Council takes a look at annexation policies

At a work session tonight, the Kalispell City Council will meet with the planning staff to broadly review the city’s annexation policies.

The discussion will touch on cost- of-services plans prepared for every annexation request.

Council members twice have tabled an annexation request from a couple who want the city to annex 3.5 acres of land at Three Mile Drive and West Spring Creek Road so they can get a general business zoning and operate a drive-through coffee stand.

A cost-of-services plan for the request showed the property would cost the city $2,595 a year more in services than it would generate in property taxes.

Because of that, council members asked the city planning staff to develop options for applicants to cover the financial shortfall if their annexation request does not “pencil out” under a cost-of-services plan.

In a memo sent out to the council, Planning Director Tom Jentz cautions that the cost of services plans are based on average costs for city department services and not on any actual or specific costs a development with experience.

While useful as a guide, the city’s cost-of-services plans are far too general in nature to use as an analytical tool to ascertain specific, measurable costs, Jentz said. “Without refinement, they should not be used to craft a reimbursement policy for annexation shortfalls.”

CONVERSATIONS also will touch on the extent to which growth should pay for growth and the tax implications of all the vacant land Kalispell has annexed in recent years.

Planning staffers conducted a cursory review of eight large annexations Kalispell approved between 2007 and 2010. 

Together they total 2,198 acres or roughly 30 percent of the city’s size.

Those annexations include Stillwater 180, Valley Ranch, Glacier Mall, Starling, Willow Creek, Siderius, Gardner’s and Silverbrook phases one and two.

With the downturn of the local housing market, most of those annexations remain vacant land.

Planning staffers found the vacant lands require about $11,000 a year in city services but pay $227,000 a year in property taxes and assessments.

“It would appear that at least for the short-term, this annexation policy is a revenue generator for the city,” Jentz said.

Tonight’s council work session begins at 7 p.m. at Kalispell City Hall.

Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com.