It doesn't take long to feel the sense of community in the Strawberry Hill neighborhood in KCK.
“People of different backgrounds, different incomes," said Wesley McKain, who sits on the Strawberry Hill Neighborhood Association Board. "And also families, people who live here and invest."
McKain and his neighbors are worried about a rise in short-term rentals, which he says detracts from what makes the neighborhood great.
He has two big issues with the boom in those rentals.
1 is a loss of neighborhood identity when properties are sold to owners who don't live in, but rent out homes short-term.
"You start losing neighbors, you start losing people who you can form relationships with," he said. "People you get to know, people who can be in your support network."
McKain said it also accelerates the rise in the cost to own a home in the area.
Those higher prices mean fewer opportunities for lower to middle-income families to move into the historic neighborhood.
"I think of Airbnb as like a supercharger for that," he said.
Strawberry Hill is one of the hottest places in the area to set up a short-term rental.
But Mike Farley, part of the Unified Government's Department of Urban Design, said short-term rentals aren't always done legally and it's tough to regulate the properties.
"Over the course of, you know, even just the last year, the number of unique, short-term rentals advertised in this community has grown," Farley said.
Farley spoke to concerned residents at a meeting Tuesday night about new regulations that could help ease their concerns.
"We want people to have that ability, but at the same time recognizing that any change in use does have an effect on the surrounding community as well," he said.
Recommendations from Tuesday night's meeting included steeper fines for not completing short-term rental approval paperwork and strict limits on the number of short-term rentals an area can host could be in force as early as February.
