Kalispell Planning Commission grapples with public notice under new land use law

The Kalispell Planning Commission on Tuesday grappled with how to notify neighbors of impending development as the municipality falls in line with a state law aimed at limiting public input in land use decisions.  

Senate Bill 382, also known as the Montana Land Use Planning Act, was signed into law by Gov. Greg Gianforte in May 2023. The bill is one of several pro-construction measures the state Legislature passed last year in hopes of easing the statewide housing crunch.  

Kalispell, along with nine other cities in the state, must “adopt a new land use plan replacing their existing growth policies and update local zoning and subdivision regulations” in accordance with the bill, according to the city website.  

The commission’s Tuesday night work session was the first of many expected meetings that will be held over several months to craft Kalispell’s new land use plan. Kalispell City Council is expected to weigh in as well and the bill stipulates that the effort will rely heavily on public input.  

An updated land use plan must be adopted by May 2026. 

Kalispell’s current land use plan and growth policy likely will not have to undergo major changes, according to Development Services Director Jarod Nygren. Many of the city's zoning ordinances and regulations are already in accordance with the bill.  

“The idea is that we can almost take everything we have and just readopt it. Not try to reinvent the wheel,” Nygren said.  

Planning Commission members also indicated that they were not looking to completely rewrite the city's growth policy, which was updated in 2017 to guide growth through 2035.  

What will see a change though, is how the public can interact with local government on individual development projects. The bill, meant to streamline construction, limits public comment on site-specific projects. Instead, it invites public input on forming a land use plan that will guide the Planning Department’s authorization of projects.

For instance, the proposed twin subdivisions along Tronstad Road that Kalispell City Council authorized on Nov. 4 over the concerns of neighbors would only have to be approved by the Planning Department, according to Nygren. 

“As long as it's in the land use plan and we’ve accounted for it that would go straight from staff,” he said. However, developments on land not yet annexed by the city may still be put forth for public opinion.

Kalispell Assistant Director of Development Services PJ Sorensen said that under the Senate bill, developers looking to build on annexed land will not be required to notify the surrounding neighborhood. Authorization of development would be purely an administrative decision. This also pertains to conditional use permits.  

But Planning Commission members showed interest in instituting policy for notifying the public of forthcoming construction.  

“I think that the limitation of public involvement seems ideologically efficient. However, what it would produce is a strange amount of paranoia about the governmental services that limit their access,” said board member Joshua Borgardt. 

Board member Shelby Odell shared the same sentiment, saying she didn’t want people waking up to find bulldozers in their backyard.  

“As a matter of like the city’s integrity and the relationship we have with the people who live here, think it would be more fair for everybody to have a notification process anyway,” she said.  

Sorensen said that the Planning Department is communicating with other municipalities on how they are implementing the bill. He said that some communities are creating a registry for people to sign up and stay up to date on land use decisions. 

Per the bill, anyone can appeal a development decision made within 30 days of the ordinance being adopted. Nygren wondered aloud how the public will know when an administrative decision is made before seeing construction outside their window.  

“I think that’ll be like a policy decision that would be up to the board and Council is like, how much notice of our administrative decisions do we need to be putting out?”  

Sorensen said that planned unit developments remain an open question under the new bill, but his assumption right now is that they will still undergo a public input process because they fall outside of established zoning regulations. Planned unit developments are a tool that developers use when wanting to build a structure outside of the zoning regulations.  

Reporter Jack Underhill can be reached at junderhill@dailyinterlake.com and 758-4407.