Council scrutinizes Silverbrook
By JOHN STANG
The Daily Inter Lake
Questions surfaced Monday about whether Kalispell would find itself overwhelmed by annexing a 325-acre housing development 2.2 miles north of the rest of the town.
The Kalispell City Council chewed over those questions Monday in preparation for a vote Dec. 4 on whether to annex the site.
The project, Silverbrook Estates, is proposed for the southwest corner of Church Drive and U.S. 93, with a mix of residential and commercial zoning.
The project's developer - 93 & Church LLC - wants to build 466 single-family houses, 120 townhouses and an 18-acre commercial district in two stages.
The first stage would be to build 249 houses in the site's southern half, dig two wells in the site's northwestern corner and donate that land for a city fire station, and construct a main arterial street from Church Drive to angle southeast to connect with U.S. 93 across from Tronstad Road.
The proposed second phase would be to build the commercial district and townhouses in the site's northeastern corner, plus 217 houses in the northern half.
Council members, city planning board members and the city's staff praised how the project is set up for houses, roads, park space and commercial buildings.
But questions surfaced Monday about annexing 325 acres more than two miles from the rest of Kalispell, hoping that enough houses will be built to provide the impact-fee and property-tax revenue to pay for city services that far north - and also hoping that neighboring landowners will seek annexation in the near future to connect Silverbrook to Kalispell.
Silverbrook's north border is three miles north of Kalispell.
"Leapfrogging is an ugly word in government, and that's what we're going to do," council member Hank Olson said.
Council member Kari Gabriel replied: "But we're not. There's going to be other development behind it." That development would link Silverbrook with West Reserve Drive, which is Kalispell's north border.
The city's staff and Howard Mann, spokesman for 93 & Church LLC, believe some annexation requests will surface in the next year for areas between Silverbrook and West Reserve Drive.
"Realistically, we're one development parcel away from being contiguous to the city," Mann said.
Council member Bob Hafferman wondered if the area's
booming economy will keep going, noting that if the boom flattens or falls, Silverbrook construction could stall. And that could lead to the city spending more to take care of the area than it would receive in revenue.
"It's a quality development. … How fast it will develop is pretty doggone iffy," Hafferman said.
Mann said an optimistic estimate is that the project's first phase - predominantly houses in the southern half - should be complete in two to four years. 93 & Church LLC wants to begin construction in the spring of 2007.
Some council members wondered if an agreement could be made in which Kalispell would annex Silverbrook after it had built a specific number of houses. However, that approach also has complications for impact fees and jurisdictional responsibilities. Council members ultimately showed no discernible majority for or against that idea.
City officials said Kalispell's new northside fire station should be able to easily handle calls in Silverbrook. A Silverbrook fire station likely would be built when enough houses and businesses are constructed to justify its existence, officials said.
The developers plan to pay to extend water and sewer lines to the project.
Reporter John Stang may be reached at 758-4429 or by e-mail at jstang@dailyinterlake.com