Airbnb launches City Portal for local governments
Worldwide: In its continuing attempts to work with local governments, Airbnb has launched its City Portal, a dedicated solutions platform for municipalities.
The portal offers a dashboard, featuring Airbnb Data, compliance solutions, direct access to team members, and a central location for enforcement resources.
In keeping with its community compact, Airbnb forged individual partnerships with a major variety of different governments, providing hosting data to support local enforcement. These agreements helped Airbnb work with cities on regulations, data sharing, and tourist promotion, helping drive over $2 billion in tourist tax collection.
During the pandemic period, however, many leaders have pushed for greater transparency and regulation on the short-term rental market. The cities of Amsterdam and Chicago, as well as the Scottish government, have planned additions to their short-term rental regulations.
City Portal will directly connect governments with the Airbnb platform, providing them with:
- Local and global Airbnb data insights into market characteristics and tax data
- Industry-first compliance tools to develop and manage regulations
- A central location for law enforcement resources
- Direct access to an Airbnb team member.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said: “We created this tool with cities and our goal is to ensure it works for big cities and small towns and is adaptive to different needs. The way we live and travel continues to change, with people dispersing to more places. The Airbnb City Portal will make it easier for cities of all sizes to work with us and benefit from our community.”
The platform is launching with 15 pilot cities and tourist boards, including New Orleans, San Francisco, Visit Scotland, Visit Denmark, and São Paulo State Secretary of Tourism. These partners will provide feedback on the pilot programme, which will allow Airbnb to better adapt the platform for the full launch.
Vinicius Lummertz, tourism secretary for the State of São Paulo, said: “Airbnb is committed to offering innovative solutions in partnership with the State of São Paulo, and City Portal will be an important tool as we plan for the recovery of tourism and the economy.”
City Portal is the latest in a number of policies from Airbnb to help build its reputation with communities. It banned parties on its platform this year and pushed an enhanced cleaning programme which reached 1.2 million listings this month.
