County opts not to review growth policy; floodplain regulation review underway
Cascade County planning staff have recommended against a growth policy update this year due to “very little growth” in the county.
Charity Yonker, county planning director, said during the Feb. 15 planning board meeting that the entire county saw a population growth of about 3,087 people, according to the 2020 Census data and that 63 percent of that growth, or about 1,900 people, was within the city limits.
The planning board last reviewed the growth policy in 2019 and decided to leave the document unchanged pending the new Census data.
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Yonker said she and planning staff met with officials at Malmstrom Air Force Base about the Joint Land Use Study that was a joint effort between Cascade County, Malmstrom, the City of Great Falls, as well as Chouteau, Fergus, Lewis and Clark, Judith Basin, Teton and Wheatland counties.
The JLUS was done in 2012, about the same time as the county’s growth policy, and Yonker said that they’re hoping to review both of those documents concurrently.
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The Air Force’s budget process would take about two years to get that project funded, Yonker said, so base officials want the county to request a JLUS update so they can submit their budget request.
She said that hopefully the concurrent review will also for some collaboration and cost sharing.
Planning board member Richard Liebert said he understood waiting to update the JLUS but that there were parts of the growth policy that should be reviewed. He didn’t specify which sections should be reviewed.
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Yonker said something they received negative feedback on is the staff reports and how long it takes staff to read them during meetings. Planning staff have maintained for years that they are legally required to read the staff reports in their entirety during meetings. City planning staff doesn’t use the same process and presents a summary of projects and written documentation is entered into the record.
The staff report includes the objectives identified in the growth policy with the applicants response and the staff analysis.
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Yonker said that Gallatin County recently revised their growth policy and it streamlined that process.
She said the county’s growth policy has five primary objectives, plus many secondary objectives and considerations within the objectives.
Yonker said those have to be addressed in the subdivision and special use permit process.
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“So we if we have a big growth policy with lots of objectives, it makes the review process more onerous,” she told the planning board.
Yonker said the planning department is currently working on updating the floodplain regulations, with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency.
She said they’ll be working with those agencies to review what the program is, which is essentially an insurance program and the county has to meet FEMA’s minimum requirements.
The DNRC has model regulations that the county is using to update theirs, Yonker said.
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The county has to submit their revisions to FEMA and DNRC for approval, then they’ll come to the planning board for review. If the board makes changes those have to be sent to FEMA and DNRC for review again, then they go to the County Commission for final adoption, Yonker told the planning board.
DNRC gives the county six months to review the floodplain regulations and the process is already underway.
During the Feb. 15 meeting, Yonker presented the planning department’s annual report and said that they’ve seen a 79 percent increase on revenue for permitting.
Over the summer, the department received more than 30 applications for special use permits, she said.
During that discussion, Dexter Busby, planning board member, said that he was concerned about the process for townhomes in subdivision review.
Staff said it’s addressed in the process that also includes review by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality.
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Yonker said that county zoning regulations and state law allow for townhouses, but that the staff will likely need to review the subdivision regulations as townhouses have become more popular.
