City OKs event regulations update

The city of Whitefish has updated its special event permit regulations, but will not charge organizers for the city services provided during the events.

City Attorney Angela Jacobs updated the city’s event ordinance that creates regulations for event permits to include changes in the law.

“The city’s ordinance governing the issuance of special event permits was passed in 2007,” she explained. “Since the ordinance was passed, courts have handed down a considerable number of cases addressing the interplay between special event permits and the First Amendment and setting forth guidelines for acceptable time, place and manner restrictions.”

City Council on Aug. 7 unanimously approved the new ordinance that sets regulations for dealing with special events and permit, but chose not to implement fees for related city services. However, an administrative processing fee will become part of the requirement for special events permits.

Mayor John Muhlfeld said Council had asked for information regarding the cost of services for events, but did not want to make it challenging for those events to take place.

“It is not our intent to place an undue burden on the nonprofits and volunteers that put events together,” he said.

An alternative draft ordinance was presented that included allowing the city to charge organizers for the cost of services associated with events — traffic control, closure of streets, and the city cost to provide materials, supplies or support personnel for the event. The city is not allowed to charge for police protection.

During public comment, a few event organizers told City Council that charging fees for the services would be detrimental to their events. The city estimated that the cost for the Whitefish Winter Carnival would be $2,000.

Paul Johanson, chairman for the board of the Winter Carnival, said the carnival already subsidizes the cost of its Grand Parade, the main event during carnival, by up to $500.

“It would be short-sighted to start charging,” Johanson said. “That would jeopardize whether we do a parade.”

Police Chief Bill Dial previously said his department’s annual cost for special events is about $6,000.

Rhonda Fitzgerald, who organizes the downtown Farmers Market, said the market already pays $1,500 in fees for the use of Depot Park. She noted that vendors also pay resort tax, which goes to the city.

“Small events in towns are iconic, and define the heart and soul of the community,” she said. “They are almost always put on by volunteers and they drive the economic vitality.”

A revision of the city’s special event permit regulations was prompted by an application in January for a neo-Nazi march through town. The Daily Stormer, a white supremacist website, had been planning to hold a march through downtown on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but later announced it had canceled its plans saying it would reschedule the march, but that never materialized.

At the time the city initially denied the application saying the event needed to provide proof of insurance and pay an event fee, but later said it would waive the requirements, but still required the website to fill out a complete event application form to obtain approval.

The incident prompted a review of the city’s special events permit ordinance.

Under the new ordinance, a permit is required when the event involves the use or closure of a street, park property in conjunction with the use of non-park property, when it includes the sale or consumption of alcohol on public property, if it will interfere with the use of the public right-of-way and if the event is for the use of park or city property for an event involving more than 75 people.

Applications for event permits must be submitted to the city 15 days prior to an event, so it can be reviewed by the city manager and city department heads.

The new ordinance also creates guidelines under which the city manager has to follow to deny a permit and requires that denial be provided in written explanation so that it can effectively be appealed to City Council.

The ordinance specifically requires that an event obtain commercial general liability insurance.

Some exceptions to the regulations are made for events involving expressive activity.

Those only require an application be submitted three days prior to the event. It also allows an exception for a spontaneous expressive event that might occur as spurred by news or events coming to public knowledge.

In addition, the ordinance provides an exemption to the administrative fee and the insurance requirement for an event solely involving expressive activity.

Jacobs explained that the courts have held unconstitutional ordinances that don’t contain exceptions for applicants who can’t afford to pay for a permit or can’t obtain insurance as indirectly restricting speech. The U.S. Supreme Court has emphasized that freedom of speech is available to all, not just those who can pay, she added.