On the map and getting bigger

Developers, speculators and travel magazine editors are always searching for the next undiscovered Western Eden: a pine-scented place with affordable real estate, dramatic views and fast ski slopes just beyond a Norman Rockwell downtown.

They seem to have stumbled across something in Sandpoint, and they’re letting the whole world know.

Sandpoint is experiencing the classic symptoms of discovery, including traffic congestion, crowded schools and skyrocketing property prices. The city’s population grew by 5 percent from 2000 to 2002, according to the most recent figures from the Idaho Department of Labor.

But much of the growth has occurred in the past year, many residents and real estate agents say. Many of the new residents live in subdivisions outside city limits – Bonner County has grown by 29 percent since 1993. A 535-lot subdivision near Dover is among the many developments being considered in the region.

The county is in the process of updating its 25-year-old land use plan, which will direct how and where development occurs. Officials hope the plan will protect the county from unchecked growth, but many are concerned the update is too little, too late.

“People are getting a little bit nervous. The impacts aren’t real obvious yet, but there’s a growing sense of concern,” said Suzanne Sawyer, executive director of the Clark Fork-Pend Oreille Conservancy, a recently formed land trust working to protect wildlife habitat in the region. “I just wish that our land trust existed a couple of years ago when property was still for sale.”

Leaders from other Western boomtowns say growth spurt pains can be calmed with creative zoning and planning. Ignoring the pain will only lead to more problems later, said Christopher Simms, director of Citizens for Smart Growth, a group based in Hailey, Idaho, that works with city government and developers. Hailey is a formerly blue-collar town that now attracts movie stars.

“Growth can destroy the very things that people love about a place,” Simms said. “People are going to keep on coming. We have to look at ways to manage the growth and make it sustainable.”

A common mistake, according to planning officials from other boom areas, is to allow developers too much influence in creating land use and zoning codes. “They all say they speak for the community,” said James Lewis, community development director for Bend, Ore., which has tripled in size since 1990.

Statistically accurate surveys of citizens’ views on growth are vital, Lewis said. “Use that as a tool to prioritize so that you’re really representing what people want,” he said, offering advice to planning officials in Bonner County. “The people need to be heard. Otherwise decisions will be made for them. Usually the people that make that decision are those who will benefit the most, and usually it will be people who want to see substantial growth.”

Bonner County Commissioner Marcia Phillips said tight budgets are making it difficult for local governments to deal with the growth. The county planning department, for instance, is charged with updating the comprehensive plan, but staff members barely have enough time to meet all the requests for building location permits and new subdivisions.

“We’re really challenged,” Phillips said.

Although the land-use plan is being updated years after the growth spurt began, the changes will help preserve the region’s charms, Phillips said. “Nothing is ever too late. The mistake would be if we put our head in the sand and hope the troubles pass us over.”

Here is how some of the other fastest growing towns in the Northwest are dealing with their changing landscapes.

Whitefish, Mont.

Population 1990: 4,368.

Population 2002: 5,517.

Price of a luxury home in the nearby Iron Horse development in 1998: $200,000.

Price in 2002: $750,000.

Tensions ran high during the first real estate boom in Whitefish in the 1970s. Current City Councilwoman Velvet Phillips-Sullivan remembers the signs posted outside her northwest Montana hometown: “Gut shoot a developer.”

Things aren’t so nasty this time around, she said, but there’s growing anger against a seemingly unending line of new housing projects. This year’s annual population growth rate in Whitefish could top 25 percent, Phillips-Sullivan said. Citizens are circulating a petition for a yearlong moratorium on new subdivisions.

“A lot of us have growth anxiety,” Phillips-Sullivan said.

A 2 percent resort tax pays for a tax rebate for local residents, but rising property taxes have prompted some retirees on fixed incomes to flee, she said. Providing affordable housing for workers has also been a major problem.

Drywall installers are earning upward of $35 an hour in the area, but that’s still not enough to pay the mortgage on most of the homes they build, said Mike Jopek, chairman of the city-county planning commission. Nurses, police officers and teachers continue to earn Montana wages, which are among the lowest in the nation.

“Three-quarters of the workers can’t afford to purchase a home here,” he said.

The town is considering a law that would require a percentage of all new subdivisions to include a percentage of housing affordable to working-class residents. Similar laws are in effect in high-growth towns across the country, according to a report issued by the Whitefish City-County Planning Board.

The report noted “strong resistance from the development community,” in creating an affordable housing ordinance. It also stated, “Like the mythical hydra, for every developer who abandons Whitefish to work elsewhere, a couple of others will clamor for a piece of our desirable real estate.”

The pressure on local political leaders from developers can be intense during periods of high growth, according to both Jopek and Phillips-Sullivan. This makes it important for elected officials to understand the desires of citizens.

“The developers are still trying to drive the show,” Phillips-Sullivan said.

The upside of the growth has been amenities that are unknown to most small towns: a large new library, an indoor ice skating rink, new trails and a massive soccer and golf complex.

“No one really anticipated we would grow as quickly as we have,” Jopek said. “We even have a Sotheby’s office here, for goodness’ sakes.”

Blaine County, Idaho

Population 1990: 13,552.

Population 2002: 20,378.

