The 58-lot Pablo Mill Village subdivision proposal received preliminary plat approval from the Lake County Commissioners on Tuesday, Jan. 6, with conditions.  

The proposed project would occupy almost 50 acres of the former Pablo sawmill's old lumber yard. The property is owned by local businessman and former Polson mayor, Eric Huffine, under his company, Dunham MT LLC.  

The proposed development will have smaller lots for duplexes and larger lots for houses, with lot sizes varying from around 8,000-to-22,000 square feet. It will also feature mixed-use residential and commercial lots.  

The proposal was presented to the Lake County Planning Board in November, and the variance request passed with one opposing vote before reaching the commissioners' chambers.  

Lake County planning director Tiffani Murphy presented the planning board’s findings and subdivision information to the commissioners.  

Huffine requested a variance to the traffic impact study on his property based on an analysis from Rob Smith of A2Z Engineering, who did not recommend a full traffic impact assessment.  

Commissioners approved this variance request, but will require a study if this subdivision and the one proposed next to it estimate more than 650 trips per day in travel.  

During public comment, local resident Monica Lloyd raised concerns about low visibility at the intersection of Light Road and Old Highway 93. Marc Carstens, the developer's agent, said they would be happy to help facilitate a realignment to make the intersection square.  

Commissioner Bill Barron asked why the applicant didn’t have a letter from the Pablo Water and Sewer District and said that they would require that for approval. Carstens said he had been in contact with the water board, but kept receiving different answers and was finally told to first provide the subdivision approval.  

Carstens also mentioned during the meeting that he requested an environmental assessment from the prior owner of this property, Mike Maddy. According to Carstens, Maddy had an environmental assessment completed on the entire mill property, but he declined to allow Carstens to use the EA. Carstens said he already reached out to the firm that prepared it to access a separate EA for just this section of the mill.  

The subdivision has also proposed a 10.81-acre piece of parkland. While it does meet the county's subdivision regulations, Barron questioned whether the county would ultimately be responsible for maintenance.  

Barron explained that the county is now responsible for many parcels of parkland created by subdivisions, and that this has become a financial burden for them. He suggested requiring the developer to pay the county for the acreage, rather than having the parkland or requiring a maintenance agreement.  

Carstens said they would like to keep the parkland because it fits well with the proposed subdivision, but they would be happy to assign a fractional value of the parkland to each lot, allowing maintenance costs to be covered by taxes. 

“This might sound like kind of a menial thing in the scheme of everything, but when you have as many subdivisions in the county as we have, and all the parkland that isn't taken care of, it's a pretty big issue,” Barron said. “We support parkland. We want to have good development parkland, but all these little pieces in subdivisions are not taken care of.”  

The commissioners approved a condition for the developer to provide a maintenance declaration and fractional ownership. Along with this change, 23 other conditions were approved.  

The commissioners granted preliminary approval of the Pablo Mill Village, and before construction, the developer will have to return to the planning board for building permits and final plat approval.