SANDPOINT — The City Council reversed course on amendments to Sandpoint’s residential zoning code, voting 4-2 to postpone implementation until the city’s stormwater masterplan is complete.

The motion to delay was made by Councilor Kyle Schreiber, who said he was concerned that the city’s 70% impervious surface standard wasn’t developed by engineers. Councilors Joe Tate and Joshua Torrez, who both previously voted to approve the changes on Jan. 21, voted in favor of postponing. 

“Luckily, right now we're about to embark on a stormwater masterplan, so I think we have a unique opportunity to update those standards,” Schreiber said. "I would ask council to join me in postponing this item until we can ensure that those standards are the correct ones, before we allow people to build all the way out to those impervious surface standards.” 

Planning and Community Development Director Jason Welker said later in the meeting that the impervious surface standard was unchanged in the amendments. The changes would have allowed buildings in the residential zones to build a living space to that 70% standard, among other amendments. 

Welker, who spearheaded the changes, has said that changes were made in an effort to increase the housing supply and bring down the cost of housing. 

“Council's decision to postpone the Planning and Zoning Commission's recommended residential zoning amendments... will have a real impact on what gets built in Sandpoint over the years ahead,” Welker said in a statement provided to the Daily Bee. “We should expect to see more of the large lot, single family development that has characterized new housing in Sandpoint in recent years and less of the affordable housing types the amendments were aimed at enabling.” 

Mayor Jeremy Grimm said following the vote that it could be “a while” until the city’s stormwater masterplan was completed, but that city staff would move as quickly as they could on it. The masterplan is mentioned as a priority in the city’s five-year strategic plan, which was passed in 2024,  

Councilor Joel Aispuro, who was joined by Council President Deb Ruehle in dissenting, later said he was frustrated by the decision to flip and felt it was a waste of the staff’s time to postpone the amendments.  

“We always talk about protecting staff and their time, but I feel like we just wasted, as you said, three months in hours and monies that it doesn't seem like we're getting back,” Aispuro said. “Just to vote 'no’ after the last meeting seem like it was going to be a yes.’” 

The two councilors who flipped their vote did not expand on their decision during the meeting.  

The changes were the spotlight of the council’s Jan. 21 meeting, where it was initially approved. During that meeting, Councilor Pam Duquette voted against the changes echoing the concerns of a majority of the public comment that the amendment would damage the “character of Sandpoint.” 

Both Welker and Grimm said on Jan. 21 that the changes would not guarantee more affordable housing, but that the amendments were one way to encourage that development. At the Jan. 21 meeting, Torrez was concerned about the lack of a guarantee that the changes would encourage affordable housing. 

The code changes will come back to the council after completion of the city’s stormwater masterplan. The full meeting and vote can be viewed on the city’s YouTube channel, youtube.com/@CityofSandpoint.