix anything before the WMFR inspection,” he said.
Inspection checklist
The WMFR inspections utilize the one-page checklist posted at the WMFR website, www.wmfr.org/short-term-vacation-rental-information.
The checklist includes properly displayed street numbers, properly maintained wall-mounted fire extinguishers, emergency lights at primary exits, smoke alarms in each bedroom, additional smoke alarms in common areas and hallways and carbon monoxide alarms in rentals with gas appliances or attached garages. The checklist notes golf carts are to be charged in a well-ventilated area, with a carbon monoxide detector required.
All electrical circuits shall be properly identified and extension cords shall not be used as permanent wiring. Dryer ducts must be free of accumulated lint and all paths of ingress and egress shall be kept clear and unobstructed.
A copy of the vacation rental owner’s annual transient public lodging establishment (TPLE) license issued by Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR) must be included in the guest information book. The guest information book must also include fire safety information describing the evacuation of the dwelling, smoke detector information, procedures for reporting a fire or other emergency and a unit-specific floor plan that identifies each room and the primary and secondary exits, including the windows.
Initial inspection
On Aug. 21, Wilcox welcomed WMFR Fire Marshal Rodney Kwiatkowski, Lt. Inspector Keith Miller and Inspector Josh Adkins to the vacation rental he and his wife own near Manatee Beach.
Miller and Adkins began by inspecting the exterior of the dwelling, including the ground-level parking and storage areas and the laundry room.
“We’re looking at everything outside the structure,” Miller said.
As they inspected each rental unit, Adkins entered the observed violations, photographs of the observed violations and additional notes into the handheld digital inspection pad that produced the electronic inspection report emailed to Wilcox.
The inspection revealed missing or improperly located smoke alarms, non-wall mounted fire extinguishers, fire extinguishers that had not been inspected and certified within the past year, no battery-powered emergency lights near the primary exits and no unit-specific floor plan in each guest information book. Wilcox was given 45 days to correct the violations and schedule a reinspection.
“Vacation rental owners and managers should embrace this process because it’s going to save lives,” Kwiatkowski said, noting that last year more than 73% of the residential fires in the district occurred at vacation rentals.
“As long as it’s not a violation that poses imminent danger, a grace period of 45 days will be allowed to become compliant. The Florida Fire Prevention Code gives us flexibility and we’ll weigh all options and come up with the best solutions when applicable,” he added.
“If you rent or advertise for rent your place three or more times for less than 30 days at a time you need a TPLE license from DBPR; and the state fire marshal’s office says we have to inspect these TPLEs annually. We have roughly 3,000 vacation rentals that are appropriately registered through DBPR. We are told by three different software companies that we likely have closer to 5,000 vacation rentals in our district.”
A recently-approved WMFR resolution formalized the fire district’s intent to categorize vacation rentals as commercial properties, rather than residential properties, for the WMFR tax assessments that appear on a property owner’s annual property tax bill. The increased tax revenues will help cover the fire district’s increased inspection costs and letters were sent to property owners informing them of the commercial assessment rate.
Kwiatkowski said anyone who wishes to challenge the district’s right to inspect short-term vacation rentals would be challenging the Florida Fire Code adopted by state legislators.
“They’re taking on the state of Florida, because they’re the ones that wrote the law,” Kwiatkowski said.
“The code tells us we have to do this,” Adkins added.
“Our goal is to work with property owners/managers to gain compliance,” Kwiatkowski said. “If, and I stress if, a property owner/manager were to refuse to meet the minimum fire and life safety standards required under Florida Administrative Code 69A-43, we would use the full force of our state enforcement powers, including, but not limited to fines or shutting down the business in order to keep the public and first responders safe. That’s a scenario I am hoping will be avoided through good quality public education.”
Wilcox said he spoke with other vacation rental owners and property managers who expressed anxiety about WMFR classifying vacation rentals as commercial properties for taxation purposes.
“I got my tax bill yesterday and it’s going to go up $700, total, for all three units on this property. Nobody wants to pay more, but I don’t mind paying that because I think there’s value in having this program,” Wilcox said.
Follow-up inspection
On Sept. 13, Kwiatkowski, Adkins and Inspector Nick Riffe returned for the follow-up reinspection that revealed all previous violations were corrected.
Wilcox displayed his rechargeable emergency lights that plug into an electrical outlet near the main exit and come on when the power goes off. He bought them at Amazon.com for about $10 each and also placed one in each bedroom.
Regarding his now-wall-mounted fire extinguishers, Wilcox said some rental owners he spoke with expressed consternation about the aesthetics of wall-mounted fire extinguishers versus placing them under the sink or in some other less conspicuous location.
“Aesthetics don’t save lives,” Kwiatkowski said.
Wilcox spent about $500 correcting his violations.
“Next year it’ll be about $100 to have the extinguishers serviced and my taxes are going up about $700,” Wilcox said of his future compliance costs.
When asked what he learned during the inspections, Wilcox said, “It confirmed to me that the intent isn’t to close down vacation rentals. The intent is to make them safer.”
Wilcox noted that for the past several years the Florida Legislature has unsuccessfully attempted to preempt all short-term rental regulation to the state and take that authority away from local governments.
“Eventually it’s going to pass. When that happens, it’s going to take the enforcement away from the cities, but it won’t affect the WMFR inspections. There will still be something in place that’s not negated by future legislation,” Wilcox said.
“A lot of the property owners are worried about what the inspections will include and how extreme they’re going to be,” Adkins said. “This wasn’t a hard task for Mike. It was simple and it took seven days – and the majority of that time was waiting for the fire extinguisher company inspection.”
“Our goal is to support local businesses and ensure that they’re safe so the guests keep coming back. We’re asking vacation rental owners and managers to go to our website and schedule their inspections,” Kwiatkowski said.
