Pushing 'pause button' on growth

Whitefish city officials don't like using the "M word" - moratorium - but that's exactly what the City Council will consider Monday when it votes on an emergency zoning ordinance that would temporarily suspend new development until a master utility plan is finished.

It's the kind of proposal that strikes fear in the hearts of developers who expected to get projects approved and even completed yet this construction season. But it's a proposal that makes a lot of sense for Whitefish at this point in time.

The city wants to put new development on hold for up to six months in sensitive drainage areas - Texas Avenue, State Park Road and Monegan Road to name a few trouble spots - until a detailed storm-drain plan can be devised.

The moratorium initially would apply to all lands within Whitefish and a mile outside city limits, but there are ways to exempt properties served by a viable city storm drain or projects with approved drainage plans.

With growth pushing forward at record levels in the resort town, issues such as storm-water drainage must be given the attention they deserve, or entire neighborhoods stand to suffer the consequences. City workers say they've responded to dozens of complaints this summer from residents concerned about storm-water runoff patterns being altered by new development. Record precipitation in June may have foreshadowed what's to come in Whitefish once the area resumes its pre-drought water levels. Flooded crawl spaces, basements leaking in new homes, flooded ditches and even submerged roads were reported after last month's heavy rains.

Newly hired planning director Bob Horne hadn't been on the job very long before he observed that the east side of Whitefish, with its silty clay soils and poor drainage, would have to be planned "with a tweezers." As land becomes more valuable in Whitefish, areas that were historically passed over as swamps are now getting a second look from developers who want to find ways to make them profitable.

It makes perfect sense for Whitefish to push the pause button on new growth until a game plan is in place. If it's a good project today with viable drainage, it will still be a good project in six months. Faulty drainage systems, however, won't be easily corrected in neighborhoods that have been built out without taking a master utility plan into account.