If you’re sitting in the Captain’s Wheel in Bayview on Lake Pend Oreille enjoying a warm cup of coffee with friends on a cold winter’s day, you might care little about residential growth in Kidd Island Bay on Lake Coeur d’Alene.

If you’re a neighbor on Rathdrum Mountain fighting attempts to subdivide the steep hillside, you’d feel little connection with the farmers near Worley. If you’re a Rathdrum Prairie grass grower, you have enough problems worrying about neighbors and suit-happy environmental groups to be concerned about subdividing wetlands north of Hayden Lake.

Yet, all these residents are connected.

In a boom area where the population could grow by 100 percent in 20 years to 250,000, everyone in Kootenai County is affected by growth. Land and housing prices are going up fast, forcing lower- and middle-income buyers farther from waterways. Rural hubs, such as Spirit Lake, Bayview and Athol, are attracting newcomers and investment. U.S. Highway 95 doesn’t need the tourism season to be clogged. Managing growth is difficult. Without proper planning, it’s impossible. That’s why it’s crucial for residents from every corner of far-flung Kootenai County to help rework the county comprehensive plan.

Revising a comprehensive plan isn’t as sexy as locating a prestigious new golf course on the east side of Lake Coeur d’Alene. But the process is of wider importance. A comp plan is the document that will guide county growth for the next decade and possibly longer. It’s foundational to land use. It’s a community’s vision for its area, not the county planner’s or the county commissioners’. Underscoring its importance are the special-interest groups already lining up to be part of the process, the North Idaho Building Contractors Association on one side and the Kootenai Environmental Alliance on the other.

However, too much is at stake to allow only well-connected organizations to perform a tug-of-war when the future of Kootenai County is the prize.

Combined with complementary ordinances, a good comprehensive plan will enable developers and communities to know what’s permitted on surrounding land. What’s permitted on hills. Where green belts will be located. Whether affordable housing will be located within upscale developments.

Individuals and communities should hold county officials to the promise that the public input process scheduled to begin in late summer will be extensive and open to all.

The solid planning that’s guiding growth in the city of Coeur d’Alene emphasizes the importance of good planning underpinnings.

City officials have revived downtown Coeur d’Alene by encouraging tall buildings to provide year-round residents and customers for nearby shopkeepers. They’ve formed an urban renewal district to work with investors and provide tax increment financing to developers. They’ve planned for an education corridor that someday will replace a mill adjacent to North Idaho College and attract good-paying higher education jobs. They’ve protected neighborhoods.

All this from planning.

In the county’s case, the area to guide and protect is far more diverse and rural, complicating the task. But the stakes are higher, too.