County backs away from North Fork zoning

A zoning proposal to limit the size of extractive industries on private land in the North Fork failed to win approval Tuesday from the Flathead County commissioners.

A motion by commissioner Joe Brenneman to approve a zoning text amendment to limit sand and gravel operations and other extractive industries to five acres and 20,000 tons annually failed for lack of a second.

The commissioners left the door open, though, by deciding to take the proposal under advisement and deal with it again “within a reasonable length of time.”

The North Fork Land Use Committee had unanimously recommended approval of the zoning text amendment, based on language in the North Fork Neighborhood Plan that calls for small-scale industrial development. “Small scale” has never been defined.

“I want to stress that the impetus for this came from the land-use committee,” Brenneman said. “It’s a landowner-driven request.”

The Flathead County Planning Board also had recommended approval of the zoning proposal, though several board members wanted the record to

show the board’s decision was separate from a memorandum of understanding signed by Gov. Brian Schweitzer and British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell that bans mining and coal and gas development in the transboundary Flathead River drainage.

“The Planning Board had concern that it [a text amendment defining small-scale mining] was being forced upon [the county] from the top down,” planner Andrew Hagemeier told the commissioners, acknowledging that the idea for the text amendment “started at a pretty high level.”

When the governor asked the commissioners in February for their support of the memorandum, the commissioners contacted the North Fork Land Use Committee, which drafted language for the text amendment.

Following Tuesday’s public hearing and the commissioners’ lack of action, land-use committee members said they feel they’re victims of the same kind of “top down” approach.

Brenneman agreed.

“This has gone through and has been unanimously endorsed,” he said. “In effect, we’re refusing to go ahead with the recommendation from people who live in the area. That’s perhaps the definition of ‘top down.’”

North Fork Land Use Committee chairman and longtime North Forker John Fredericks urged the commissioners to approve the zoning request, based on widespread support among North Fork residents.

“It’s a shame that people up there can’t get what they want,” he said after the hearing.

North Fork resident Molly Shepherd said the definition included in the proposed text amendment clearly implements the goals and policies in the North Fork Neighborhood Plan.

Gary Krueger, a West Valley gravel operator who earlier this year pushed for and won county approval of a zoning text amendment that includes asphalt and concrete plants in the county’s definition of gravel extraction, testified that he thought the North Fork amendment was using zoning “in an improper fashion.” He argued that the findings of fact didn’t support assertions that limiting the size and scope of North Fork extractive industries would affect the health and welfare of residents or would harm the environment.

Krueger said it’s the county Board of Adjustment’s role to make decisions on proposed extractive industry projects. Krueger is a member of the Board of Adjustment.

About 95 percent of the land in the North Fork is federal or state land; the amendment applies to less than 14,000 acres of private property.

Commissioner Jim Dupont was concerned that private property owners’ mineral rights would be limited under the proposed zoning. He also said he doesn’t feel it’s necessary to zone an area where the zoning “probably won’t be used.”

“If we’re saying that [extractive industries] are a health and safety issue, then maybe motorized vehicles should be banned [in the North Fork], too,” Dupont said. “Are we implying the extraction of gravel is dangerous?”

As written, the text amendment offers no recourse other than to forbid extractive operations larger than five acres or go through the planning process of changing the definition.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.