With new developments regarding a proposed residential on-street parking permit program around Flathead High School and Elrod School and more than two hours of public comments, the Kalispell Planning Board unanimously decided to consider the issue in more depth on Oct. 28.

“I have three pages of notes. We have another 20 pages of email,” Planning Board President Chad Graham said at the conclusion of Tuesday’s hearing. “We have a lot more information that we need to consider on this issue.”

There was representation Tuesday from Kalispell Public Schools administration, west-side residents and students who either lived in Kalispell, or commuted to Flathead from outlying towns.

Prior to the hearing, both a neighborhood committee and Kalispell Public Schools submitted modifications to the city’s original proposal.

The original proposal encompasses 207 properties. Only residents or property owners within the residential parking district would be eligible to purchase on-street parking permits for their registered vehicles plus two visitor permits. An amount had not yet been determined.

Permits would be required from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, Aug. 15 through June 15. The proposed parking district would be bounded by Third Street West to the north, Ninth Street West to the south, Second Avenue West to the east and Sixth Avenue West to the west.

The neighborhood committee’s modifications would allow Flathead students and staffers and Elrod staffers to purchase parking permits for the 2015-16 and 2016-17 school years with the rationale that that would give the district enough time to build infrastructure to accommodate more parking.

During these years, students and staff would be able to park on one side of streets — the east side in 2015-16 and the west side in the 2016-17. The committee suggested permits should either cost more than resident permits or residents would get free permits while staffers and students pay a certain amount.

West-side resident George Giavasis voiced his support of the parking district. He said it is not just a parking issue but also a city services issue.

“I work from home so I see the issues and see the lack of services all day long. We pay for services we don’t get,” Giavasis said, noting the inability for the city to do snow plowing, leaf pickup and street cleaning because of the parking problem. He was also concerned about emergency vehicle access.

“If there were a fire at my house there is no way a fire truck could park on either of the streets during school hours,” Giavasis said.

On the other hand, west-side resident Linda Geisel said she didn’t have a problem with parking the way it is now.

“The streets are public streets. Anyone should be able to park on a public street,” Geisel said.

School Superintendent Mark Flatau and Flathead High School Assistant Principal Michele Paine addressed the Planning Board with a PowerPoint presentation outlining the district’s ideas for modifying the original parking district proposal.

In addition to creating roughly 65 to 70 additional parking spaces on district property at Flathead and Elrod, school administrators suggested an on-street parking permit program that would allow for resident parking on the west side of Third Avenue West and Fourth Avenue West between Third and Tenth streets and nonresident parking on the east side of the streets.  

Where the district would add parking was an area of contention for some. Some students and school staffers were concerned about the proposal to extend parking into the southern edge of Elrod’s playground and a grassy area on the east side of the high school where the Flathead Environmental Club recently planted a garden.

“Even among our school staff, we certainly didn’t have a 100 percent buy-in,” Flatau said. “This particular area is a very sensitive area and I can understand why.”  

Flathead Environmental Club advisor Amanda Matdies, flanked by three club members, said the group opposed taking away the green space for parking.

“The students wanted to let you know we would be one of the compromises,” Matdies said.

West-side resident Donna Smith, said the grassy area was installed in 2008 despite the parking problem, leading to the removal of roughly 24 parking places.

“I believe everything in this area should be removed from this section of the street,” Smith said, adding that she was also willing to pay for a permit to park in front of her house.

School administrators provided a snapshot of parking around the neighborhood and student lots at different times over different days, saying that on school days during peak hours, up to 57 percent of parking spaces in the proposed parking district were open.

The district also showed data of increased parking lot use from 84 percent in 2012 to 93 percent in 2014, with the goal to continue encourage parking lot use and the possibility of opening up senior lots, for example, to underclassmen if they aren’t filled at 8 a.m.

“We’ve done our research and done our homework on that, and what we have found is that truly there is ample parking out there even during our most busy points of day,” Paine said.

Erica Wirtala, government affairs director at Northwest Montana Association of Realtors, offered to help the city secure up to $1,500 in grant money to do an impartial assessment to validate the number of cars in the neighborhood to add to data collected by the school and add studies to include parking during special events or outside school hours, for example.

“I think the problem lies in perception, perception of the problem from the neighborhood point of view, and the perception of the problem from the schools’ point of view,” Wirtala said. “In Montana we have a unique perception of parking where if you can’t park right by your front door there’s a parking problem whereas when people sometimes come from out of state and they realize parking is more difficult and parking two or three blocks from their home is not quite the problem as other people would perceive it.”

There was also a high concern for student safety among administrators, parents and students with a parking district that excluded students. Paine said pushing students blocks away from the school adds to the scope of administrator supervision to ensure student safety.

“It just expands our world as far as managing the school and managing the students and keeping everybody safe,” Paine said.

Students including student body president Daniel Olszewski spoke about safety concerns walking to their vehicles at night after school sports or activities with the lack of streetlights, icy sidewalks in the winter and sexual offenders.

“Safety is a huge concern for us,” Olszewski said noting that he has gotten home from some school events after 2 a.m.

Some community members thanked the school district for their efforts. Devin Kuntz, a west side resident, neighborhood committee member and former Flathead student, was one of them.

While Kuntz advocated for the committee’s addendum to the parking district proposal, he was not entirely opposed to the school’s modifications, but said that plan was neither long-term nor sustainable and “doesn’t really even come close to solving the problem.”

“I’m a little concerned that there hasn’t been a timeline attached to their proposal whatsoever, which would pose a bit of an implementation problem, particularly with sustainability,” Kuntz said.

Kuntz said the parking issue is only going to increase with modest population growth and a long-term plan needs to be in place.

“I’m hopeful after tonight to move forward with positive change,” Kuntz said.

Kevin LeClair, a city senior planner, said the Oct. 28 work session will be similar to a roundtable discussion to look at all the proposals, suggestions and comments.

“We’re not really required to pick one proposal or the other,” LeClair said during a phone call Wednesday.

LeClair said ideally there would be a hybrid solution of what the neighborhood committee and school district are trying to achieve that is in the best interest of the community.

The city Planning Board work session will be at 7 p.m. Oct. 28 at Kalispell City Hall, 201 First Ave. E.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or by email at hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.