Business plan could help out sports complex
After two years of three-way talks, the Kalispell Youth Athletic Complex may be on the way to a permanent affordable home.
According to an idea pitched to the Kalispell City Council on Monday night, new commercial development on 23 or 24 acres in the northeast corner of the complex along U.S. 93 might be the way to make that happen.
The commercial development could include ventures that benefit from being next to large crowds of kids and families — maybe a Super Dairy Queen and a dentist, one official said tongue-in-cheek.
The developer, in effect, would buy out the lease to the city’s part of the land and the city would turn around and put it toward buying a permanent easement for what remains of the full 134 acres.
The Department of Natural Resources and Conservation is preparing a request for proposals, hoping developers will pitch some ideas of their own for the best use for that area.
Next, after the department, Kidsports and the city are on board with the proposal, a second request for proposals would go out as the department searches for the firm to do the actual construction.
If it’s not all construction, DNRC Area Manager Bob Sandman said, the proposal could include a mix of development, grants and philanthropy.
Representatives of the state agency, the city of Kalispell and Kidsports said that, besides giving Kidsports a permanent home, it also could help DNRC meet its state mandate to bring in revenue from the 134 acres of Section 36 state school trust land where the complex sits. And it could generate some new property tax revenue for the city.
Kidsports is a nonprofit representing Kalispell Pee Wee Baseball, Flathead Soccer Club, Kalispell Babe Ruth League, Kalispell Youth Softball Association and Flathead Valley Little Guy Football. In 1996 they banded together for fundraising to build the new complex with $1 million in seed money from the city after it sold former athletic fields at the south end of town.
The bottom line for Kidsports is securing a permanent land-use agreement for the land, swapping a one-time payment of what could be a few million dollars for escalating annual lease payments that will be re-evaluated in 2016.
Since today’s lease payments were based on a $7,000-per-acre land value when the lease was executed in 1997, those lease payments could jump substantially in 2016. Annual payments now are about $42,000. If the permanent lease doesn’t come through, they would settle for a 99-year-lease.
For the city, which legally holds the lease and depends on Kidsports to fund those annual payments, it would mean not being on the hook if Kidsports ever defaults. And it would mean a new stream of property tax revenue from the commercial development.
For the DNRC, it would be a way to bring in the full market value on the trust land for “the support of common schools” as required by the Enabling Act of 1889 when Congress established the state of Montana. Today, the DNRC is responsible for managing 5.1 million acres of trust land in Montana.
In Kalispell, the DNRC would join its 12-acre former campus with another chunk of about 12 acres that Kidsports would carve out of its lease area, fronting on the highway between the DNRC campus and the state highway department’s detention basin.
A portion of the gravel cross-country trail that curves into that area would be relocated to wind among future soccer fields, baseball diamonds and a parking lot to the northwest along Reserve Loop. The city maintains the 8- to 12-foot-wide gravel path, but it’s used year-round by high school teams, cross-country skiers, dog walkers and others.
The entire complex is zoned P1 for public use, with a slice of commercial zoning at the northeast corner of the former DNRC campus. Commercial zoning likely would be put in place if the plan goes through.
Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com