Take me to the river: Float trip focuses on issues surrounding streamside protection
By CHELSI MOY of the Missoulian
The hum of excavators and beeps of backing dump trucks at a streamside gravel operation just west of Missoula drowned out the sound of an osprey on the opposite bank of the Bitterroot River. In many ways, this scene illustrated the ongoing struggle between nature and development along Montana's river banks.
It was a crisp October day when an unlikely group of 15 floaters, including local officials, conservation folks and building industry representatives, climbed aboard five rafts to float eight miles of the Bitterroot and Clark Fork rivers.
The trip was sponsored by the Missoula Board of County Commissioners to educate themselves and others about streamside protection. It was the commissioners' second trip in two months down the same stretch of river, a patchwork of restored and denuded riparian habitat.
Members of the local building and development community, as well as representatives of conservation groups, joined the Missoula County commissioners in floating the Bitterroot and Clark Fork rivers Thursday afternoon to look at streamside areas. Missoula County wants to develop a streamside-protection program. Photo by LINDA THOMPSON/Missoulian
Here, fly fishermen cast against the backdrop of dense forests. There, the channel parallels Blue Mountain Road, and cars and boats travel side by side against a backdrop of residential development.
Streamside protection is a controversial issue in Missoula County, one government officials are not yet sure how best to address.
A year ago, Missoula County proposed a streamside setback for new development, but many residents - especially those in outlying areas - criticized the idea as a taking of private property. The proposal died; interest in streamside protection remains strong.
Many Montana counties have addressed streamside protection, either through zoning, subdivision regulations or by passing special ordinances. Some measures have more teeth than others.
Three years ago, Deerlodge, Butte-Silver Bow, Madison and Beaverhead counties collaboratively passed a streamside setback that looks at all development within 500 feet of the Big Hole River and places a default setback at 150 feet.
Missoula County has a “riparian-area management plan,” but no specified distance or setback.
The plan “has some gaps in it,” said Mel Waggy, rural landscape scientist for Missoula County's Rural Initiatives.
So Missoula County is looking for a better approach - one that is broader than the regulatory measure proposed a year ago, but narrow enough to protect local rivers.
In February, the county formed an advisory committee of 13 scientists specializing in hydrology, fisheries, ecology, forestry and other specialties. It is also forming a citizens advisory committee and hopes to pick members in November and begin meeting in January.
Feedback from those two committees will help shape a county streamside protection program, a topic that dominated discussion on the river late last week.
Floaters had barely settled into their boats when the group came upon an industrial gravel operation located just past Fort Missoula on the Bitterroot River. A dozen cement posts and fence wiring prevented the small bank from eroding into the water, but did little to shield the machinery working just beyond.
No one much commented on the glaring example of poor streamside protection. It was too obvious. Plus, most were aware that the city of Missoula has already agreed to assume reclamation responsibility at the site a year and a half from now as part of a larger park project.
Several river meanders later, the crew came upon construction workers pounding nails on a trophy house several hundred feet from the bank of the river across from Maclay Flat recreational area.
“It looks like the civic center going up,” said Greg Tollefson of the Missoula Conservation District.
The rectangle-shaped mansion was on the outer edge of the 100-year floodplain. Construction of new homes inside the flood “fringe” on an existing lot is permissible, as long as the home is located in an elevated area and the septic tank is outside the floodplain, said Todd Klietz, the county floodplain administrator.
As the river wound away from the Lolo National Forest and toward Target Range, cars and homes appeared closer to the river's edge. Bright orange flowers outlining neatly manicured lawns rubbed against the river. Lawn fertilizer and other gardening toxins can seep into the river when lawns are that close.
Small, white suds clung to the rocks near Maclay Bridge. Whether it's soap or septic systems, it's an indication that civilization is too close the river, said Brent Campbell, president of WGM Group, a design firm specializing in land-use planning, engineering and surveying.
Though an unpopular idea, Campbell would like to see Target Range connect to city sewer, rather than the individual septic tanks most homes have now. He'd also like to see the county take a multidisciplinary approach to streamside protection that involves not just regulations, but cooperation and education.
Conservation folks and the building community agree on one thing: Both want healthy rivers. To what extent and how to get to that point is less clear.
“Should the benefit of the doubt go to the developer or to the river?” asked Bruce Farling, executive director of Montana Trout Unlimited. “We think the river should get a break.”
A one-size-fits-all approach is unpopular among the development community. Any regulation should be site specific, said Dick Ainsworth, an East Missoula resident, part-time developer and retired surveyor. Those who want to develop along the river should have to pay to study the riparian vegetation buffer, he said.
“Developers would rather pay for it than to have a blanket setback that would prevent them from developing at all,” he said.
Farling pointed out the difficulty of allowing streamside protection on a case-by-case basis. Builders and developers want to know the rules going into the process. When it's site specific, there are none, he said.
Farling and Janet Ellis of Montana Audubon Society see the issue as a statewide problem because rivers cross multiple counties and jurisdictions. They'd like to see a statewide river setback to protect counties that don't have regulations, but then allow developers the opportunity to prove building should occur closer to the river based on a list of criteria.
Riparian areas make up 3 percent of Montana, Ellis said. Yet, 50 percent of breading birds live there and the general public wants to recreate there. Though this area is a small portion of Montana, it's where everyone wants to be, Farling said.
As the group neared the takeout point at Kona Bridge, Ellis pointed to a home just off the river bank.
“When you have something like that, you can't get it back,” she said. “You can deal with grazing. But there, someone invested more than a field. Governments will go to bat for homes there. That's why we have to get in front of it.”
Reporter Chelsi Moy can be reached at 523-5260 or at chelsi.moy@missoulian.com.
