Apartment complex proposals stalled

Some neighborhood backlash paired with design uncertainty has stalled proposals for a 96-unit apartment complex on Kalispell’s south end, according to city officials.

Initial plans for The Lofts at Ashley show five, three-story buildings on a 3.79-acre site at the corner of Airport Road and Teal Drive.

The land is currently designated within Flathead County and sits largely unused as a grass field bordering neighborhoods within city limits. Developers are asking the land be annexed into the city.

Kalispell Planning and Building Director Tom Jentz said Lofts at Ashley LLC, a Montana-based company, bought the land in recent months. Hoffmann Morgan & Associates, a Missoula-based architecture and engineering firm, submitted the conditional-use permit application on behalf of the developers.

According to the application, the proposed multi-family development would include 81 two-bedroom units and 15 three-bedroom units and 177 parking spaces.

It would require a zone change to RA-2, a district that provides areas for residential development including multi-family housing and compatible non-residential uses such as office spaces for high land use intensity.

The proposal, submitted to the city Sept. 7, has piqued some nearby residents who say the complex would tower over their properties.

Jentz said city staff were set to deliver their report outlining possible impacts of the project to the planning board at its Oct. 11 regular meeting, but that date has been pushed back.

“There’s definitely been some buzz from residents about this one,” Jentz said. “But the project itself needs to be reviewed, and the applicants would like to propose some modifications and work through the planning board on some ideas.”

Jentz said the developer decided to postpone the public hearing and downgrade the project’s application status to a work session with the board to fill out some remaining details. He said a public hearing will most likely be held at the board’s regular Nov. 14 meeting and the work session will likely take place Oct. 11.

“It’s possible there will be some work on a better design plan that’s possibly more suitable to the neighborhood,” Jentz said. “But that’s hard to say before finishing the review and getting more information from the community.”

Glenn Wills said when he moved into his Ashley Park home in 1996, he chose a house on a lot with the open field at his back door. He said he was told by his Realtor the field was designated as a park and would remain that way.

“We picked that house because of the park,” Wills said. “If built, those apartments would be looking right into my sliding glass door.”

Jentz said though it’s still early in the city’s review of the application, there’s no indication the land was legally required to be open space or that it’s had restrictions or stipulations.

As of Monday evening, no one from Lofts at Ashley LLC had returned requests for interviews about the project.

Barbara Gallagher, an Ashley Park resident of 18 years, said the proposal comes at a time when her neighborhood has already seen a lot of growth.

“It’s just trees and grass, but it’s been a place for neighborhood kids and it’s the last one we have like it,” Gallagher said of the proposed development site. “And a lot of us were told it was here to stay.”

She believes the housing was proposed in anticipation of growth in the area, such as the school district’s goal to build a new elementary school on Airport Road near the proposed complex.

The city has also developed a new urban renewal plan for the south end of Kalispell that proposes expanding and improving Cemetery Road for expected residential and commercial growth.

Gallagher said she’s anxious to hear from the city’s review process how the proposed complex would impact traffic in her neighborhood.

“We understand land gets sold and needs to be developed,” Gallagher said. “But three stories high on an already developed subdivision in front of all of us? As far as I’m concerned, it’s too many people on a small piece of land.”

Reporter Katheryn Houghton may be reached at 758-4436 or by email at khoughton@dailyinterlake.com.