Airbnb Issues Response To Hoboken House Party Ordinance

HOBOKEN, NJ — When people are renting out their homes and apartments amid a pandemic, how does a city guarantee their guests follow statewide rules for precautions amid coronavirus?

The mile-square city of Hoboken, which is teeming with young people and restaurants, recently instituted a fine of up to $1,000 for people holding house parties, if they exceed guidelines for crowding and noise.

In July, an Airbnb house party in New Jersey infamously drew 700 people. (The company cracked down on house parties after that.)

Airbnb lists several rentals in Hoboken, as well as others in nearby towns that show up when searching for Hoboken.

According to city spokesman Vijay Chaudhuri, earlier in the pandemic, the Hoboken Office of Emergency Management banned the use of short-term rentals for non-Hoboken residents through an executive order, "to protect the health and safety of Hoboken residents." But the state issued an order to permit Airbnb's as long as they follow certain regulations, including indoor gathering limits.

(Indoor gathering limits were reduced to 10 people by the state of New Jersey on Tuesday.)

On Tuesday, Airbnb issued a statement to assure the public about the new house party ordinance.

Statement from Airbnb on Hoboken “House Party” Ordinance

"Airbnb fully agrees with the importance of preventing disruptive house parties, especially as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact communities across New Jersey," the company wrote. "That’s why Airbnb has taken steps to ban both parties and party houses, going so far as to suspend or remove party houses across New Jersey this summer — including here in Hoboken. We fully support Mayor Bhalla and the City Council as they work to implement this new ordinance and we hope to partner with the city to continue to crack down on parties and party houses, in accordance with public health guidance.”

They also provided this background on other steps they have taken about house parties:

Background

• Airbnb informally banned party houses in late 2019.
• In a July party house crackdown, Airbnb suspended or removed more than 35 listings throughout New Jersey that received complaints or otherwise violated our policies on parties and events, including in Hoboken.
• The company recently announced a global ban on all parties and events at Airbnb listings, including a cap on occupancy at 16.
• Airbnb prohibited one-night reservations over Halloween weekend in entire home listings throughout the US and bolstered existing protections and technologies aimed at stopping as many large gatherings as possible that weekend.
• The company expanded the manual screening of high-risk reservations flagged by our automated systems. This technology helps us to stop parties before they start. Since the expansion of our manual review of high-risk reservations last year, more than 250 high-risk reservations in New Jersey have been proactively cancelled. Further, our restrictions on guests under the age of 25 from booking entire-home listings locally, combined with our restrictions on very last-minute bookings, have blocked over 23,000 distinct reservation attempts in New Jersey.

Hoboken updates

The Hoboken Police Department doled out six fines of up to $1,000 to people throwing house parties over the previous weekend, the city said.

On Wednesday, the mayor said Hoboken University Medical Center has 14 coronavirus patients, including six Hoboken residents. This a change from last week, when the mayor said 17 people were fighting the virus at the hospital, including six Hoboken residents.

On Monday, the city confirmed five new cases, and 11 on Tuesday, bringing the total citywide to 1,202 since the beginning of the pandemic. Fatalities remain unchanged at 31.

Over the weekend, the state of New Jersey said it had confirmed the highest number of new cases since in April.

On Sunday, the State of New Jersey reported 18 new fatalities since the day before, and a record high of 4,540 new cases, following 4,395 positive cases on Saturday. Before that, the highest one-day total was 4,391 on April 17.

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