Longtime planner takes over leading development for Kalispell

Longtime Kalispell planner takes over leading development 

For PJ Sorensen, serving as Director of Development Services isn’t just a job, but a chance to continue shaping the community that shaped him.   

After nearly 30 years with the city of Kalispell, 54-year-old Sorensen was recently promoted to lead the department that guides land use decisions, provides planning assistance and ensures compliance with city code.  

The new gig is familiar for Sorensen, who previously served as assistant director and has been filling the role since fall 2025, after former director Jarod Nygren became city manager.   

While Sorensen worked on the forefront of a construction boom driven by the pandemic and helped bring the city into compliance with a sprawling pro-housing law, he never formally studied planning.  

After graduating from Willamette University College of Law in Oregon, he returned to his hometown of Kalispell and took a job at a local law firm. But he quickly realized it just wasn’t his cup of tea. The political science major had always been more interested in the nuts and bolts of government.  

A job opened with the city, and he took it. As zoning administrator, Sorensen reviewed city ordinances and floodplain regulations before signing off on building permits. At the time, most of the city’s planning services were contracted to the Flathead Regional Development Office. 

He planned to hold the job for only a few years, but that didn’t happen.  

“I just really enjoyed it. So, I’ve stayed there now for 27 [years],” he said with a chuckle. 

Sorensen eventually became senior planner in 2020, where he was tasked with managing the substantial growth on the coattails of the pandemic. Processing the surge of development proposals and preparing staff reports for Kalispell City Council often meant long hours in the department’s basement office at City Hall.  

“It was a very busy time,” Sorensen said. 

Council approved around 7,500 new housing units since 2021, of which 2,000 have been built, according to the city’s land use plan.   

By 2024, he was hired as assistant director of Development Services, where he played a key role in bringing the city into compliance with the Montana Land Use Planning Act.  

“It was a huge lift. And it’s something we took very seriously,” he said.  

Signed into law in 2023 by Gov. Greg Gianforte, the act was designed to streamline construction amid a statewide housing crunch. It required 10 Montana cities, including Kalispell, to draft new land use plans shaped largely by public input. It also required cities to adopt new zoning and subdivision regulations to encourage higher-density housing and overhaul how the public weighs in on site-specific developments.   

Municipalities have until the end of May to comply with the law, which Sorensen said was an aggressive timeline.  

“Usually, cities don’t have that kind of time frame,” Sorensen said. 

But after nearly 20 work sessions with the Planning Commission and several more with Council, Sorensen and his staff guided city leadership as it shaped a new land use planning framework to guide growth over the next two decades.  

Now as director of Development Services, Sorensen oversees the city’s planning, building and community development departments. He said the 15-person staff is small given the pace of growth in Kalispell.  

“Missoula has got quite a bit more planners ... it’s a bigger city, but actually a lot of the volume that comes through because we’ve got so much growth happening here is similar,” Sorensen said.  

Sorensen’s favorite part of his job is the people he works alongside.   

“I think we’ve built a really good team here, and we all get along and look out for each other,” Sorensen said.  

Sorensen also enjoys guiding builders through the city’s development process.  

“We’ll talk to them about their ideas and their dreams for the property and lay out what some of the city rules are,” he said. “Those things aren’t done overnight.”   

His job also includes fielding questions from residents, whether they’re planning to build a garage or add onto their home.   

Kalispell is much larger than when Sorensen moved here from Alaska at age 8.  

Now Whitefish Mountain Resort, where he still spends his time, has grown well beyond the four chairlifts he remembers, and the Sundown Drive-In Theater that used to inhabit where Immanuel Living exists no longer marks the edge of town.  

Despite how much the city has changed since his childhood, Sorensen said he doesn’t feel overly sentimental about the way things were.  He said there are pros and cons to a larger community.  

“Anytime you’ve got growth, there’s growing pains, but when I was growing up, every kid went to Missoula or Spokane in August for school shopping, and now we have those opportunities here,” Sorensen said. 

He sees his role in guiding land use policy and helping the public engage in development decisions as a way to give back to the community.  

“It’s not just a job,” he said. “It’s something where I can give back to not just my current community, but where I grew up.”  

Reporter Jack Underhill can be reached at 406-758-4407 or junderhill@dailyinterlake.com. If you value local journalism, pledge your support at dailyinterlake.com/support.