Hearing focuses on Whitefish critical areas law

The Whitefish City-County Planning Board will finalize its recommendations to revamp the city’s critical areas ordinance following a public hearing on Thursday.

The board began the public hearing on the proposed changes at its Oct. 20 meeting, but continued the hearing to allow time for a third work session last week.

At the City Council’s request, the Planning Board held earlier work sessions in August and September to discuss amendments that would make the law more user-friendly. Realtors in particular have claimed the law is too complex, too expensive and makes it difficult to put values on property within the Whitefish planning jurisdiction.

The city staff has proposed renaming the critical areas ordinance the water quality protection ordinance. Passed in 2008, the city law has been controversial because it applies drainage regulations not only in the city but also in the two-mile planning “doughnut” around Whitefish where residents have no voting power in city elections.

Beyond the name change, one of the biggest changes is to focus slope concerns only to areas within 200 feet of lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands where slopes are 10 percent or greater. For analyses in those areas, a geotechnical letter will be required. References to site screening for potential instability and site stability analysis have been removed, and all other references to steep slopes were deleted.

Erosion control still is a requirement under the proposed changes, but references to “allowable discharge” were deleted. All the erosion control standards would be placed in a separate chapter, with the idea that it’s a concern that affects the entire planning jurisdiction rather than just the area within 200 feet of water.

Groundwater regulations will be split between the public works engineering standards and subdivision regulations. References to single-family home development were deleted.

Planning Board member Karen Reeves said she believes the changes “get rid of the clunky things and streamline” the ordinance.

“The board seems pretty united” with the proposed changes, she said, noting that a complicated matrix in the original ordinance would be thrown out.

“It’s not a major overhaul, but I think it’s a much more usable, fluid document,” Reeves said.

Longtime Whitefish developer Tim Grattan isn’t sure the tweaking does much of anything.

“The bottom line is that it looks like they’re doing a slice and dice, repackaging it and it’s the same critter,” Grattan said.

Greg Carter, a Realtor who served on the original critical areas committee and has voiced the need for a simpler document, said he believes restricting slope regulations to the 200-foot zone near bodies of water is a good change.

He noted, however, that intermittent streams — places where water flows only during certain times of the year — are included in the 200-foot zone. He wonders how that might restrict development.

Even with the proposed changes, the ordinance “is still so complicated the normal person can’t understand it,” Carter said, adding that the document has been reduced from 38 to 34 pages.

“If the goal is water-quality protection, then let’s make it an erosion control ordinance,” he continued. “Why do we need to make people spend money on geotechnical reports?”

The City Council is scheduled to hold its public hearing on the proposed changes on Dec. 5. If the revamp is passed, Carter believes Realtors will continue to place an addendum on listings and purchase agreements that discloses the difficulty of accurately determining a value on property within the Whitefish planning jurisdiction.

The disclosure form requires sellers and buyers to contact the city Planning and Building Department and fill out a water protection area report to determine the property’s use.

IN OTHER business at Thursday’s meeting, the Planning Board has six other public hearings scheduled.

They include requests to rezone two tracts on Carver Bay from residential to suburban residential as part of an annexation process; and conditional-use permit requests for a guest house on Sandy River Lane and a parking lot at 324 Kalispell Ave.

The board also will consider two requests from the city of Whitefish: one to amend conditional uses in residential zones to allow personal services including massage therapists in certain areas along major arterials; and another to review the 2007 city growth policy.

Thursday’s meeting begins at 6 p.m. at Whitefish City Hall.

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