Kalispell City Council holds off on creating C-PACE district

Kalispell City Council postponed creation of a C-PACE district at its Tuesday meeting after City Manager Doug Russell recommended a temporary delay.

Russell said he wanted to give city staff time to clarify the municipality’s role in the tax collection clause of the resolution.

C-PACE, established last year in Montana through a law signed by Gov. Greg Gianforte, is designed to allow commercial property owners to fund energy efficiency improvements at no upfront cost through privately issued loans. The loans are repaid via energy cost savings through a special tax assessment that is collected by the local government and passed on to the lender.

At the information session delivered by program administrator Adam Gill in December, Gill assured Council that local governments have no enforcement role in the collection of property taxes through the program.

Russell said after the meeting that he wanted to consult further with Gill and get back to the Council with more details. He said he expects to resolve the issue soon.

“Great program, and I think we’ll get it through,” Russell said.

COUNCIL ALSO appointed Alison Howard to step in as interim municipal judge until the position appears on the ballot in November. Councilors recently appointed Rich Hickel to fill the position on an interim basis, but he abruptly stepped down after less than two months in the role.

Council also got a briefing from Flathead County Health Officer Jennifer Rankosky, specifically about the hospitalization rates for contagious viral diseases during the so-called “tripledemic,” with influenza, Covid and RSV circulating widely.

Rankosky reported that the rates in the first two weeks of 2023 are down significantly from December. Rankosky said that so far this year the county has recorded 79 cases requiring hospitalization, with over 1,000 such cases last year.

Rankosky did clarify that the numbers may be incomplete. Only cases severe enough to require hospital care were counted, she said. Plenty of people are picking up Covid tests from the county, Rankosky said, but most don’t report their status.

As part of the city manager’s report, Russell said that the city would be closing the gazebo in Depot Park to the public. Russell described the gathering of homeless people in the structure as an “encampment.”

While officials could not constitutionally remove people from the park during daylight hours, Russell said the city will be looking into new ordinances that would limit the time spent in the gazebo without a permit or ban “placement of personal property.”

Reporter Adrian Knowler can be reached at 758-4407 or aknowler@dailyinterlake.com.