Bridger Canyon Corridor Study
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Category Archives: News
2014 Newsletter
Contents
- From the Chair
- Annual Meeting June 24th
- Parking at Bridger Bowl
- Cell Towers
- LIDAR mapping
- Variance Appeal
- Zoning Updates
- Resources
- Directors
- Membership, Dues Notice & Payment Form
From the Chair
This has been a busy year for BCPOA. We’ve written briefs for a zoning variance appeal, and intervened in the creation of zoning amendments to regulate cell towers and additional parking at Bridger Bowl, among other things. We’ve also seen turnover of two keystone properties in Bridger Canyon—the Crosscut Ranch in the Bridger Bowl Base Area, and the Flying J that occupies the heart of the canyon south of the Base Area.
I can’t reflect on the year without mentioning the unfortunate series of events in our rural fire department. While every director has an opinion, BCPOA as an organization has endeavored to remain neutral in this matter, both because we felt that BCPOA membership was divided, and because we felt that it was not our place to adjudicate an issue that has its own organization and political process.
As a purely personal observation, it seems to me that the underlying substantive issues in the department were greatly amplified by a vicious cycle of strong rhetoric and attributions of ill motives. I know some of the principals on both sides, and I’m certain that they have had the best interests of the canyon at heart, though it did not always appear that way to their opponents. I hope that we can turn that cycle around, speak softly and listen more, and gradually repair the injuries that have been done. I’m sure that the differences that divide us are smaller than the common interests that brought us together in this beautiful place.
I hope that this coming year will be even bigger—not because I want to spend more time in meetings and hearings, but because we’ll finally see the submission of a zoning update. The updated regulations should put to rest many of the ambiguities about Planned Unit Developments and other features that have plagued us in years past. The Bridger Canyon zoning district will be 43 this year, and it has served well to preserve the beauty and value of Bridger Canyon. Let’s hope the next 43 go as well.
Tom Fiddaman
Chairman
Annual Meeting June 24th
BCPOA’s annual General Meeting of the membership sees the election of directors to represent you, and covers a variety of news from the year. Bring a neighbor, and your dues if you haven’t paid them yet!
6:30 Refreshments, Celtic & classical strings by the Fiddaman brothers
7:00 General Meeting
Agenda
- Adopt the Agenda
- Minutes of Annual Meeting – May 2013
- Treasurer’s Report
- Introduction of current board members
- Review of Year
- Current Business
- Elections
- Retiring Board members
- Review of Board work and meeting times, dues requirement for voting
- Board Chair election
- Election of new Directors
- Canyon Groups
- Budworm spraying protocol
- Other Business
Parking at Bridger Bowl
Bridger Bowl has proposed a zoning amendment that will increase its parking area by about 50%. The primary motivation is to avoid parking overflow onto the highway on powder-frenzy days. This seems like a laudable move from a public safety perspective.
Additional parking at Bridger Bowl is problematic with respect to the Base Area Plan, though one could argue that the plan already had a lot of problems. The issue is that, including potential parking at a Base Area development, potential parking for 9000 skiers will substantially exceed the capacity of the mountain. Bridger Bowl has agreed to defer construction of 1/3 of the area to mitigate the overage while the Zoning Advisory Board takes up the issue.
Cell Towers
Cell coverage for the overall Canyon remains elusive, though several events portend some level of coverage in the near future. Since the original zoning regulations pre-dated the existence of cell towers, the zoning update committee hammered out a set of regulations to give some guidance on height and placement issues. Bridger Bowl is in active negotiations with a tower company to start installation this summer on the first of two roughly 60 ft. tall towers. Two, shorter towers, higher on the mountain, will provide better coverage with less visual impact.
Still in question is coverage for the lower Canyon and coverage in the nooks and crannies of the Canyon. If you are concerned that you may be left out of coverage, be prepared to make your concerns known to the County Commissioners. Once basic coverage is achieved and the highway is covered there will be little incentive for installation of further coverage.
