Porter Township, Pennsylvania Short-Term Rental Regulations: A 2026 Guide For Airbnb Hosts

Do you own a place in Porter Township, Pennsylvania and you're weighing whether to put it on Airbnb or Vrbo? Well, the good news is that Porter Township doesn't run anything close to the licensing gauntlet that bigger Pennsylvania markets do. It sits in Clinton County, near Mill Hall and Lock Haven, and I went through the township's own zoning page, its permit fee schedule, and Clinton County's own records without turning up a dedicated short-term rental ordinance for this township at all.

None of that amounts to a green light, though. Porter Township's own copy of its zoning ordinance wouldn't load for me, even after two separate attempts, so I can't tell you which zoning district your property sits in or whether a short-term rental shows up there as a permitted use. What I can confirm is that two taxes still attach the moment you take a paying guest, regardless of what the zoning ordinance eventually turns out to say: Pennsylvania's 6% hotel occupancy tax and Clinton County's own 5% hotel tax on top of it.

So this guide walks through what's actually confirmed for 2026: the permits Porter Township does have on the books, both tax layers and who collects them, the honest gap in the zoning ordinance, and exactly who to call before you list. Every figure below comes from Porter Township's, Clinton County's, or Pennsylvania's own pages, checked in July 2026, and where I hit a locked door, I've said so plainly. If you're weighing this property against a market with clearer rules, run the numbers through BNBCalc first.

What Are Short-Term Rental (Airbnb, VRBO) Regulations in Porter Township, Pennsylvania?

Running the numbers is the easy part. Knowing what actually governs the property comes first, so let's start with the layer that's supposed to matter most here: local zoning.

Pennsylvania itself sets almost no rules on this. The state's own Joint State Government Commission said as much in its March 2025 staff study: Pennsylvania's short-term rental rules are "a patchwork of primarily county and municipal zoning ordinances and regulations," and even the definition of "short-term rental" changes from one municipality to the next. That leaves Porter Township holding almost the entire decision.

And Porter Township, as far as I can find, hasn't made one yet. I went through the township's own zoning page, its permit fee schedule, and Clinton County's list of Porter Township's zoning documents, and none of them mention short-term rentals, vacation rentals, tourist homes, or Airbnb by name. The county's own copy of the actual zoning ordinance wouldn't open for me on repeated attempts, so I can't rule out that a specific zoning district somewhere in the township addresses this. What I can tell you is that nothing public and readable currently says short-term rentals are banned, licensed, or even acknowledged here.

What Porter Township does have instead is the ordinary permit structure every land use in the township runs through, starting with a Zoning Land Use Permit that costs $40 flat plus $2 for every additional $1,000 of value, with a $40 minimum, and a Home Occupation permit that runs $35 (as of July 2026). Neither form mentions short-term rentals by name, so the Zoning Officer is really the only person who can tell you whether either one applies to yours.

Starting a Short-Term Rental Business in Porter Township

That phone call to the Zoning Officer is worth making before you buy anything, not after. Rich Brungard handles both zoning and code enforcement for the township, and he's reachable by appointment, generally 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., at 570-726-6733 or [email protected]. Since the ordinance text itself wasn't something I could confirm line by line, that call is doing work no amount of online research can replace here.

Porter Township is rural, the kind of place where "starting a business" usually means registering a home occupation rather than incorporating anything elaborate, and a short-term rental fits that mold about as well as anything does. If your property doesn't already tie into a public sewer system, the township's Sewage Enforcement Officer, Eric Williamson, is who signs off on septic capacity for a change of use, and that's worth checking before guests start showing up on a system sized for a single family.

Porter Township's quiet is a different reality from Pennsylvania's bigger short-term rental markets. Counties that see real tourist volume, like Lancaster County or Bucks County, tend to run formal registration or zoning-overlay programs precisely because the volume forces the issue. Porter Township hasn't had to build one yet, at least not one I could find, and that's a fair trade for a market this quiet: fewer rules, but also fewer buyers competing for the same handful of listings.

