Sign variance OK'd for business in 'doughnut'

A new native plant nursery on the outskirts of Whitefish has received the OK to install a sign along U.S. 93 South.

Whitefish City Council voted unanimously April 21 to approve a variance requested by the Center for Native Plants to install a barn wood and metal sign on their property at 5605 Highway 93 South.

The property is within the two-mile planning “doughnut” around Whitefish, so it falls within the city’s jurisdiction while the ongoing doughnut lawsuit between the city and Flathead County is sorted out.

The nursery needed a variance to the city’s sign ordinance because the property is zoned within the residential sign district, which limits signs to just 10 square feet.

“That’s 5 feet per side,” property owner Greg Gunderson pointed out. “At 75 feet from the shoulder of the highway, that doesn’t seem to cut it.”

With traffic moving at 65 miles per hour or faster on the highway, Gunderson said they would need a much larger sign to adequately promote their business.

“We have to have enough sign for people to read,” he said. “The goal is to have an attractive sign that fits into the landscape, and that conveys a message to the public.”

Senior planner Wendy Compton-Ring explained the residential sign district was applied to all areas outside of city limits in 2005 when the city first obtained planning jurisdiction of the area.

It was anticipated this district would remain in place only until the city was able to either create a specific sign district for the highway or apply one of the existing sign districts.

“It’s just something that hasn’t been fixed,” planning director Dave Taylor said.

It was noted that most of the signs along the highway exceed the sign district standards.

“No one can argue the zoning in place is a bit antiquated,” mayor John Muhlfeld said.

He pointed out that the sign requested by the nursery is actually smaller than other sign district standards.

“For what we would normally consider out there, this is more than reasonable,” councilor Frank Sweeney added.

Council agreed to the variance request for a sign that includes 48 square feet of copy space and 77 square feet of architectural embellishments.