A homeowners association in Park Township will have its day in court on Monday as members seek to overturn a ban on short-term rentals. They want an Ottawa County circuit court to declare that short-term rentals of single-family homes are permitted under a 1974 zoning ordinance. Township officials, meanwhile, ask the court to dismiss the association’s lawsuit and remove an injunction against enforcing the ban.

Michigan Capitol Confidential previously reported that the Park Township Board voted on Nov. 10, 2022, to enforce a long-dormant zoning ordinance. The 50-year-old law had not been used to ban short-term rentals.

After township officials indicated they would enforce the ban, homeowners who rent out their property on a short-term basis created the nonprofit organization Park Township Neighbors. They sought a compromise, they say, but township officials refused. The association then sued.

In the latest development, Park Township filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit with prejudice. If the judge rules in its favor, the homeowners who brought suit must pay the township’s legal fees.

The township’s motion to dismiss acknowledges that the prohibition was not enforced for many years.

”Prior to the past half-dozen years or so, renting out cottages, houses and cabins in single-family residential or agricultural zoning districts to third parties for purely commercial or business use was relatively rare. It has long been common throughout West Michigan (particularly on lakes) for the past century or so for families to rent out their cottages or cabins for a few weeks each year to pay the property taxes and defray costs,” reads the brief that accompanies the motion to dismiss.

Jeremy Allen, president of Park Township Neighbors, told Michigan Capitol Confidential in an email that the township did not dispute the facts.

Its court filing, he said, “means that all of the under-oath depositions of their current and former employees and board members (where they stated that there were no regulations against short-term rentals in the past) or the many printed documents and emails also supporting the legality of short-term rentals aren’t being disputed by them.”

The township agreed that its employees have said short-term rentals were not illegal, Allen said. Park Township Neighbors, he told CapCon, hopes the judge will see the township’s motion to dismiss as a kitchen-sink attempt.

The township’s brief acknowledges that until April 1, 2024, Park Township zoning ordinances did not mention short-term rentals but disputes the idea that this made short-term rentals permissible. “The current and past Zoning Ordinances for Park Township also do not mention circuses, commercial bungee jumping operations, castles, ice skating rinks, or many other uses or items. That silence does not indicate or even imply that those uses are allowed.”

The township approved two new ordinances in March banning short-term rentals. Even if the homeowners win the current dispute, they will also need a favorable ruling on the new ordinances.

The homeowners association asks the judge to rule that as part of the current lawsuit, short-term rental homes that existed before the new ordinances took effect will be grandfathered, meaning they would be allowed under law.

Security guards employed by Triple Canopy, Inc. at roughly 20 sites in Michigan will no longer be required to pay a union, United Security Guards of America, as a condition of being employed.

Michigan resident James Reamsma, who led the effort to launch a deauthorization vote, also filed an unfair labor practice complaint against the union. Reamsma and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which gave him legal aid, await the outcome of that complaint.

Reamsma, who works out of the Grand Rapids area, launched the successful deauthorization effort earlier this year. The National Labor Relations Board, which oversees union elections, scheduled the vote for May. It did not announce the results until September.

The vote removes the union security clause from the contract between the union and Triple Canopy, which provides security at various federal installations. Guards at Triple Canopy’s locations in Michigan now can choose not to pay the union, but the union retains exclusive bargaining rights over the guards.

Federal labor officials waited too long to release the vote tally, Reamsma told Michigan Capitol Confidential. “It’s frustrating that the NLRB takes so long to process our election to free ourselves from having to pay dues to a union,” he said in a quote provided by the right-to-work organization.

“Many of us are retired police officers, or military, working part time, supplementing our income by providing security for government buildings across Michigan.”

Reamsma also filed unfair labor practice charges against the union in May, alleging it failed to comply with federal rules about disclosing its political spending. He was obligated to pay either dues or an agency fee, and he told the union he wanted to pay an agency fee. An agency fee does not fund political activities. Dues can fund political activities.

The union told Reamsma that the fee and the dues were the same amount, according to the right-to-work organization. The union “failed to provide the financial disclosures for itself and its affiliated unions, and a chance to object to its alleged reduced fee,” Reamsma said in a press release from the organization.

Reamsma also wanted to pay by check rather than through withholding, the organization said. Withholding allegedly continued, however, in violation of federal labor law.

CapCon could not contact the union for comment.