Keep in mind that "no rules yet" isn't the same as "will never have rules." Pennsylvania's legislature has a bill sitting in committee, House Bill 2303, that would create statewide operator tiers and a countywide registry; it hasn't passed, but if it does, rural townships like Porter would inherit whatever framework the state builds. Don't assume the current quiet is permanent.

Short-Term Rental Licensing Requirements in Porter Township

None of that pending legislation is in effect yet, so what you're licensing against today is what the township already has on the books. There's no license called a "short-term rental permit" in Porter Township. What exists instead is the general-purpose permit structure I mentioned above, and the honest answer is that I can't tell you with certainty which piece of it captures an Airbnb, because that determination sits inside a zoning ordinance the county's own website wouldn't let me open.

Permit	Fee	When it's likely to apply
Zoning Land Use Permit	$40 flat, plus $2 per additional $1,000 of value (minimum $40)	Any new use or change of use on the property
Home Occupation Permit	$35	Running the rental as a business out of your home
Business Permit	$35	Operating any business within the township
Zoning Hearing Board Application	$800	A variance, special exception, or conditional use, for anything that doesn't fit the zoning ordinance outright

All of these route through the Zoning Officer, and the Zoning Hearing Board meets alongside regular zoning business the last Tuesday of each month, at 7:00 p.m., at the township building. Nothing on the township's site states a guaranteed turnaround time for a straightforward Land Use Permit or Home Occupation Permit, so budget more than a single billing cycle if you're timing a listing launch around it. Do check with Rich Brungard before you submit anything, since paying the wrong fee just means paying it twice.

Required Documents for Porter Township Short-Term Rentals

Since you can't rush the turnaround, the more useful move is still getting the paperwork right on the first pass. Porter Township doesn't publish a short-term-rental-specific checklist, so what you'll actually fill out is the Business/Home Occupation application that covers most home-based operations. It asks for:

• Your name as applicant or owner, and a phone number
• The business name and the address and location of the property
• The zoning classification of the property, if you know it
• Whether it's a home occupation (yes or no)
• A brief description of the business and what it "sells," retail or wholesale, an odd fit for a rental but the form asks it either way
• How many parking spaces are available for guests
• Whether you'll put up a sign, since a separate sign permit applies if you do
• Whether you'll have employees

On top of the township form, keep the county's Hotel Tax Reporting Form handy too, since that's the document you'll be filing monthly once guests start paying you. Remember that the township application asks for a business description and a parking count, which means you'd want both worked out before you sit down to fill it in, not while you're standing at the counter.

Porter Township Short-Term Rental Taxes

That monthly filing habit is worth building early, because two separate tax authorities expect a cut of every stay, and one of them runs on exactly that monthly clock.

Pennsylvania's own Hotel Occupancy Tax runs 6% of the rent, under 61 Pa. Code Chapter 38, and the Department of Revenue applies it to single-family and condo short-term rentals booked through Airbnb, Vrbo, or directly, the same as it would a hotel room. Since Act 109 of 2018 kicked in on January 22, 2019, though, Airbnb, Vrbo and the other big booking platforms have had to collect that 6% and hand it over themselves, tax on their own booking fee included, so if every stay comes through one of them, you likely never touch this piece directly.

Clinton County adds its own 5% hotel tax on top, and this is where it gets more hands-on. The county's ordinance defines the tax broadly enough to explicitly cover "rooms in private homes if the room is reserved for lodging," so an Airbnb in Porter Township owes it just like a hotel in Lock Haven would. The county collects it from the operator, meaning you, unless your booking agent confirms to the county that it already paid the tax on your behalf, and that confirmation isn't something to assume. Check it directly rather than guessing.

Tax	Rate	Who typically remits it
Pennsylvania Hotel Occupancy Tax	6%	Airbnb or Vrbo, automatically, under Act 109 of 2018
Clinton County Hotel Tax	5%	You, unless your platform confirms to the county it's already paid
Combined	11%	Split between the two rows above

Reporting for the county piece runs on its own calendar: payment is due by the 15th of each month for the previous month's rentals, with interest and penalties stacking if you miss it. Don't let that date sneak past you the way a quarterly deadline might; a monthly cadence punishes forgetfulness faster.

