A Maui County Council committee on Thursday recommended the approval of a version of Mayor Richard Bissen’s controversial plan to phase out roughly half of the island’s short-term rentals in a far-reaching effort to improve the island’s housing stock.

However, some of the most contentious details remain unfinished business and several council members expressed frustration at how the process has pitted members of the community against each other.

Applause broke out at the end, but the public debate was occasionally interrupted by heckling, signaling growing impatience with the council’s delays in voting.

The 6-3 vote on Bill 9 came after several hours of often heated deliberations and multiple days of emotional testimony during meetings of the Housing and Land Use Committee, which includes all nine council members. 

The measure, which has polarized the community for more than a year, must still be approved by the full council. That is expected to happen in roughly two weeks around Aug. 12, according to council member Gabe Johnson.

Aspects may change before the final vote, as some council members agreed to support the bill contingent on the creation of a temporary investigative group to allow for discussion between lawmakers and the county planning department and to iron out differences over exceptions for certain properties in areas with multiple zoning districts.

Emotions ran high as the issue pit many property owners and advocates who say they may lose their livelihoods and fear an economic hit to the tourism-dependent island against supporters who believe the bill will help ease a housing crisis that was exacerbated by the deadly 2023 wildfires.

One widely cited study released in March by the University of Hawaiʻi Economic Research Organization warned that the elimination of nearly half of the county’s short-term housing stock would lead to widespread job loss, a decrease in tax revenue and a weakened economy.

“I find this whole process kind of disappointing because we’re not coming out with clean solutions,” council member Alice Lee said. Lee voted yes but expressed frustration that questions like the loss of revenue weren’t addressed.

Bissen first proposed Bill 9 in May 2024, responding to the devastating 2023 wildfires that displaced more than 12,000 people in Lahaina and Kula and exacerbated Maui’s longstanding housing crisis.

The legislation aims to increase long-term housing options for locals by prohibiting property owners from operating apartment-zoned units as short-term rentals on platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo.

The council also took up the issue on Wednesday but had to extend deliberations when members couldn’t reach a decision.

On Thursday, council members spent several hours behind closed doors in executive session conferring with their attorneys on proposed changes and any liabilities potentially facing the county before returning to the public portion of the meeting to vote on amendments and then the bill itself.

Lawmakers agreed to extend the timeline to end the exemptions that have long allowed about 7,000 condos and other apartment-zoned units to operate as short-term vacation rentals. If approved, the legislation would phase out these vacation rentals in areas zoned for apartments in West Maui by the end of 2028 and elsewhere by the end of 2030.

But after much debate, the council chose not to include other proposed amendments that included a path for certain properties in resort areas to continue operating as short-term rentals and the creation of a streamlined process to apply for zoning changes. Those proposals were met with pushback from the county planning department and will instead be tackled by the temporary investigative group, much to the frustration of some council members.

“I’m not a happy camper. I’m very disappointed in the way this has all evolved,” said council member Tom Cook, who spearheaded those amendments and was one of the three to vote against the bill along with Council Vice-Chair Yuki Lei Sugimura and Committee Chair Tasha Kama.

Those who voted in favor included Johnson, Council Chair Alice Lee, Tamara Paltin, Keani Rawlins-Fernandez, Shane Sinenci and Nohelani Uʻu-Hodgins.

For several lawmakers, the outcome of this committee vote felt unsatisfying.

“I find this whole process kind of disappointing because we’re not coming out with clean solutions,” said council member Alice Lee, who voted to support the plan but made clear her reservations because issues like the potential loss of revenue weren’t addressed.

Still, the council chamber was filled with community members and lawmakers celebrating the outcome, many wearing red shirts and representing Lahaina Strong which has been in fierce support of the bill.

“Too long our government has looked at profits over people,” Johnson said in an interview with Civil Beat following the vote. “And with this bill and this movement, we’re now looking at people over the profits.”

As the marathon session came to a close, Kama urged the community to unite.

“We haven’t been together, and we all feel that,” she said. “But that’s not us. That’s not who we are. We need to get back to who we really are, people who love each other, who care about each other.”

Civil Beat’s coverage of Maui County is supported in part by a grant from the Nuestro Futuro Foundation.