Visitor traffic was part of the reason Debbie and Peter Anderson were able to turn their independent coffee shop Morning Brew, a Kailua institution since 1995, into a chain.

The Andersons opened their second Morning Brew location in SALT in Kakaako in 2017. Together, the two stores now employ about 35 part-time workers and support plenty of local contractors and vendors.

While the Anderson’s don’t have a vacation rental, their reliance on visitor traffic has them interested in the vacation rental debate that’s been percolating at the Honolulu City Council for some time.

“From our perspective there really should be a way to make a win-win for everyone,” said Debbie Anderson. “Keep good regulation, but don’t put everybody out of businesses. In 1995 when we came to Kailua, there were vacancies everywhere. Kaneohe Ranch did a good job renovating and expanding, but the expansion of the tourism dollars helped the independent businesses that were there.”

If tourists were forced to stay only in Oahu’s resort districts like Waikiki, Ko Olina and Turtle Bay, Anderson said it would hamper business throughout the isle.

“It would also really limit tourism — I believe many tourists are coming to Oahu because they have accommodation choices. If we didn’t allow them to stay where they want, they’d go somewhere else that would,” she said.

Anderson said she hopes any decision that Council makes is based on good data and doesn’t reflect a rush to judgment. She said she’s perplexed at the severity of the vacation rental penalties the Council is weighing, especially when compared to recent efforts to decriminalize marijuana.

“What’s so criminal about vacation rentals? What’s such a bad thing about something that is helping supplement income and city tax dollars?” Anderson asked. “This really seems to have gotten absurd.”