SANDPOINT — City Council approved a preliminary request last week for an industrial subdivision at the Sandpoint Airport. The proposed “Sandpoint Airpark” would consist of 22 lots on approximately 22 acres on the corner of Woodland Drive and Boyer Avenue.

“We are hoping to maybe get an avionics company there out on Woodland, maybe an upholstery (company) to help support Quest,” said Scott Dempsey, speaking on behalf of the applicant, Pat Feenstra of Feenstra Investments, LLC.

The project originated with a building for Quest, he said. Because the building required street improvements anyway — sidewalks, gutters, curbs, trees, etc. — Dempsey said they decided to go ahead with a subdivision.

The land in question located in an “industrial general” zone surrounded by vacant land and aircraft hangars. The IG district is intended for light and medium manufacturing, allowing a wide range of manufacturing and industrial uses that generate little traffic from tourists and the general public, and are consistent with the “Sandpoint Comprehensive Plan.”

Questions to Dempsey by council members revolved around rights of ways. Aaron Qualls, city planning and economic development director, said there is a staff-added condition to the agreement where the developer must prove he has access before final approval of the subdivision.

“Primarily because if he did not, then we would be approving landlocked lots,” Qualls said, adding that, after some research by himself as well as others, there does appear to be an easement through the property along Flightline Way.

Besides Dempsey, one person spoke during the preliminary public hearing. Introducing himself as a property owner of a hangar adjacent to the proposed subdivision, he voiced concerns over the homeowners association for the area.

“For myself, and I think I can speak for a better part of the front row of hangar owners, we are all for Scott Dempsey continuing with this and developing that back lot, but we really don’t want to be tied into anybody else’s homeowners association,” he said.

Dempsey said a meeting with the existing homeowners association did not go “smoothly,” and the subdivision would have its own association.

“I am doing everything I can to work with everybody there,” Dempsey said. “... It’s just difficult when we have two different associations not working in harmony … We want to have good neighbors; we want to have a quality development.”

Although council approved the preliminary subdivision proposal, the developer will have to adhere to the conditions laid out by city staff before final approval.

Mary Malone can be reached by email at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @MaryDailyBee.