Possible Write-Offs or Deductions

Your rental income is ordinary taxable income at the federal and state level, and the usual short-term rental deductions apply: mortgage interest, property tax, insurance, cleaning and maintenance, platform fees, and depreciation on the portion of the home used for guests. None of that is unique to Porter Township, so a tax preparer familiar with Schedule E rental property rules can handle it the same way they would anywhere else in Pennsylvania.

State-Wide Short-Term Rental Rules in Pennsylvania

Zoom out from Porter Township specifically, and that state-versus-county split I've been describing is really the whole Pennsylvania story in miniature, since the commonwealth sets a tax floor and then stays out of almost everything else, leaving licensing, zoning, and any outright ban entirely up to whichever municipality you happen to be in.

There's no statewide registry and no statewide license, and nothing caps what a township like Porter can eventually decide to do on its own. The one state-level registration that does exist is a tax license, the Sales, Use and Hotel Occupancy Tax License, which the Department of Revenue hands out for free through myPATH, and even that's only required if you don't book exclusively through a platform that already handles the collecting and remitting for you. Book everything through Airbnb, and this piece likely doesn't apply to you at all.

Three bills are sitting in Harrisburg that would change that picture, though none has passed as of my last check in July 2026. House Bill 2303 would build out a whole "Transient Lodging" chapter of state law, with three operator tiers and a countywide registry; it's been sitting with the House Tourism, Recreation and Economic Development committee since March 19, 2026. House Bill 1256 and Senate Bill 1105 are narrower, covering compliance rules and county-level tax reporting for counties outside Philadelphia and Allegheny. None of them are law yet, so don't plan your Porter Township listing around a framework that doesn't exist.

Two counties do get special state-administered tax handling that Clinton County doesn't. Allegheny County adds a state-collected 1% local sales tax, and Philadelphia adds 2%, both layered on top of the state's own 6%, but Clinton County isn't one of them. Its 5% hotel tax still runs through its own ordinance and its own Treasurer's office instead, which is exactly the local layer covered above. For the fuller statewide picture, including how this plays out in counties where local ordinances go much further than Porter Township's silence, the Pennsylvania short-term rental guide covers the state layer in more depth.

Does Porter Township Strictly Enforce STR Rules? Is Porter Township Airbnb Friendly?

Silence at the state level is one thing; silence at the township level is another, and it's the one that actually determines what happens if a neighbor complains. I looked for any record of Porter Township citing, fining, or otherwise going after a short-term rental, and found none, not in anything I could access on the township's own site, and not in any news coverage either.

That absence of a record isn't the same as a guarantee, mind you. A three-member Board of Supervisors and a single Zoning Officer running a township this size means enforcement, if it ever happens, is going to be complaint-driven rather than proactive. There is a real mechanism for it, though: anyone denied a permit, or cited for violating one, can appeal to the Zoning Hearing Board for an $800 application fee, and that board meets alongside regular zoning business the last Tuesday of each month. If a neighbor genuinely objects to a short-term rental next door, that's the venue where it gets argued out.

So is Porter Township Airbnb friendly? As best I can tell, yes, mostly by not getting in the way rather than by rolling out a welcome mat. That's a real advantage if you want to avoid a permitting fight, and a real risk if you're hoping for a rulebook that spells out exactly what's expected of you. Do check back with the Zoning Officer periodically, since a township this quiet can go from zero rules to a full ordinance in one meeting cycle if enough residents start complaining.

How to Start a Short-Term Rental Business in Porter Township

Checking back periodically matters, but you still need an order of operations for right now, and skipping steps here mostly costs you money rather than time.

