BL2026-1520 on 1st reading

This discussion topic was requested by Council Member Tasha Ellis, relative to BL2026-1520, legislation relative to the definition of "boarding house" within the Metropolitan Zoning Code.

BL2026-1520 quietly strikes the clause "who are in need of shared lodging and personal services, supervision, or rehabilitative services" from Nashville's definition of "boarding house" (17.04.060). That clause is what tied the term to supportive/recovery housing. Removing it turns "boarding house" into a plain physical-use category: any temporary, shared-room accommodation, need or no need.

Before this reaches second reading, I'd like the sponsor and Planning staff to answer three questions publicly: (1) What prompted this specific deletion — a Fair Housing Act compliance concern, or a broader push to open up room-by-room rental uses? (2) Does this change anything in the Title 17.16 use table governing which zoning districts permit boarding houses, or does it only touch the definition? (3) Is this being coordinated with the pending changes to our unrelated-occupant cap? 

I'm asking because co-living operators that convert single-family homes into 5-8 bedroom room-by-room rentals — PadSplit already operates in Nashville — depend on exactly this kind of definitional flexibility nationally. District 29 has already seen what concentrated investor ownership of single-family housing does to a neighborhood. I want to know whether this bill is unrelated cleanup or a first domino.