Kalispellplanningto add jobs

Kalispell will hire more employees this fiscal year than ever before.

This year's budget will fund almost 21 new positions, many of which are a result of increased growth in Kalispell.

The city plans to create the equivalent of just more than 21 new full-time-equivalent positions during the 2006 fiscal year. That number combines part-time and full-time workers and also includes promoting some existing part-time workers to full-time status.

That brings the city to 179 full-time employees.

Last year, the city employed 158 full-time employees. Kalispell cut two of those full-time positions from this year's budget and created two new positions.

For accounting purposes, the net increase for fiscal 2006 is 17 new full-time positions, because some of the positions won't be filled right away. Therefore, the city isn't paying full-year salaries to those people.

The new employees' salaries will be funded primarily through the general fund (taxpayer dollars), fees (such as those paid only by people using specific services, such as hook-up fees for connecting to city services) or a combination of both.

The salaries and benefits for the new employees will cost the city $1,052,851 this year.

Many of the positions stem from the wave of new residents and development in Kalispell.

"It's the result of growth," City Manager Jim Patrick said about several of the new jobs.

The city has experienced such rapid growth during recent years that this budget year appears to be a game of catch-up; that is, adding positions to ease current employees' workloads that have been increasing each year. Some of the positions have been planned for years to accommodate anticipated growth, Patrick said.

"This is deferred maintenance," he said.

Growth is driving the city to hire an operator for the wastewater treatment plant (a position the city had planned for some time), two maintenance and repair employees in the water department and a construction manager.

Kalispell also will hire six firefighters and two traffic police officers. The general fund will pay their salaries.

The firefighters will staff the new fire hall, Fire Station 62, that will be built north of Four Mile Drive and west of the new Costco. They start working in January.

Additional new positions are a result of other considerations, such as increased requirements from the state or department restructuring, Patrick said.

For example, the state requires cities to do additional water sampling, so Kalispell will hire an engineer to meet the new requirements.

"This was an unfunded mandate, if you will," Patrick said.

Kalispell recently also formed its own planning staff. The city previously met its planning services needs by paying part of the salaries of Tri-City Planning Office staff.

On July 1, the office dissolved because Whitefish earlier had pulled out of the agreement to set up its own department to give the city more individual attention.

Consequently, Kalispell absorbed most of the Tri-City staff to form its own planning department.

The five Tri-City staff members who moved to Kalispell are considered new employees under the fiscal 2006 budget because, though the city previously had paid part of their salaries, they weren't technically city employees.

The city planning staff combined with the existing building department under an umbrella department, which will be called the Planning, Building and Zoning Department.

Two employees will be added to the emerging department.

A code enforcement officer will handle nuisance abatement, such as checking that city sidewalks are shoveled properly and that people don't have junk cars in their yards. The city this year will add a building inspector to ease the workload of its current two inspectors.

A new fire marshal, who inspects buildings' compliance with the fire code, also will join the city staff.

Kalispell also plans to create a new position for a network administrator who will see to the city's computer needs. The city previously contracted with a company that charged Kalispell $60 an hour to address its computer issues.

Kalispell also will employ a new part-time employee to work on special events for the Parks and Recreation Department.

Reporter Camden Easterling can be reached at 758-4429 or by e-mail at ceasterling@dailyinterlake.com.