1. Call the Zoning Officer first. Confirm your zoning district, and ask directly whether a short-term rental needs a Land Use Permit, a Home Occupation Permit, or both, since the ordinance itself wasn't something I could verify from the outside. Reach Rich Brungard at 570-726-6733 or [email protected].
2. Check your septic and sewer situation. If you're on an on-lot system, loop in Sewage Enforcement Officer Eric Williamson before you list, since guest turnover changes what the system needs to handle.
3. Apply for whichever permit the Zoning Officer confirms. Budget $40 for a Land Use Permit, $35 for a Home Occupation Permit, or both, payable at submission.
4. Register for Pennsylvania's Sales, Use and Hotel Occupancy Tax License through myPATH, unless you'll book exclusively through a platform that already collects the state's 6% for you.
5. Set up Clinton County's monthly hotel tax reporting. Confirm with your booking platform whether it remits the county's 5% on your behalf, and if it doesn't, plan to file the county's own form yourself by the 15th of each month.
6. List the property and keep records. Track nights, revenue, and which tax layer each stay owed, since you're the one reconciling two different filing calendars.
7. Watch Harrisburg. House Bill 2303 and its companion bills could add a statewide registry or operator tiers, so check their status before you assume next year's rules still look like this year's.

Who to Contact in Porter Township about Short-Term Rental Regulations and Zoning?

Whichever step trips you up, three offices between them cover almost every question you'll have, and knowing which one owns yours saves you a call you don't need to make.

Zoning, permits, and code enforcement

Zoning Officer and Code Enforcement Officer Richard "Rich" Brungard is the first call for anything permit- or zoning-related, including the district determination this guide couldn't make for you.

• Phone: 570-726-6733 (appointments generally 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.)
• Email: [email protected]
• Meetings: last Tuesday of each month, 7:00 p.m., at the township building

General township business

Porter Township's supervisors and administration handle anything outside zoning specifically.

• Address: 304 Peach Orchard Road, Mill Hall, PA 17751
• Phone: 570-726-6733
• Email: [email protected]

County hotel tax

The Clinton County Treasurer administers the county's 5% hotel tax, its monthly reporting, and its online payment portal.

• Address: 2 Piper Way, Suite 124, Lock Haven, PA 17745
• Phone: 570-893-4004
• Hours: 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday; 8:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Wednesday
• TTY: dial 711

State tax registration

The Pennsylvania Department of Revenue handles the Sales, Use and Hotel Occupancy Tax License and general state tax questions.

• Phone: 717-787-1064
• Online: register through myPATH

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you legally run an Airbnb in Porter Township, Pennsylvania in 2026?

Likely yes, though the township's zoning ordinance itself wasn't readable to confirm district by district. Nothing on Porter Township's own site, its permit fee schedule, or Clinton County's zoning records identifies short-term rentals as banned, licensed, or specifically restricted. Confirm with the Zoning Officer before you buy, since a specific zoning district could still address this in ways the public pages don't show.

Does Porter Township require a short-term rental permit or license?

There's no permit called a "short-term rental license" here. What exists instead is the general permit structure every property owner uses: a Zoning Land Use Permit ($40, plus $2 per additional $1,000 of value) and, if you're running it as a home-based business, a Home Occupation Permit ($35). The Zoning Officer can confirm which one actually applies to your situation.

What taxes do you pay on a Porter Township Airbnb?

Two layers apply. Pennsylvania's Hotel Occupancy Tax runs 6% of the rent, and Clinton County adds its own 5% hotel tax on top, for 11% combined. Airbnb and Vrbo generally collect and remit the state's 6% automatically under a 2018 state law. The county's 5% is reported separately, due by the 15th of each month for the prior month's rentals.

Does Airbnb collect Pennsylvania's state hotel tax automatically?

Yes, for the state portion. Since Act 109 of 2018 took effect, booking platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo are required to collect and remit Pennsylvania's 6% Hotel Occupancy Tax on your behalf, along with tax on their own booking fee. Clinton County's separate 5% hotel tax works differently, since the county collects it from you unless your platform specifically confirms to the county that it's already been paid.

Who do you contact about Porter Township zoning for a short-term rental?

Start with Zoning Officer and Code Enforcement Officer Rich Brungard, reachable at 570-726-6733 or [email protected], generally by appointment between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. He's the one who can confirm your zoning district and which permits, if any, actually apply to a short-term rental on your specific property. If you're weighing Porter Township against a market with clearer rules and better data, Pennsylvania's Airbnb market numbers are a useful place to keep comparing.

Last verified: July 2026. Every ordinance, tax rate, state law, and contact detail in this guide links to or comes from its official source.