Coverage maps from Atlas Towers’ first proposal (with 130-150 ‘ towers) can be found here but should be taken with a shaker of salt. Unfortunately, these are the only coverage maps we have available. http://bcpoa.net/2013/04/possible-cell-tower-coverage/
LIDAR mapping of Bridger Canyon (and beyond)
Craighead Institute is still seeking to aggregate Federal, State, Municipal and private interests in the Canyon to cooperatively raise funds to map the entire Zoning District. LIDAR mapping would be a benefit to the Canyon for decades to come, providing key baseline data critical to planning for development, climate change, habitat and wildlife preservation, water and air quality. Contact Kent Madin for more information.
http://www.craigheadresearch.org/bridger-canyon-lidar-project.html
Variance Appeal
With overwhelming support from the membership at last year’s General Meeting, BCPOA has filed a complaint in district court against the county’s handling of a CUP and variance on the Petty property. As is too often the case, this began with construction initiated without permits, and was compounded by county errors and efforts to accommodate the violation. BCPOA is contesting several aspects of the decision. So far, only procedural questions have been considered. Surprisingly, the county (with support of the applicant, as interveners) has fought us tooth and nail to exclude its own variance application guidelines from the official record and to defend its failure to produce a written decision, which merely refers to the audio record of the hearing. The substantive issues with the decision may not be heard for a considerable time yet. Details are on our web site at bcpoa.net.
Zoning Updates
The Zoning Advisory Board has resolved to submit a complete updated regulation in the next few months. This will address all areas of the Canyon, except for the Bridger Bowl Base Area. The Base Area will be tackled separately, because its complexity would delay implementation of good progress to date, and because there has been no contact with the new Base Area landowner to date. We will work to be sure that residents are well informed about the changes as soon as a complete draft is ready.
Resources
Our web site, BCPOA.net, is a good resource for zoning documents, canyon history and links, and news. We frequently publish public documents, maps and other material in advance of major zoning actions.
You can follow the progress of the zoning updates on the Zoning Advisory Board’s site, bczoning.wordpress.com.
Planning documents and commission schedules are on the Gallatin County site, gallatin.mt.gov/planning. The Planning Dept. email address for inquiries and public comment is planning@gallatin.mt.gov
Membership, Dues Notice & Payment Form
BCPOA membership is for landowners in the Bridger Canyon zoning district, from (roughly) Ross Peak Ranch at the north end of Bridger Canyon Road, south to where the Bridger Canyon Road crosses Bridger Creek west of the slide area, east from Bridger Canyon Road to Interstate 90 on the Jackson Creek Road, and east from Bridger Canyon Road to the zoning boundary on Kelly Canyon Road.
Membership supports a variety of community resources, including BCPOA.net, the [canyon] email list, and occasional postal mailings. It also provides leverage for many volunteer hours contributed by BCPOA directors and others, particularly where legal and professional services are needed in defense of our zoning and natural resources.
Join us here!
Bridger Bowl Parking & Cell Tower Zoning Amendments
Personal Wireless Services zoning amenment
On May 8, a joint hearing of the Bridger Canyon Planning & Zoning Commission and the County Commission will consider a proposed Personal Wireless Services (i.e. cell towers) amendment to the Bridger Canyon Zoning.
We’ve provided the text of the amendment and some background on the Zoning Advisory Board web site, at http://bczoning.wordpress.com/2014/04/26/personal-wireless-services-amendment-poll/
There’s also a one-question poll: should the amendment be approved, approved with changes, or rejected? Let us know what you think. Comments are open on the post as well.
Public Comment Open and Informational Meeting March 3rd South Bridger Interface Project
Release Date: Feb 14, 2014
Bozeman, MT–The Bozeman Ranger District, Custer and Gallatin National Forests has released an Environmental Assessment (EA) for the South Bridger Interface Project that is available for review and public comment. The District will also be hosting an informational meeting on Monday March 3, 2014 at the Bridger Canyon Rural Fire Department Community Room from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. (8081 Bridger Canyon Road, Bozeman, MT). Resource specialists will be available to provide information and answer questions about the proposed South Bridger Interface Project, which is located approximately 15 miles northeast of Bozeman, MT in Bridger Canyon.
