Whitefish Long Range Planner Alan Tiefenbach reported the status of the growth policy update, Vision Whitefish 2045, at a council work session last week and the consulting firm czb, LLC described its work on the land-use chapter. 

The sections of the policy that are complete include: history, demographics, vision, economic development, public facilities, environment, natural resources and hazards. 

Drafts for three elements, transportation, housing and land use, are in progress. 

Tiefenbach said information from transportation plans throughout the years was summarized on two composite maps, one for motorized concerns and road improvements and another with trails. 

“What we were told when we were envisioning, is that the community wanted non-motorized transportation to be treated equally to motorized transportation,” Tiefenbach said. “So we made sure they all have equal weight in this transportation element.” 

In the transportation element, multimodal means all modes of travel are treated equally, and automobile travel is not prioritized, and it was the top desire of visioning participants. 

The community housing committee is working on the housing element. It is expected to go for agency and public review and is tentatively scheduled for the Planning Commission’s Dec. 17 meeting.

Tiefenbach said the plan is to finish the transportation element in November, housing in December and land use in January. The council will begin working on the plan at a work session in January. 

Thomas Eddington with the czb team said street types and place types make up a future land-use policy. 

The consultants met with the community twice in September. Each session saw about 50 attendees. An online version of the session was offered in October, and 150 people participated. 

Six main areas were delineated: north of the tracks, residential west of downtown, downtown, Karrow Avenue, residential east of downtown, U.S. 93 from Montana 40 north of the river, and the public shared opinions about the likelihood of the areas experiencing change over the next 10 to 20 years. 

Community input and the consultants’ analysis of street types were turned into a large map, and a chart was made to represent the need for affordable housing units. 

“If you’ve got 2,100 units as the need over the next 20 years, stretching the housing assessments forward for another 10 years ... you would need about 1,600 of those 2,100 units as housing for those earning less than 120% of AMI,” Eddington said. “A pretty tall order.” 

He said the land-use plan is closely integrated with the housing and transportation plans. 

To be in compliance with the new Montana Land Use Planning Act, the city’s growth policy update must meet all requirements by May 18, 2026.