Missoula News

growth and rivers

Making the Case for Streamside Setbacks

By Peter Metcalf, 4-22-08

Streamside setback regulations protect a stream from “death by a thousand cuts” hydrogeologist Dr. Chris Brick told City Club Missoula at its monthly luncheon Monday. 

By themselves, a single home or a stretch of rip-rapped bank do not present much danger to a stream, but collectively, all the structures, armored stretches of bank and cleared riparian vegetation do, said Brick, the staff scientists for the Clark Fork Coalition, an organization focused on community development and environmental protection of the Clark Fork River. 

“What we’re concerned about is how we can maintain our Montana values for our streams and rivers in the face of lots of people wanting to come here,” Brick said. 

The combination of continued population growth in Montana’s valleys and insufficient legal regulations for rivers has county governments across western and southwestern Montana, including Missoula, wrestling with potential streamside setback regulations. Last year the state legislature briefly considered a state-wide setbacks bill before deciding the issue should be handled at the county level.

Streamside setbacks are basically buffer zones intended to protect rivers and streams by restricting new development and certain land use activities, such as clearing riparian vegetation within a certain distance of the stream. Most setback regulations in use around the country established a fixed width for these zones, such as 100 feet from the high water mark. A more flexible—and more expensive—option is a variable-width setback that tailors the setback distance to site-specific conditions, such as slope, channel migration rates and the characteristics of the floodplain, Brick said. 

Protecting native riparian vegetation and floodplains is essential to maintain healthy rivers and streams, Brick explained, helping to lessen the downstream impacts of floods, filter sediments and pollutants from the water, minimize erosion and stabilize stream banks. Riparian corridors also provide prime wildlife habitat for many species. In addition to ensuring these essential ecological functions, setbacks help protect property owners from loss due to flooding and erosion, she said. 

So far only Gallatin county has enacted county-wide streamside setback regulations, all of the fixed-width variety. Setbacks have also been established for portions of the Missouri River through north-central Montana and, on a variable-width basis, for the entire Big Hole River. Correction: Contrary to what was previously reported, in Park County, setbacks are only in place in the design and improvements section of the county subdivision regulations and the “donut” zoning regulations applicable to the area surrounding Livingston. We apologize for the error.

Missoula County Rural Initiatives proposed county-wide regulations to establish a fixed-width buffer zone along streams and rivers from new development last year. The proposal met fierce opposition from streamside property owners and property-rights advocates, many of whom considered the proposal tantamount to a “takings” of private property. 

Rural Initiatives has since scrapped the proposal and gone back to the drawing board. They recently launched the Stream Protection Program to help determine the best approach to protect streams and riparian areas in Missoula County, said Mel Waggy, a rural landscape scientists with Rural Initiatives Missoula County.

The program recently convened a Technical Advisory Committee to examine a broad range of existing or potential stream protection methods “from a scientific standpoint” to determine the best methods for protecting ecological functions like water quality, erosion control and wildlife habitat. These methods include public education, new and existing land-use regulations and financial incentives to encourage landowners to voluntarily protect riparian corridors, Waggy said.

Recruitment for a Citizens Advisory Committee that will help determine the best protection measures begins in the next couple months. 

It is still way too early to tell what type, if any, future streamside setback proposal will emerge from this program, but Waggy expects it to be a more integrated approach than last year’s proposal, possibly combining public education efforts with voluntary and legal protections.

For more information on the Stream Protection Program visit the program’s website or contact Mel Waggy at 406-258-3707.

For more information on City Club Missoula, call 406-546-6643.

NOTE: This story has been corrected. Please see corrected paragraph on county-wide setbacks above.

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