Kalispell should help Kidsports acquire a $2.27 million permanent easement for the youth sports complex on school trust land, Kalispell City Council members agree.

The rub is how much money Kalispell should pitch in and where the money should come from. Those are the questions City Council members wrestled with for more than two hours at a work session Monday.

The answer isn’t any clearer.

Kalispell and Kidsports face a Dec. 31 deadline to buy the easement if they want to avoid a $26,000 annual “option fee” the state of Montana decided to charge.

In February, an otherwise unnecessary $43,000 annual lease payment to the state comes due. Together, the option fees and lease payments could add several hundred thousand dollars to the final cost if it takes Kalispell and Kidsports all five allowable years to pay for the easement.

City Manager Doug Russell proposed using $2.27 million sitting in the Airport Tax Increment Financing District to buy the permanent easement in full by year’s end. In exchange, Kidsports would agree to raise money to improve its facilities with more fields and better parking and access roads.

One goal in forming the tax increment financing district years ago was to “relocate”  sports fields on city land in south Kalispell away from the city airport, freeing up land for commercial development and airport hangars.

That city land sold for $2.79 million.

About $1.48 million was used to help launch Kidsports and build new sports fields on leased school trust land in north Kalispell. But the targeted relocation still hasn’t been accomplished, with Kidsports still in search of a permanent home, some council members argue.

“We had a permanent location, threw them in a U-Haul truck, planted them in a new field we don’t own, and haven’t held up our end of the bargain,” council member Phil Guiffrida III said, adding that Kalispell helped rebuild just 10 of the 16 sports fields at the new location.

“I don’t see a permanent relocation until a permanent easement is in effect,” Guiffrida said.

Council members Tim Kluesner and Jeff Zauner said they support using the Airport Tax Increment Financing District to pay for all or most of the easement for Kidsports, arguing that the district generates about $500,000 in tax increment a year to replenish its coffers and support borrowing for future projects.

“Let’s just get this done and do the right thing for the community,” Kluesner said, agreeing that the goal of relocation isn’t complete until Kidsports has a permanent easement.

Others disagreed.

“I don’t believe in gutting the airport TIF for this,” council member Kari Gabriel said, adding that she does not oppose helping pay for the easement. “I’m just saying that’s not the right avenue.”

Mayor Tammi Fisher said she “can’t stomach” the loose definition of “relocation” that’s being used by some council members. And based on the original urban renewal plan, relocation is the only eligible use for tax increment money, she said.

“We relocated 10 ball fields and planned to relocate 16, so we have six left,” Fisher said. “If there’s six fields we didn’t relocate, then whatever their present-day value is can come out of the airport TIF.”

Fisher suggested the rest of money that’s needed could come from general obligation bonds.

The voter-approved bonds also could pay for needed improvements to Kidsports and Four Mile Drive. Kidsports could pitch in some of its own money and then lease the property from the city to pay off the bond.

Council member Bob Hafferman is opposed to any bonds. “We have the money and we can do it legally. We just have to use our heads,” he said.

Council member Randy Kenyon said he expects that multiple funding sources will be needed to acquire the easement. “We just need to move forward and do so expeditiously,” he said.

The funding questions will be revisited in a future work session.

WITHOUT THE permanent easement, Kidsports faces a mandatory mid-lease reappraisal in 2016 that threatens to make its annual lease payments to the state of Montana unaffordable, tripling them or worse, city officials have said.

Dan Johns, director of Kidsports, said he wants to see the future of the popular youth athletic complex secured.

“I wholeheartedly appreciate the fact that council has stepped up and said the city should pay for it. It’s how we get there,” he said.

Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com.