Nantucket residents voted to preserve their right to rent properties to short-term visitors, capping years of acrimony on the Massachusetts island over how to balance its tourism economy with a housing crunch.

At a crowded special town meeting attended by roughly 1,500 residents on Tuesday night, more than 70% backed a measure allowing homeowners to rent out their properties without any requirements on length of stay. They also declined to advance a competing proposal that would have mandated week-long minimum stays during the summer and capped the number of days a property could be rented each year.

Short-term rentals have been a hot-button issue for Nantucket, with supporters of tighter limits arguing that wealthy tourists are gobbling up all the housing options for workers and propone

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