The South Bridger Interface project area is located within the wildland urban interface, adjacent to and partially within the Bridger Bowl Ski Resort in the vicinity of Slushman Creek. It lies between private residential and forested/agricultural lands to the east and National Forest System lands, partly occupied by Bridger Bowl to the west. Forest vegetation in the project area consists of Douglas-fir and lodgepole pine that has experienced a high rate of tree mortality from spruce budworm and mountain pine beetle. The proposed action would thin approximately 250 acres of forest vegetation to reduce tree mortality from ongoing insect infestations, and is needed to maintain a healthy forest in the Bridger Canyon corridor. Without treatment, there is a high probability that many more trees would be severely impacted by budworm and Douglas-fir beetles.
“The proposed project includes treatments that are designed to alter stand micro-environments that will create conditions less favorable to western spruce budworm, mountain pine beetle and Douglas-fir beetle; along with improving the growing space of remaining trees to allow for tree growth, vigor and resiliency,” explained Keith Konen, Forest Silviculturalist.
Minimal temporary road construction of one half mile or less is anticipated for access. The proposed project would start in 2014 and would be completed within a three-year timeframe, followed by burning of slash piles, rehabilitation of temporary roads and monitoring of the project.
Public comment on the project will be accepted for 30 days (through March 16, 2014). The South Bridger Interface Environmental Assessment is available online at: http://www.fs.usda.gov/projects/gallatin/landmanagement/projects, by scanning the QR code, or by contacting the Bozeman Ranger District at 406-522-2520 to request a copy. For additional information about the project, contact Amy Waring, Project leader at 406-255-1451
Note: this appears to be a more direct link.
Updates:
Bozeman Daily Chronicle coverage
SBridgerInterface.pdf press release
Variance Appeal Update
As you may recall, the membership at the May General Meeting voted overwhelmingly to appeal the commission’s grant of a variance to enable conversion of old barns to guesthouse/recreational use, within the setback from Bridger Creek. As is too often the case, this was an episode of build-first-permit-later, and we were puzzled to see the commission seemingly content to see its authority flouted. There’s more background here:
http://bcpoa.net/2013/04/variance-hearing/
BCPOA has appealed the commission’s decision, granting a variance that allows the project to proceed. While this is a very messy, multilayered case, the points we would like to make are simple. For example,
- The commission should not lightly set aside objective standards, merely because it likes a project, for then standards have no meaning.
- Saving pennies through poor documentation and circumvention of procedures is enormously costly in the long run, as citizens are denied due process and confusion propagates errors.
The first issue we are contesting is that the commission did not issue a proper written decision; it merely delivered the verdict, making reference to the audio recording of the proceedings. That makes it difficult to distinguish actual findings from mere discussion, and imposes additional burdens on anyone who desires to review or contest a decision. This is a constitutional issue, and if we prevail on this point, we may recover our costs. However, in that case, a likely outcome is that the judge would remand the case to the commission for a fresh statement of the decision, essentially restarting the process.
Getting to the meat of the case, it’s still complicated. There are actually two standards for a variance, one via the P&Z commission, and one via the county commission. Rather than considering them sequentially, as is proper, both were heard together. We don’t believe that either standard was met, but this further mingles procedural and substantive issues.
The variance case was actually heard twice. Initially, the commission denied it. Then, circumventing regulations that prevent rehearing an application within one year, the commission reconsidered the variance a month later, under the pretense that it had been “withdrawn” and re-presented with new information.
As if that weren’t enough, the commission only considered the question of a variance after it had already granted a Conditional Use Permit for the project. This is backwards, because the CUP is moot without the variance, and the discussion of standards among the two proceedings was somewhat mingled and confused.
As the case now stands, BCPOA has filed its initial complaint, and the parties have responded. We have moved for summary judgment on the constitutional issue of adequacy of the written decision.
We have met with the other parties to agree on what documents constitute the official record. The county has fought tooth and nail to exclude a few documents, including its own variance evaluation criteria and public sewer permit records. We are somewhat puzzled by this, as they are part of the evidence of a pattern of errors and omissions, but not decisive in themselves. This wrangling increases our costs, deterring future appeals. (By contrast, BCPOA cheerfully granted the applicant’s request to intervene, though it is not in our favor and we could have contested it, because we felt that it was right to do so and minimized cost and delay to all concerned.)
