Zoning request stalled

The Whitefish "doughnut" area is a smidgen smaller than the 1996 Flathead County-Whitefish Master Plan area.

It's a bureaucratic distinction that few, if any, ever knew or cared about - until recently.

That led to a confusing discussion with a proposed roundabout solution to a rezoning request at Wednesday's Flathead County Planning Board meeting.

Five landowners requested that their 40 acres west of U.S. 93 and north of Hodgson Road be rezoned from agricultural use to general business use for 20 acres along the highway and to suburban-agricultural use on 20 acres away from the highway.

Happy Valley Storage and an office building owned by Bankfull Boy LLC already are in place along the highway on agricultural-use land.

The owners want the rezoning to increase the value of their lands if they decided to sell any property in the future.

There are no plans to expand the current businesses along U.S. 93.

In 2007, Oh's Body Shop and Midway Motors -both across U.S. 93 from Happy Valley Storage and the Bankfull Boy office building - received the same zoning change.

That stemmed from a planning department mistake, county Planning Director Jeff Harris said.

In 2007, the planning staff thought that the Whitefish doughnut - a two-mile city planning zone surrounding Whitefish -was the same as the 1996 Whitefish-Flathead County Master Plan area.

But the southern tip of the Whitefish/Flathead County area is outside the doughnut - which became apparent after close reading of the two areas' legal descriptions.

This created confusion in which planning rules should be applied to the southern tip of the Whitefish/Flathead County Master Plan area, which contains Oh's, Midway Motors and the 40 acres currently seeking rezoning.

The wrong rules mistakenly were applied in 2007 to the rezoning of Oh's Body Shop and Midway Motors, Harris said.

With the correct set of rules being applied, the county planning staff recommended against rezoning the 40 acres because the business zoning would encourage strip development along U.S. 93, which runs counter to the 1996 Whitefish/Flathead County Master Plan.

Consequently, the five landowners have to decide whether they want to request that the county amend the Master Plan to allow business zoning along their stretch of U.S. 93.

The planning board delayed action until Feb. 11.

Reporter John Stang may be reached at 758-4429 or by e-mail at jstang@dailyinterlake.com