Under both House and Senate bills, the new tax would apply to vacation-home rentals with terns shorter than 90 days, and to Airbnb and similar "sharing economy" rentals. Both bills also include an additional 2.75% room tax to be dedicated to a Water Protection Fund.

The House bill provides for a tax rate of between 4% and 8% depending on number of units rented. Towns would vote on whether or not to implement the new tax, and towns implementing the tax would be required to register rental units and conduct safety inspections.

Under the Senate bill, for towns that already collect the existing 5.7% state room tax, liability would be automatically extended to include short-term rentals.

Sentiment in the real-estate community seems to favor the Senate version - probably because of the complications posed by the registration and inspection requirements of the House version.

The safety issue in and of itself should be sufficient to motivate governments at every level to want to get these rental units registered and inspected.

And there's also a fairness issue: hotels, inns, bnbs, campgrounds are all subject to state and/or local health and safety inspection, to ensure the safety of visitors. That costs these businesses a lot of money, and allowing short-term rentals to remain exempt from these requirements will soon start putting out of business the "legitimate" lodging businesses with which they're competing.

Let's have some regulations with teeth in them.