County growth policy update starts

The Flathead County Planning Board kicked off the public process for updating the county growth policy with a workshop on Oct. 20. The move coincides with other development issues county planners and the commissioners looked at in recent weeks.

Protecting water quality, developing a countywide transportation plan and preventing sprawl were several concerns raised by the eight people who commented at the workshop.

One of the speakers, Dave Brant, who has been ranching between Kila and Marion since 1968, said he wants to see some type of incentive offered to keep development closer to the cities. He said development on the side of Mount Haskill, northeast of Whitefish, would present access issues for police, fire and school vehicles.

Brant acknowledged the difficulty county planners have when it comes to recognizing private property rights, but he suggested “strong-arming” Plum Creek about its development plans.

Planning board chairman Gordon Cross said a committee would use public comments to scope out the growth policy update process.

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One day earlier, a zoning proposal aimed at limiting the size of extractive industries in the North Fork failed to win approval by the Flathead County Commissioners. About 95 percent of the North Fork is federal or state land, so the proposed zoning text amendment would have applied to less than 14,000 acres of private land.

Commissioner Joe Brenneman’s motion to approve a zoning text amendment that would limit the size of sand and gravel operations in the North Fork to five acres and 20,000 tons per year died for a lack of a second. Brenneman noted that the request was “land-owner driven.”

The North Fork Land Use Committee had unanimously recommended approval of the amendment to the North Fork Neighborhood Plan. The county planning board had also recommended approval.

Gary Krueger, who recently won county approval for a zoning text amendment that protects his gravel operation in the West Valley, said the findings of fact for the zoning text amendment didn’t support the claim that larger extractive industries would harm health or the environment. Krueger said that decision should be made by the county’s Board of Adjustment, of which he is a member.

Commissioner Jim Dupont said he was concerned the proposed zoning text amendment could affect mineral rights held by private property owners.

“If we’re saying that (extractive industries) are a health and safety issue, then maybe motorized vehicles should be banned (in the North Fork), too,” he said. “Are we implying that the extraction of gravel is dangerous?”

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On Oct. 26, planning board members from across the valley met to discuss a coordinated effort to protect the U.S. 93 corridor between Kalispell and Whitefish from sprawling development. A consensus was reached that keeping the corridor looking nice should be a priority, especially during a economic downturn.

“If politics make strange bedfellows, economics can make even stranger,” Cross noted.

County planning director B.J. Grieve noted that the county didn’t have the same planning tools that the cities have, but design features aimed at protecting the visual landscape could be achieved with an overlay plan and overlay zone.

Two days later, Dupont said he was open to the concept.

“The issue is how much are we going to control it,” he said. “I’d hate to see it be like a continuous strip of businesses from Kalispell to Whitefish.”

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Earlier in September, the commissioners turned down a proposed large-tract rural zoning classification by 2-1, with commissioner Joe Brenneman dissenting.

The proposed zoning would have provided large landowners with a way to develop their land by using conservation easements to increase project density. The new classification was intended to protect traditional natural resource-based uses in rural locations, but it became controversial because of density concerns, complexity of the proposal and the potential for unintended consequences.

Commissioner Jim Dupont said he’d read the document two or three times and was “still somewhat confused on what it says or doesn’t say.”

He said he could support large tract rural zoning if it was restricted to lands owned by F.H. Stoltze Land and Lumber Co. or Plum Creek Timber Co. It costs too much for others to implement, he said. The document could be improved down the road, he noted, but “I don’t feel right now we need this.”

Stoltze owns land around Whitefish, including land adjacent to Whitefish Mountain Resort in the Haskill Creek drainage and land in the city reservoir’s watershed. Stoltze representative Paul McKenzie said only 30 percent of the 38,000 acres the company owns is zoned.

Plum Creek owns significant timber holdings around the valley, including land at the head of Whitefish Lake once rumored for development. Plum Creek representative David Greer said large-tract rural zoning offers better choices than currently exist. Using 40, 80 and 120 acre agricultural zoning creates squares on the landscape, he said.

Cross said the board spent more time on large tract rural zoning over the past five years than anything else, other than the county’s growth policy and subdivision regulations.