Current listing for a 1,350-square-foot, three-bedroom, two-bath rancher in Ketchum: $669,000.

Ernest Hemingway ventured here during the first boom just before World War II. He kept coming back, attracted by the beauty and the fishing. His final days were spent here in a house on 22 acres he bought in 1959, reportedly paying less than $50,000. The real estate would now fetch about $20 million, according to an estimate published recently in the Los Angeles Times.

Growth and sprawl aren’t new issues to the people of Blaine County. But the region continues to struggle to protect the qualities that attracted the early-day ski and trout bums.

Sun Valley recently adopted affordable housing and dark sky ordinances, according to Christopher Simms of Citizens for Smart Growth. The dark sky laws attempt to curb light pollution and preserve views of the stars by banning poorly directed spotlights and streetlights.

The city of Hailey also has a dark sky law and recently instituted a cap on the size of retail stores to prevent an influx of “big box” retail outlets, according to the city’s Web site.

A recent push in the region encourages higher-density developments downtown, as opposed to continued carving up of farmland into 5-acre lots, Simms said. Citizens for Smart Growth recently hosted a forum on the topic called “Honey I Shrunk the Lots.”

A few developments have been designed according to so-called conservation subdivision rules, Simms said. The concept calls for limiting building to a small portion of the lot and concentrating all the homes in a subdivision in one area. This preserves open space and wildlife habitat, cuts down on aimlessly scattered lots and reduces the amount of roads needed to reach all the homes, Simms said.

“We’ve allowed too many business-as-usual subdivisions,” he said, adding that it’s never too late to improve zoning laws. “The housing market hasn’t slowed a bit,” Simms said. “It just continues to boom year after year.”

Bozeman

Gallatin County population 1990: 50,463.

Population 2003: 73,243.

Cost of a downtown Craftsman bungalow: $500,000.

Much of the concern over Bozeman’s decadelong growth spurt focuses on ensuring the city’s downtown doesn’t become a tourist trap overrun by art galleries and gourmet bistros, said Craig Kenworthy, with the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, a Bozeman-based conservation group. “Our downtown is on the brink of becoming a Colorado mountain town.”

A recent influx of big-box retailers, such as Home Depot and a Super Wal-Mart, has squeezed downtown hardware, grocery and book stores. A downtown that remains important and geographically close to local residents is vital in protecting the city’s charm, Kenworthy said.

A variety of downtown mixed-use developments has Bozeman emerging as a regional leader in the New Urbanism movement, which is something of an architectural backlash against strip malls, long commutes, giant retail stores on the edge of town and vast subdivisions full of large homes surrounded by privacy fences. One development includes 800-square-foot cottages that have been popular with couples and single residents, Kenworthy said. The homes are within walking distance of many workplaces and downtown attractions.

“People don’t move from Los Angeles or a large city to be in the same kind of tract housing,” he said. “We don’t want to look like New Jersey with mountains.”

Bozeman voters passed a $10 million open space bond four years ago. Another $10 million bond for buying parks and open space is on the November ballot. Kenworthy expects it to pass.

The city is in a court battle trying to reinstate development impact fees. Until they were overturned recently by a state court, the fees were collected to offset the cost of the new roads, sewers and parks needed by the new subdivisions.

Kenworthy said he understands the weariness felt by some Sandpoint residents over the town’s continued showcase in national magazines, such as Sunset and Outside. Bozeman has been a frequent feature in magazines, and the articles usually prompt a spurt of property buying, often sight-unseen over the Internet.

“I cringe whenever Outside runs these pieces,” Kenworthy said. “They never address the issue of going to these small towns and making good choices about impact.”

Bend, Ore.

Population, 1990: 20,469.

Population 2003: 62,900.

Price for a typical mountain-view lot within city limits: $200,000 to $300,000.

In 1998, about 45,000 people lived in the sunny, high-desert town of Bend, in central Oregon. City officials thought the boom was beginning to fade. They predicted slow, steady growth. By 2018, the forecast called for a population of 68,000.

The target is now expected to be reached by the end of next year.

Innovative planning, including development fees and a goal of a city park within six blocks of every home, will help keep Bend a good place to live, Mayor Oran Teater said.

“The first thing to remember is that we still live in a free country and people can choose to live where they choose,” he said. “My motto has been, ‘The nicer a community you build, the more livable community you have, the more a magnet it becomes.’ “

Developers are already required to pay for all new roads, sewer and water pipes within a new subdivision. They must also pay a system development charge for all new construction, Teater said. The fee, which would be about $9,000 for a new 2,000-square-foot house, helps pay for such things as new traffic arterials, parks and open space. All new development must pay for itself, Teater said.

Bend has been lauded for its smart growth policies, but the boom has been powerful enough to diminish some of its small-town charms, such as short commutes, a low crime rate and inexpensive housing, said Shauna Quistorff, director of the Central Oregon Environmental Center. The high demand has also outpriced many downtown homes for workers, forcing many to live on the sprawling outskirts of the city.

“People want to live downtown, they want to live within walking distance of all the major city destinations. But they can’t really afford that,” she said. “It does still have a small town feel, but it’s definitely being diminished. There’s a lot of people living the typical American lifestyle now where you’re having to commute 20 minutes through traffic to get to work.”