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But the court squarely disagreed, finding that Manhattan Beach's zoning code "always permitted <br />short-term, as well as long-term, residential rentals." (Id. at 148 (emphasis added).) The court <br />explained that once the house or apartment building was built, anyone — renter or owner — could <br />reside there for periods long or short, since the code "offer[s] no textual basis for a temporal <br />distinction about the duration of rentals", and the term "`residence' does not imply some <br />minimum length of occupancy" (Id. at 148-149.) In short, "[a] `residential building' is used for <br />human habitation without regard to length of occupancy," and "[i]t is possible to reside <br />somewhere for a night, a week, or a lifetime." (Id. at 149.) <br />As in Keen, the Santa Ana Municipal Code authorizes "single-family residence" and "multiple <br />family residence" uses, and these classifications place no minimum length of occupancy <br />restriction on these residential uses. (Santa Ana Mun. Code, § 41-184 et seq.) And, just as in <br />Keen, long-term rental of residential property is permitted under the existing Santa Ana code. <br />And so, just in Keen, without any durational requirement for rentals in the code, there is no <br />justification for the unfounded claim that STRs are currently forbidden. <br />National Landscape <br />The California Court of Appeal's decision in Keen is not an outlier in holding that STRs are a <br />lawful residential use under existing zoning regulations. At least three state supreme courts have <br />reached the same conclusions, holding that local zoning ordinances limiting the use of property <br />in certain districts to "residential uses" permit STRs. (See Town of Conway a Kudrick, 175 N.H. <br />714 (N.H. 2023); In re Toor, 192 Vt. 259 (Vt. 2012); Landing Development Corp. a City of <br />Myrtle Beach, 285 S.C. 216 (S.C. 1985).) These courts have correctly observed that the <br />structures being used as STRs were indisputably "single units that include `provisions for living, <br />sleeping, eating, cooking, and sanitation,"' and that requirements for residents to be "living as a <br />household" or the like "refer[] to a group of individuals who live together under the same roof, <br />regardless of duration." (Kudrick, 175 N.H. at 719; see also Toor, 192 Vt. at 265 (similar quote).) <br />More broadly, nearly two dozen state supreme courts have addressed whether homeowners <br />association covenants and zoning ordinances like Santa Ana's that do not specifically address <br />STRs can nonetheless be read to prohibit or limit them. The majority of these courts have come <br />to the same conclusion: STRs are permitted residential uses. <br />The Proposed Prohibition Would Illegally Terminate the Existing Ability to Lawfully Use <br />One's Property for STR <br />The proposed prohibition would immediately disallow all STRs within the City, including those <br />already lawfully operating. The proposed prohibition would, in effect, convert currently legal <br />STRs into immediately illegal nonconforming uses. But terminating these legal nonconforming <br />uses in this way would violate longstanding California law. <br />California courts have long held that a parry may continue to use their property even though such <br />use is nonconforming. (Hill a Manhattan Beach, 6 Cal.3d 279, 285-86 (Cal. 1971); Livingston <br />Rock & Gravel Co. a Los Angeles County, 43 Cal.2d 121, 127 (Cal. 1954); Edmonds a Los <br />Angeles County, 40 Cal.2d 642, 651 (Cal. 1953); E.B. Jones a City of Los Angeles, 211 Cal.304, <br />310-311 (Cal. 1930).) The reason is simple: immediate termination of previously lawful (and <br />now non -conforming) uses would be of doubtful constitutionality. (Livingston Rock & Gravel <br />3 <br />