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RED-HOT RED LODGE

Red Lodge has about 2,500 year-round residents, but the mountain town on Montana's scenic Beartooth Highway is growing by leaps and bounds.

The Billings Gazette has published a series of articles about growth in the town, detailing the millions of dollars of new building projects, including the addition of 600 new homes.

Construction of a new critical-care hospital, and a new senior center on the hospital campus, along with a new high school is all slated to commence within the next year. Efforts are under way to raise the funds necessary to build a tournament-sized gym and a high-quality auditorium to give Red Lodge the opportunity to host sporting events and to give local musicians and students a venue for concerts and plays.

The Red Lodge Nature Center has begun raising the $8 million it needs for its new facility, and the Carbon County Historical Society is also planning a multimillion-dollar renovation of the building it purchased a few years ago which now houses the Historical Society' Museum.

All that construction means many more workers will be coming to town, and as in other Rocky Mountain West communities, those workers won't have many options when it comes to housing. Even with the addition of 600 homes, the price of those homes may be out of reach of many of the workers, with the median price of a home already at $235,000. [more]

THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND

Numerous states around the country are retaliating against a 2005 Supreme Court ruling that gave local governments the power to condemn private property for economic development. That retaliation is especially pronounced in Western states, where private property rights are considered somewhat of a divine right.

The lead in a Washington Post article from June 24, 2005 sets the stage. Charles Lane writes: “The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that local governments may force property owners to sell out and make way for private economic development when officials decide it would benefit the public, even if the property is not blighted and the new project's success is not guaranteed.” This ideology, as one can imagine, stands in stark contrast to the culture of our region for many reasons. [more]

TIMBER TRANSITIONS

The timber industry has been under numerous economic and environmental strains in the last few decades, and companies are forced to adapt or die. Perhaps no company has adapted more than Plum Creek Timber Co. Chronicling that adaptation, the Missoulian offers an excellent four-part series detailing the company’s move from being simply timber-based to expanding into the real estate and development industries.

The series by Michael Jamison and Tyler Christensen begins with a look at what Plum Creek is doing and those effects on the company as well as on communities surrounding the company’s land holdings, with a focus on western Montana. [more]

BREAKING NEWS

This morning the Salt Lake Tribune ran a breaking Associated Press story that U.S. Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth had announced his retirement.

Later, Headwaters News Assistant Editor Daniel Berger confirmed with Forest Service Spokesman Bobbie Mixon that Gail Kimbell, Regional Forester for The Northern Region in Missoula, Mont. will replace Bosworth as the Chief of the U.S. Forest Service. Bosworth will retire on Feb. 2, 2007. Bosworth maintains a home in Missoula, and he has indicated previously that he intends to return to Montana when he retires.

Bosworth was the Regional Forester for the Northern Region before he was named chief of the U.S. Forest Service.

Gail Kimbell has been the head of the Northern Region (Region 1) since December, 2003, when she replaced Brad Powell in that post. [more]

WORKING THE SYSTEM

As more ranchland and open, undeveloped private land is converted into homes and communities, the loss of such "open space" is becoming a bigger issue in the West. Perhaps the best defense against such loss is the conservation easement - a legal, binding agreement by a landowner to forfeit his or her rights to develop the land. All conservation easements are a bit different, administered by different groups and written with different terms, though most provide some sort of a tax break to the landowner in exchange for giving up development rights.

These easements are widely popular conservation tools because they offer benefits to the landowner and to the land. In Montana, The Nature Conservancy and the Blackfoot Challenge are using conservation easements to help secure and keep land free from development in the Blackfoot Valley. [more]

FOREST SERVICE MEDIA GROK

It’s hard to know what to make of the Forest Service lately. The 100-year-old land management agency has somehow (surely someone can map out exactly how this happened) backed into such a corner whereby it is constantly at the mercy of Congress, the president, industry, environmental groups and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Sometimes its own leadership seems to come into play only after the above have said their piece.
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ROCKY EDUCATION

Montana school officials’ wish lists to lawmakers are generally just that – hopeful thinking in times of limited funding. But going into this legislative session, Montana lawmakers have a projected $1 billion in surplus funds to divvy up.

The Missoulian reports today that at a meeting in Ravalli County, 60 people representing 40 schools and social services agencies showed up to meet with Sen. Rick Laible, R-Darby, Rep. Ron Stoker, R-Darby, and Rep. Bob Lake, R-Hamilton, to request lawmakers take advantage of the surplus to pump up funding for schools and other programs that benefit children.

School officials pressed their need for funding Gov. Brian Schweitzer’s proposal for all-day kindergarten, a program many officials said their schools simply did not have the space to provide.

But the three lawmakers cautioned that the $1 billion surplus was one-time money and would not be able to support long-term programs.

And a story in today’s Billings Gazette indicated that school officials may face another difficulty during the upcoming legislative season.
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ROCKY MOUNTAIN LAND USE GROK II

Now that the elections are past, newly elected officials haven’t yet taken office and several land-use initiatives have either passed or failed, the media can return to the business of covering growth and development.

In Montana, that means taking a look at the process of approving developments. Over the weekend, the Missoulian reports on what some see as the advantage of big subdivisions in the Flathead Valley. Development in that valley is on a roll, with more projects planned that are larger than ever before, on more acres and for a much higher selling price. Tom Jentz, Kalispell's lead land-use planner, said that he prefers these larger developments because they include money and plans for streets, utilities and services, and manage a larger chunk of the growth. [more]

PLANNING AWARDS

A Vermont-based foundation has named homeWORD, a Montana-based affordable housing nonprofit, as the winner of the foundation’s inaugural PLACEMATTERS Innovator in Place Award. The award is part of the PLACEMATTERS06 planning conference, to be held next month in Denver, Colorado.

“Though a small organization in staff and budget, homeWORD has managed to do remarkable things, not only for Montana, but the field of sustainable development in general,” said William Shutkin, President and CEO of the Orton Family Foundation in a press release sent out this morning. “homeWORD represents the kind of commitment to place and people that is the starting point for civic innovation, and for the livable, affordable and vibrant communities we all seek.” [more]

BUILDING IN THE BIG SKY

Managing growth in the Rockies is dynamic. As the region expands into new physical and economic territory, the existing rules of operating aren’t necessary appropriate as they stand.

Such is the case in two development stories out of Montana today. In Lake County, reports the Missoulian, commissioners and a developer hammered out a plan to create a unique sewer district, with the developer as its sole member, so he could continue on with a proposed subdivision of 42 luxury homes on 41 acres in the Swan Valley. [more]