The Daily Inter Lake

A Flathead District judge has overturned the Flathead County Commissioners' decision to approve Haskill Mountain Ranch subdivision near Kila.

Judge Ted Lympus ruled on Aug. 28 that the application for the subdivision was deficient in a number of state-mandated critical areas.

The decision to approve the subdivision was without legal support and was rendered beyond the statutory time limit, Lympus said.

The Kila-Smith Lake Community Development Coalition and Charles and Catherine Meyer sued the county after the commissioners approved the subdivision in October 2006.

Haskill Mountain Ranch is a proposed development about 7 miles southwest of Kila, spanning 530 acres with 74 lots that range from 2.5 acres to 30 acres. All lots would be served by individual septic and water systems.

The preliminary plat originally was presented to the Flathead County Planning Board in June 2006, and the application was unanimously denied by an 8-0 vote.

When the preliminary plat came before the commissioners, however, Bob Watne and Gary Hall voted to approve it.

The plaintiffs argued that the development would drastically increase traffic counts, create excessive dust due to unpaved roads within the subdivision, threaten groundwater and destroy wildlife habitat.

Lympus ruled that an affidavit by the Meyers "clearly establishes the failure of the applicant to disclose required information in the environmental assessment."

An area the judge highlighted was the "glaring omission" of the inadequate percolation test information.

Regulations require that test sites be 25 percent of the total number of proposed lots. The Haskill Mountain Ranch developers should have used 18 tests but performed only 10.

The tests also were clustered and therefore not representative of the entire subdivision.

The application also failed to include groundwater monitoring results, which showed groundwater at less than 48 inches. High groundwater was found in 21 of the 43 test holes.

Developers argued that there is no groundwater, but did not provide evidence to rebut the findings of the previous tests.

Lympus also wrote that the developers failed to publicize information that indicated severe limitations at the site for sewage disposal and failed to indicate numerous rock outcroppings and steep slopes, both of which would negatively impact the site's ability to support a subdivision.

"The failure on the part of the applicant to fully set forth in the environmental assessment all these aspects of the property and adjacent land subjects the proposed development to being rejected," Lympus wrote.