BSC hosting neighborhood plan workshop meeting next week

By ALEX STRICKLAND / Bigfork Eagle

Members of the Bigfork Steering Committee and the Bigfork Land Use Advisory Committee are encouraging Bigfork residents to attend a Feb. 7 meeting at Bethany Lutheran Church to hammer out final details of the updated Bigfork Neighborhood Plan.

The meeting will take place at 7 p.m. in the church basement.

The Bigfork Neighborhood Plan was created in 1993 as an advisory document with some legal standing to help address growth issues in Bigfork. Since the town is unincorporated, all proposals dealing with zoning, subdivision or other development are subject to the approval or denial of the county planning board and then the county commissioners.

Since Bigfork cannot directly control its fate, then, a neighborhood plan provides a blueprint that the planning board and commissioners are legally bound to consider, if not follow to the letter.

Revising the 1993 plan has drug on for three years as the BSC and the Flathead County Planning Office have worked together with the community to create a draft and then haggle with the legalities and feasibility of certain portions. In the latest stage, population and growth information has been tabulated to provide projections for future growth and establish what designations, i.e. commercial, residential, will need to be beefed up to accommodate the village's burgeoning population.

The meeting next week will provide a final opportunity for residents to comment on the plan and suggest any modifications before it is submitted to BLUAC and then on to the planning board and commissioners for approval.

"The community workshop is an opportunity for Bigfork residents to learn what their neighbors have been doing to update the Bigfork Neighborhood plan over the last three years," said County Planning Office Assistant Director BJ Grieve, who has worked with the BSC throughout the process.

"The Bigfork Neighborhood Plan is important for accommodating and guiding future growth in Bigfork to ensure that it is safely and efficiently served and protects the character of the community that everyone values so highly," he said.

The Bigfork Neighborhood Plan and accompanying map is available online at www.bigforksteering.org or in hard copy at the UPS Store in Bigfork. Comments taken at the meeting will be typed up and submitted along with the plan through the process so that no input goes ignored.

A joint workshop with the BSC and BLUAC will take place the following week at noon on Feb. 14 to go over the comments and make any final tweaks before submission.