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A diverse range of residents sit on the island’s newest City Council-appointed committee charged with creating short-term rental housing regulations.

Perhaps that’s why the first session Wednesday night was marked by much back and forth over the depth and breadth of the problem with out-of-control rental properties.

The first meeting was an opportunity for the residents, business leaders and realtors present to learn about the problems and discuss a starting point for solutions.

But the committee is calling on Marco Island residents to give it further insight into the issue before charging forward. A tentative forum has been scheduled for Feb. 27 at 7 p.m. in the community room of the Marco Island Police Department building to gather citizen input and testimony.

Part of the purpose for the meeting will be to find out if the problem is a subsurface, hidden issue that is going under-reported. Committee member Karen Salvi recounted to the committee the constant disruption created in her life by a neighboring rental property, but said she reaches a point where she does not even bother to report complaints, knowing that the city has little power of enforcement of anything other than noise or parking violations.

Salvi is advocating restricting rental lengths to 30 days or more in order to reform the properties that are used primarily for parties.

Member Ken Honecker said he has experienced the same frustration as Salvi.

“Once you find out how the system here works, you give up and you stop calling,” he said.

City Councilor Chuck Kiester, the non-voting chair of the new committee, said the group was formed to focus on closing loop-holes that allow rental owners to fly under the radar or skate by with infractions.

Joe Oliverio, who was appointed to the committee for his status as head of the Marco Island Restaurant Association, said he came into the committee believing the issue was larger than a handful of repeat problems. Hearing testimony from Police Chief Roger Reinke about repeat problems with a handful of properties, Oliverio said he believed the committee’s core mission should be to find a way to make those “frequent flyers” more accountable.

“It’s like apples. You don’t throw out the whole cart, but get rid of the bad ones before they spoil the whole bunch,” Oliverio said.

Presently, no form of city regulation or registration exists for Marco Island short-term rental properties. Chief Code Compliance Officer Eric Wardle said the properties are required to be licensed by the state of Florida for commercial use, but that list is not made readily available to the city and no inspections are required.

Wardle said there are currently 23 licenses issued by the state to short-term rental properties on Marco Island. A property is defined as a short-term rental if the owner rents it out three or more times a year for less than 30 days at a time.

Fire Chief Mike Murphy added that the licenses are issued with no fire inspection, and the state has indicated that the onus for such safety regulation will fall to local entities.

“It provides the authorization to me, but the state can issue all of these licenses without notifying me,” Murphy said.

To top it off, city ordinances governing the number of unrelated people who can stay in a house at a given time are hard to enforce, Wardle said, without going through a house to request identification from every occupant. Moreover, when police arrive on a call of a disturbance or problem, the renters are not even obligated to speak to law enforcement.

It is just a snapshot of the myriad problems that led to the committee’s formation, and a glimpse, too, at the tough row the committee may have to hoe in the coming months. As the committee forms its purpose and mission, it will establish recommendations for City Council to form into city codes and ordinances, all through the direction of staff like Wardle, Murphy, Reinke and Community Development Director Steve Olmsted.

The committee is expected to establish regular meeting times following the public forum planned for later in the month.