Planners recommend extraction limits in N. Fork

The Flathead County Planning Board last week recommended limiting the size of extractive industries in the North Fork, but took pains to disassociate itself from a much-publicized memorandum of understanding between Gov. Brian Schweitzer and British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell.

That memorandum, signed earlier this year, calls for a ban on mining in the North Fork of the Flathead River in the United States and Canada.

Current county regulations require extractive industries in the North Fork Zoning District be of a “small scale,” but it is undefined and has not been implemented.

The board’s recommendation, which will be considered by the county commissioners, would limit extractive industries to five acres in size and allow no more than 20,000 tons of material to be removed each year. Those limits parallel limits set out in the Canadian-U.S. agreement.

County planner Andrew Hagemeier said the memorandum signed by Schweitzer and Campbell “got the ball rolling, but we’re not being required to do this as part of the MOU.” Hagemeier said there is only one active gravel pit in the North Fork, and it would be grandfathered. Two others have been mothballed.

Planning Board member Charles Lapp, who was the lone opponent of the recommendation, said, “The whole thing is based on what [Gov. Brian] Schweitzer wrote in that MOU ... it’s gonna hit the paper that we complied with the MOU.”

Board member Michael Mower said the North Fork Land Use Advisory Committee still would have moved forward with its recommendation in favor of the regulation even if the memorandum didn’t exist.

“I don’t think anything’s going to happen” with the memorandum, he said, calling it “political fluff.”

Kalispell City Council member Randy Kenyon, who owns a residence northwest of Polebridge and serves as secretary of the North Fork Land Use Advisory Committee, said the committee is “concerned with cooperating in any way we can to show the Canadians, particularly the British Columbians, that we’re doing everything possible ...”

The Planning Board unanimously approved a finding of fact that states, “The main motive of the North Fork Land Use Advisory Committee ... was protecting the watershed and not complying with the MOU.”

Board chairman Gordon Cross said many of the board members were concerned “about all these references to the MOU [in the staff report]. The MOU in there muddies the waters,” he said as justification for the additional finding of fact.

The board then voted 7-1 in favor of recommending approval of the text amendment on small-scale extractive industries.

“I just think it’s tied too much to the memorandum of understanding,” Lapp said. “It’s going down the wrong path when we’re guided by another country in private property land use. Sure we’re making a gesture ... but it’s quite meaningless because there isn’t anything going on up there [North Fork Zoning District] in regards to it.”

Cross countered Lapp.

“The North Fork was beating the drum about energy development in Canada,” Cross said. “They beat the drum so loud they got other people in the county concerned, and then they got the state concerned, and ultimately they ended up with an agreement between two countries because of the fact that the little people started it.”

In other action, the board approved a rezoning request for 10 acres at 150 Schrade Road in the U.S. 93 North Zoning District. Applicants Ben and Lorraine Tempel requested an “upzoning” from 10-acre suburban agricultural to 5-acre suburban agricultural. The property is located east of U.S. 93, six miles north of U.S. 2.

Mower called the rezoning a “blatant circumvention of the intent of zoning [by] turning a guest house into a second residence and then subdividing it. I don’t think it is the right thing to do.”

Nonetheless, he voted in favor because if he voted no it could appear he was discriminating against the property owners.

The property is surrounded on three sides by 10-acre suburban agricultural zoning, but is located kitty-corner to one-family limited residential zoning.

Several members of the board noted they often are asked to approve “upzoning” requests of this nature, which make the property more dense.

“We see this thing over and over and over again,” board member Marc Pitman said.

Reporter Caleb Soptelean may be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at csoptelean@dailyinterlake.com