Kalispell annexation: Where's the balancing point?

Kalispell’s growth half a decade ago prompted a spate of island annexations, wrapping city borders around far-flung patches of land.

Today that has given way to a dormancy, pitting the cost of providing services to outlying developments against frugal infill development.

The latter suits the city’s current budget crunch but Kalispell is almost certain to revive from its torpor.

When it does, where is the balancing point? How should city planners approach developers’ requests for annexation? How should the city encourage the type of annexations it wants to see?

That is the stuff of an annexation policy in its infancy.

More questions than answers arose at a Kalispell City Council work session Monday night, a session intended to begin hammering out a policy to guide city planners and developers over coming years.

Planning Director Tom Jentz laid out a bit of history first.

The 50 years before 1990 were a long, slow growth period. That changed around 2000, when a million square feet of commercial space went into Evergreen. The Home Depot came to Kalispell but, Jentz said, Evergreen was better positioned for growth so that’s where most of it went.

Then annexation became the name of the game in Kalispell. The city covered 5.5 square miles in 2000; it doubled to 11 square miles by 2009. Three Mile Drive became a hot spot for housing. Old School Station and Hutton Ranch Plaza came along in 2005 with industrial and commercial space. From then to 2009 a rush of annexations brought in Silverbrook Estates, Willow Creek, Valley Ranch, Glacier Town Center, Siderius Commons. Some made it, others languished.

“When a developer has decided to develop, it will be done,” Jentz told the council. “It’s just whether it’s in the county or the city.”

Trumbull Creek Crossing, a 160-acre mixed-use development north of Evergreen along East Reserve Drive, is the current case in point. It was not the focus of Monday’s meeting, but rather a catalyst for annexation policy discussion. It’s 1.75 miles from Kalispell’s nearest border at Village Greens but developers want annexation.

Council members heard them out, then turned their attention to broader issues.

“What are the trigger points?” Tim Kluesner asked. A map of Kalispell’s sprawling growth over the last decade is “a mess,” he said. “We need to come back and focus on our core because the more contiguous we are, the more efficient we will be.”

Jim Atkinson noted that at one point a three-quarter-mile stretch outside city limits was considered edgy on one development “but they filled in [the area] between, and this will, too.”

Bob Hafferman demanded more information on cost of services. Wayne Saverud asked about annexation districts, a phased approach to annexation. Jeff Zauner asked the difference between those districts and simple waivers of protest.

“How far does the city realistically want to go with its boundaries?” council president Duane Larson asked. “Philosophically, we’ve got to decide how big we want the city to be … We need to concentrate on core development and concentrate on infill, especially on infill.”

Council members asked City Manager Jane Howington to set up a joint meeting with the planning board to continue discussions, using issues raised Monday as a template for that discussion.