Mayor addresses growth, challenges facing Whitefish

Whitefish Mayor John Muhlfeld drove into town for the first time on a Monday in July of 1995. He said Whitefish was like a “ghost town,” with just a few blinking traffic lights at 7:30 in the morning.

Muhlfeld – whose full-time job is principal hydrologist for Whitefish-based River Design Group – was coming to work for the Kootenai National Forest, and to ski and recreate in Northwest Montana.

But he and most longtime Whitefish residents “never envisioned the growth would escalate this quickly,” Muhlfeld said in an interview with the Inter Lake in Whitefish’s spacious City Hall, which opened in 2017.

Now, crowds gather early on summer mornings in Whitefish. Parking spots on Central Avenue fill up quickly and long waits at traffic lights are not uncommon.

These growth-related issues are a major reason why he is running for his third term as Whitefish mayor (he is unopposed).

“Obviously the biggest challenge for the city of Whitefish right now is growth. We’re a small town, so to speak, but we certainly have the complexities of a much larger city,” Muhlfeld said.

Whitefish has a full-time population of 7,608, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. But Muhlfeld said at the peak of the tourist season – in July and August – the town can have upwards of 20,000 to 25,000 people. That is more than Whitefish is equipped to handle.

“There’s no doubt that the success of our community is taxing our infrastructure,” Muhlfeld said.

Meanwhile, Muhlfeld has to balance long-term residents’ emotions over growth with the community’s allure to tourists and second-home buyers.

“That’s probably the most challenging part of the job,” Muhlfeld said, “and certainly understanding those that feel we’re quote ‘selling out’ or no longer care or pay attention to the care or concerns of our long-term residents. But I’ll clearly state that is certainly not the case.”

Muhlfeld said the city can only manage developers’ activities to a certain extent.

“We’re not trying to discourage folks from building, clearly not. But at the same time, there’s valid concerns raised by the general public … that we need more tools in the toolbox, so to speak, to be able to mold these developments and these projects in a manner that doesn’t negatively impact these traditional neighborhoods and adjacent neighbors,” he said.

Muhlfeld pointed out the U.S. 93 South corridor as an area where the city is making progress on regulating development. The Whitefish City Council is currently working on a series of zoning text amendments to help “mitigate impacts associated with large building footprints,” which includes reducing the maximum square footage of new buildings from 15,000 to 10,000 square feet before developers would need a conditional-use permit.

He said the amendments are in line with public input received during the U.S. 93 South corridor planning process. “Whitefish residents firmly believe that the entrance to Whitefish should be authentic and unique and not resemble ‘Anywhere, USA,’” he said.

But the city’s “hands are oftentimes tied” when it comes to some other developments locals might oppose.

Muhlfeld said the city becomes “pinned in these situations where a land-use application comes forward for our consideration that meets the code, and is not requesting deviations from the zoning code … it’s use by right.

“So it boils down to whether you want to put the city in a potentially litigious situation or follow the letter of the law. And they’re entitled to these certain uses that are provided in the zoning code,” he added.

Meanwhile, most new developments are not helping with Whitefish’s affordable-housing dilemma.

“There is a lack of affordable housing,” Muhlfeld said, but “we’ve taken great strides over the last several years to address the need to provide affordable and workforce housing.”

He pointed out a mandatory affordable housing ordinance that requires 20% of homes built within a subdivision are “permanently deed-restricted affordable,” and said a few multi-family apartment complexes are in development. The city is trying to get an affordable-housing complex built in the “snow lot,” an empty lot east of Whitefish Middle School currently used for snow disposal.

However, Muhlfeld said “it’s very hard to keep up,” and a housing-needs study indicated the city “needed upwards of 900 units by the year 2020.”

“It’s not a solution that only government can solve. It takes strong public/private partnerships. It requires developing incentives to encourage developing affordable housing and think about affordable housing,” Muhlfeld said.

In the meantime, Whitefish is struggling with traffic and congestion. Muhlfeld said Whitefish has “essentially no control” over the primary and secondary state highways that go through Whitefish.

“When we look at other corridors like Wisconsin [Avenue] where we have major pedestrian traffic and vehicle conflicts occurring, and certainly escalating congestion, it’s a concern of many,” Muhlfeld said. He reported the city is engaged with the state Department of Transportation on the downtown transportation corridor, a large-scale planning effort that will encompass 13th Street northward to Second Street through downtown and south on Baker Avenue.

But there will be more to solving the issue than just building or fixing transportation corridors.

“In a perfect world, it would be nice if not everyone that came to Whitefish was reliant on a vehicle,” Muhlfeld said. “We’re certainly not looking to build another parking garage only to compound the issue that we have.”

He said change will come with emphasizing alternative modes of transportation and making Whitefish more biker- and walker-friendly, and also marketing the town to “low impact ‘geotourists,’” who “have a fairly light footprint on our community and the services our community provides.”

Water and sewer rates are also a contentious issue for long-term residents. The city recently increased rates for residential water and sewer services, and the higher rates go into effect this month.

“We understand that water and sewer rates are expensive in Whitefish, but honestly, it’s not an easy place to provide these services,” Muhlfeld said. “The rate payers in Whitefish are tasked with paying for water and sewer infrastructure designed to handle a much larger population than we have year-round.”

He explained the cost to treat Whitefish’s water – surface water from Haskill Creek and Whitefish Lake – is significantly higher than the groundwater used by other towns. The city also has to build a new wastewater treatment plant. Muhlfeld hopes the contract is awarded before the end of the year and anticipates the expanded plant will be operational in late 2021 or early 2022.

As Haskill Basin provides “about 90% of the city’s water supply,” Muhlfeld said his proudest accomplishment was helping establish the Haskill Basin conservation easement, a 3,020-acre conservation partnership with F.H. Stoltze Land and Lumber Co. and Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

The easement also made room for additional trails in the Whitefish Trail system.

“It’s been an exciting project … And quite frankly it’s been a model that’s being looked at nationally in terms of how to balance conservation with recreation while still maintaining these lands as working for us,” Muhlfeld said. But the work is far from over, as the city and Whitefish Legacy Partners envision the trails circumnavigating Whitefish Lake.

He explained the Whitefish Trails are also “providing good-paying jobs” and bringing in more people to “come downtown to shop and spend money in our stores, our restaurants, our bars, etc.”

“We’re certainly a changing community, but at the end of the day I feel that we’ve done a really good job balancing growth while retaining the small-town feel that many of us that moved here, grew up here, have come to enjoy and value,” he said.

“It was just a small, quiet town. And at times, I really miss those days, but at the same time I see that what we’ve done here in terms of smart planning and smart growth has really fostered a lot of good things.”

Reporter Colin Gaiser can be reached at 758-4439 and cgaiser@dailyinterlake.com