Liner concerns lead to new hearing for water-ski plan

The Flathead County Planning Board will hold a second public hearing Wednesday on the Rosewater water-skiing subdivision to consider new information about a plastic liner system for a proposed manmade lake.

The hearing begins at 6 p.m. in the second-floor conference room of the Earl Bennett Building, 1035 First Ave. W. in Kalispell.

The county commissioners approved a zoning overlay for the subdivision two months ago, but sent the proposal back to the Planning Board because they decided new information about the liner constituted the need for a subsequent public hearing.

Specifically, the Planning Board will look at details about the liner system, its potential for leaking, long-term maintenance and repair, and potential noise impacts associated with the proposed water-skiing use.

Rosewater is being developed by Bill Tanner of Score Management, which plans to build a 58-lot subdivision in two phases around a 27-acre manmade lake on 154 acres east of Whitefish Stage Road and north of Rose Crossing.

The zoning overlay will allow homes to be clustered around the lake on acreage where the underlying zoning is suburban-agricultural with a five-acre minimum lot size.

The Planning Board, which earlier had recommended approval of Rosewater with a number of conditions, added a requirement for long-term maintenance of the lake liner. 

Yet there were lingering questions about the lake maintenance following a public hearing March 25 before the commissioners.

Several people voiced concerns about the potential for the plastic liner to spring a leak and allow water potentially contaminated with herbicides and petroleum pollutants from motor-boat exhaust to flow into the nearby Whitefish River.