Zone changes on hold until growth policy adopted

By WILLIAM L. SPENCE

The Daily Inter Lake

Effective immediately, the Flathead County Planning Office is no longer accepting or processing zone change applications.

The moratorium was announced late Friday. It stems from the Oct. 1 deadline related to growth policies.

Planning Director Jeff Harris said state law is very explicit when it comes to zoning: Prior to Oct. 1, zone changes had to be consistent with the county's 1987 master plan; after Oct. 1, however, they must be consistent with the growth policy.

Flathead County's new growth policy won't be in place by the statutory deadline. Consequently, the planning office lacks the necessary foundation to process any additional zoning requests.

The moratorium is being announced now because the Flathead County Planning Board already has a full agenda for its September meetings, so any new zoning applications couldn't be processed until after Oct. 1 anyway.

Subdivision applications will not be affected by the moratorium, Harris said. Zoning variances due to hardships and conditional use permit requests also will continue to be accepted and processed.

Planned unit development applications and zoning text amendments, however, will be put on hold until a new growth policy is adopted.

Harris said a handful of previously submitted applications will be affected by the moratorium.

One is Doug Averill's planned unit development proposal for a 106-lot subdivision in Bigfork, which was scheduled to go to the planning board in October. Another is a new zoning district proposed for the Juniper Bay neighborhood, south of Somers, which is struggling to cope with a recent surge in high-density condominium projects.

It remains to be seen what effect the moratorium will have on the planning office's workload and revenues.

The office took in $471,000 in fees for all applications in general last year, or 71 percent of its total revenue stream. Over the last three months, zone changes, text amendments and planned unit development proposals accounted for a third of the planning board's total agenda items.

It could be some time before the moratorium is lifted. The planning board just began its review of the draft growth policy on Thursday. At best, a new policy wouldn't be ready for final adoption until late October or early November - and even that is highly questionable, given the board's initial reaction to the draft.

Reporter Bill Spence may be reached at 758-4459 or by e-mail at bspence@dailyinterlake.com