Next, we must file a brief on the substance of the case, though we are hoping to defer that until the constitutional question has been heard.
For the moment, BCPOA is adequately financed, in part due to the very generous rate reduction that our attorney, Brian Gallik, has granted us. Our legal committee, Deb Stratford, Richard Lyon, Charlie Hager & Chuck Broughton, has also put in many volunteer hours. There may yet come a time when we need to appeal for funding, but for the moment we hope we can use our resources for other purposes. In any event, thank you for your support, past and future.
GC variance evaluation criteria
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Cell Tower Draft Regulation
Here’s a quick update on cell towers.
A recent 911 outage (countywide) emphasized the value of cellular backup when other communication lines are down.
Bridger Bowl is eager to proceed with siting a tower, for installation in this year’s construction season. They’ve rejected the original Atlas Towers proposal of a 130’ structure at the end of A lot, in favor of much smaller towers, higher on the mountain. BCPOA directors have also met with Verizon engineers (thanks to Kent Madin for organizing), who also indicated that much of the canyon could be covered with two towers in the 50’ ballpark. Less height generally means more towers for equivalent coverage, but we think this is a net improvement from a concealment standpoint.
Because the zoning did not previously address the issue, the P&Z commission has initiated a zoning amendment to create a cell tower regulation, and the Zoning Advisory Board has prepared a draft. Unfortunately, the draft has been stalled in legal review for 2 months, with no end in sight.
The BC P&Z Commission meets tomorrow, and has this issue on its agenda for discussion. You may attend, or direct written comments to the commissioners via planning@gallatin.mt.gov.
BCPOA has written to urge the commissioners to provide the resources needed to bring the Advisory Board’s work to completion.
New Director
The BCPOA board is pleased to welcome Drew Seessel as a new director, representing the Jackson Creek area.
Base Area Auction
If you’ve been skiing at Bridger, you’ve probably seen that Bridger Canyon Partners’ remaining piece of the Base Area is up for auction on March 20th.
The web link leads to http://www.conciergeauctions.com/auctions/crosscut-ranch-bozeman-montana-59715/ which lists the property as, “Ideal for use as a gentleman’s ranch, with development & conservation opportunities, over four commercial acres, 2 creeks and direct access to the Bridger and Bangtail mountains with ski-in ability and ski-out potential, the property is a great balance of open meadows, diverse plant life and abundant wildlife. Previously offered for $16M. Selling to the highest bidder on March 20th.”
The 259 acre parcel represents about ¾ of Bridger Canyon Partners’ original holdings. The remainder – a parcel south and east of the parking lot – was sold to Bridger Bowl. $16M would be a bit over $60,000 an acre, which would be well above the price paid by BB, but similar to the price paid in the transfer of 14 acres for Bridger Pines’ sewer system.
We can certainly hope for a conservation-minded buyer, without ambitions for a 500+ unit development. Could we also dream of a way to put much of the property into a land trust or similar mechanism, preserving the headwaters of Bridger Creek while continuing access to recreation?
Some history on the last Base Area development attempt is here. (Apologies for broken links – this is not fully migrated from BCPOA’s old web site.)
2013 General Meeting
Slides from the General Meeting are here.
With overwhelming approval of the membership and board, BCPOA will pursue an appeal of the Petty CUPs and variances. An amendment to the initial complaint will be filed soon. The initial complaint will likely be followed by briefs within a month or two and a court hearing for summary judgment some time later. Because some points of the case are constitutional, BCPOA hopes to recover some litigation costs.
Concerning the interchange about Bridger Pines’ sewage lagoon dewatering, see Gallatin County’s report, Bridger Pines Site Visit 092012. An excerpt:
Discussion & Summary: Again, I did not find evidence of a ‘dam breach’ or massive sewage leak. I was also unable to tell if the existing pump discharge is more than normal for this historically leaking lagoon. But there is water from the pond reaching Bridger Creek after flowing down slope and through meadows a distance of about 1/3 rd mile.
See also the Fire department issues post.
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