Vacation rental owners will now need to sign up for a new account on MUNIRev’s short-term rental arm, LODGINGRevs, to access their records. A new vacation rental complaint hotline has been launched, the town-village Building and Planning Department announced Wednesday, June 30.

Anyone with a complaint about a short-term rental or who may suspect a violation of the town-village joint vacation rental regulations can contact the hotline at 518-739-7906. Complaints can also be submitted online at by sending an email to lodging.munirevs.com/complaint.

Owners of vacation rental properties should get an email with an activation code, which they will need to use at northelba.munirevs.com to sign up for an account to access their records, renew their permits, update their contact information or pay their annual permit fee.

Throughout the past few months, the town and village have contracted with a company called Host Compliance to operate the back end of its vacation rental enforcement. Earlier this month, Code Enforcement Officer Michael Orticelle said the municipalities left Host Compliance “mostly for administrative reasons.”

“Their customer service wasn’t what it should’ve been, it waned over the year, and we had no administrative power, really, to do any changes that would be helpful for owners — transferring properties and so forth,” he said.

The switch to LODGINGRevs is expected to save the Building and Planning Department somewhere between $15,000 to $20,000 per year, according to Orticelle.

The new software will also provide the department with more information, such as how many days a property has been rented in any given year. That function is expected to give the department some support as it enforces the village’s 90-day cap and the town’s 120-day cap on rental occupancy. These caps are only applicable to units where the owner doesn’t live full-time. The occupancy caps don’t apply to properties on Main Street, Sentinel Road and on portions of Route 86 that are commercial areas. Property owners can contact the Building and Planning Department for information specific to their units.

The fine for the first week of noncompliance with the law is at least $350, according to the law. Each week that the violation continues is counted as a separate law violation. When a property owner violates the law a second time within five years of the first offense, there’s another fine of at least $1,000. The code enforcement office has the ability to revoke a property owner’s rental permit. Property owners have the option of appealing any decision the office makes to the Short Term Rental Appeals Board within 30 days.