The Lakeside Estates phases 3-5 earned unanimous approval from the Flathead County Commissioners last week, subject to 21 conditions and relatively few actual concerns.

The 44-acre subdivision consists of 59 single family residential lots on 32.37 acres, with a 3.4 acre common area and eight acres worth of roads. The staff report lists the owner and developer as Doug Siderius of Lakeside Land Development, LLP.

Although phase 2 received final plat, phases 3-5 expired on July 10 of last year. That meant that the applicant had to resubmit a preliminary plat for them, get approval from a new planning board and a new board of commissioners, and receive a new timeline.

Last week's hearing was not the first time Flathead County commissioners reviewed and gave the project their approval. It was, however, the first time the plat was considered by Flathead County Commissioners Joe Brenneman, Jim Dupont and Dale Lauman.

The original approval for phases 2-5 came on March 10, 2004, almost nine months before Flathead County Commissioner Joe Brenneman took office. Lauman took office two years later, in 2007, and Dupont took office just three months ago.

As it turned out, not only had the commissioners changed, but so too had the county standards for road width, from 20' to 24', which created something of a problem. According to the applicant, roads for the subdivision are nearly finished, with only one road that has yet to be graded in.

In fact, Siderius told the planning board last month that the biggest issue in expanding the roads to meet the current standard would be the fire hydrants, which have already been installed, since the utilities themselves already run beneath the roads. Siderius said the water system has been in use for years, and as a result the commissioners opted to grant a variance.

Another concern was storm water runoff, which Lauman said others had brought to his attention.

"Several people have contacted me over the last couple of years," Lauman said. "It appears that, at one point, the runoff was creating some problems. All three of us had some concern about that, knowing the area and the steepness of the terrain there. It's also something that we will be watching and, come final plat, we will look at it again. I trust that they will have complied with everything."

Although he acknowledged Lauman's concern about the stormwater, Flathead County Planner Andrew Hagemeier maintained that the Department of Environmental Quality would deal with that particular issue.

"I already talked to DEQ," Hagemeier said. "They said they do review runoff lot by lot."

The planning board also noted, last month, the need to clarify the requirement of thinning fuels.

Although the commissioners discussed extending the thinning of understory fuels beyond the building sites, Hagemeier did not believe that would be necessary and the condition was approved as amended by the planning board. Having satisfied every major concern, the commissioners approved the preliminary plat by a unanimous vote.

"It has kind of been reviewed and re-reviewed and looked at a lot," Lauman said. "As long as the lot-to-lot and roadway-to-lot runoff is dealt with, I don't think there's anything to really be concerned about."