City, county seek common ground

Whitefish Mayor John Muhlfeld and Flathead County Commissioner Phil Mitchell say they would like both government entities they represent to forge a new relationship.

The commitment from both officials came during the Sept. 5 Whitefish City Council meeting.

On the agenda that night was a request from Muhlfeld for approval of a letter he had written asking the county to reconsider proposed permanent zoning that would reduce stream and wetland setbacks from 200 feet to 20 feet in the Haskill Basin area. Muhlfeld later that night asked council to table the issue.

“Hopefully, by extending an olive branch on this, it can open some doors to further discussion on issues we may have mutual concern on,” Muhlfeld said.

Mitchell said he had already met with Muhlfeld, but would like to set up a meeting between the mayor and all three commissioners.

“I wanted to meet to see how we can possibly resolve a few issues,” Mitchell said.

“How do we get to something that is acceptable,” he added. “One way we do that is to not have referrendums or lawsuits, and sit down together. I think we can come to some common ground on some things.”

The county is converting the zoning in the area around Whitefish known as the “doughnut” as it takes over jurisdiction of the area from the city. Interim county zoning is in place in the doughnut, but the county is looking to implement permanent zoning.

Muhlfeld wrote a letter to county commissioners on Sept. 19 outlining the city’s concerns over the reduction in stream and wetland setbacks in the area where Whitefish gets its drinking water. He said his letter was a request that the county honor a 200-foot setback that has been in place for Haskill Basin for over eight years since the city’s adoption of its water quality protection regulations.

The intent of the regulations was to protect and improve the quality of Whitefish’s water bodies, he wrote. Out of conern for the long-term protection of its water supply the city implemented a 200-foot setback for lands upstream of the municipal water supply intakes on Second and Third creeks in Haskill Basin, which are the sources for most of the city’s water supply, he notes.

“I’d like the opportunity to visit with the county commissioners to discuss this issue to see if we can come to some mutual agreement to how to best handle the setbacks for Second Creek above our water supply,” Muhlfeld said during the council meeting.

He pointed out that Whitefish was forced to discontinue use of First Creek in 1975 because of e. coli contamination and sedimentation from residential and commercial development upstream of the city’s water intake. The letter asks the commissioners to keep the 200-foot setback in place for Second Creek.

Mitchell said the county’s stream requirements are very good.

“We look at site specific,” he said. “The blanket 200 feet thing is hard for me to accept without science or justification.”

F.H. Stoltze Land & Lumber Co. owns a significant portion of the land in Haskil Basin. The city, along with The Trust for Public Land, is expected to finalize by the end of the year a $20.6 million conservation easement with Stoltze that would protect 3,000 acres in the basin from development but allow for the timber company to still manage the forest.

Paul McKenzie, lands manager for Stoltlze, also addressed city council asking them to reconsider the letter to the county.

McKenzie said there is about three miles along Second Creek on Stoltze property that would lie within the setback area, which equals about 145 acres inside the buffer area.

“Stoltze takes its reponsibility to manage these lands seriously,” he said. “Over the last 100 years we’ve worked very hard to ensure clean water comes along with a sustainably managed forestlands.”

He said the city’s water quality protection regulations allows Stoltze to continue to manage the forest lands. The company’s concern, he said, is that just placing a 200-foot set back requirement into county regulations, as suggested in the Muhlfeld’s letter, without the rest of the language that appears in the city’s water quality protection regulations could impact forest management.

“The setback may or may not impact our ability to manage our lands,” McKenzie said. “It might fall short of your goal of protecting Second Creek.”

Mitchell and Muhlfeld both expressed willingness to sit down together again.

“John [Muhlfeld] and I have talked about having him come down and speak with all three commissioners,” Mitchell said. “I hope this can happen so all three commissioners can understand what you’re working on longterm for the city for water.”

“This is a topic that we have mutual interest in discussing, so I do plan on contacting the county commissioners office to schedule a meeting,” Muhlfeld said.

The working relationship between the city and county has been pratically non-existent in recent years.

At the center of the contenious relationship has been a decade-long battle over control of the planning doughnut outside city limits.

Several attempts failed to negotiate an agreement between the two parties over how planning and zoning should be handled in the area. The two governments were locked in a court battle over control of the planning doughnut in a case that eventually made its way to the Montana Supreme Court, which rulled in July 2014 that the county has control over the area.

The county commissioners are set to hold final public hearings Dec. 17 before voting on zoning changes in the doughnut.