Voters To Decide Tuesday on 25-Room Limit for City Hotels

BY BAY CITY NEWS SERVICE

Sonoma voters will decide Tuesday whether there should be a limit on the number of hotels with more than 25 rooms in the city.

Measure B, the Hotel Limitation Measure, would amend the city of Sonoma's General Plan to prohibit new hotels and expanded existing hotels with more than 25 rooms to preserve Sonoma's small town character.

 The measure requires a majority approval to pass. Under the measure, the city could permit a new hotel or expanded existing hotel to have more than 25 rooms under the General Plan if the city's existing annual hotel occupancy rate exceeds 80 percent, or if the approval of more than 25 rooms won't adversely affect "the historic small town characteristics that gives Sonoma its unique sense of place."

A Yes on Measure B group, the Preserving Sonoma Committee, says hotels, like other development projects, should be subject to regulation under the planning process. "Unless commercial hotel development in Sonoma is controlled, we risk being over-built.

Traffic, pedestrian safety and over-crowding are already problems; without development controls in place it will quickly get worse" the committee's website states.

The Protect Sonoma No on Measure B Committee's argument is that the prohibition on more than 25 rooms will damage the city's reputation as a world-class tourist destination. They say Measure B's ban is extreme because an 80 percent occupancy rate is unattainable.

"Sonoma does not have a hotel problem," the Protect Sonoma No on B Committee states. It says local residents, the Planning Commission, Design Review Commission and City Council are the best course to determine the city's sustainable future.

A study by Keyser Marston Associates Inc. of San Francisco determined Sonoma's average annual occupancy rate since 2003 was 62 percent, and the highest occupancy rate was 69 percent at a hotel with more than 26 rooms in 2006.

"It is highly unlikely that Sonoma's existing lodging properties will achieve the 80 percent average annual occupancy rate prescribed by the initiative," Keyser Marston Associates concluded in its report. In 2012, only New York City, San Francisco and Oahu had an 80 percent average annual occupancy rate, according to the study.

If Measure B is approved, it is unlikely any hotels over 25 rooms will be built in the city of Sonoma, the study concluded. There are five lodgings with 26 or more rooms and 34 lodgings with between 1 and 25 rooms in Sonoma, according to the study.

The 39 lodging properties in Sonoma contain 527 rooms. The Renaissance Lodge at Sonoma is the largest with 182 rooms.