Board talks CFAC post cleanup; what does the future hold?

The Columbia Falls City-County planning board last week took a first look at possible revisions to its growth policy map. The city has planning jurisdiction to projects in a “doughnut” that extends roughly 1 mile from its boundary in an agreement with the county.

In addition, and perhaps most importantly, the city has planning jurisdiction over the Columbia Falls Aluminum Co. lands north of town.

The city updates its growth policy on a five year rotation, city planner Eric Mulcahy noted. In 2013, it didn’t touch the map, as the area was still feeling the effects of the Great Recession. Today, things are robust again and the city has only about 150 residential lots left to develop. While the map isn’t a regulatory document, it does outline the potential for future growth.

The CFAC property could someday be prime real estate. But the future of the property — and the potential zoning, largely depends on the extent of the Superfund cleanup on the former aluminum plant. CFAC hired a planning firm — rePlan back in 2014 to examine the site, but a report has never been released publicly.

The old plant has been completely torn down and filled in with gravel, save for a few warehouses. The company is hoping to attract new businesses to the site, but the Bonneville Power Administration is going to tear out a substation that used to serve the plant, saying it dates back to the 1950s and is too old.

That means whoever moves in would have to arrange with Flathead Electric Co-op for a new power supply.

The site also has other infrastructure problems — namely heating and cooling systems that likely have frozen and thawed and likely have leaks, noted city councilman Mike Shepard, who used to work at the plant.

The landfills at the site are also of concern. While the site could make for a residential development of some sort, that would depend on the degree to which the landfills are cleaned up.

Glencore, CFAC’s parent company, tore down the Vanalco plant it owned in Vancouver, Washington about 10 years ago.

According to documents from the state of Washington, Glencore cleaned up the site, but only to industrial site standards, with a host of covenants that restrict its use for other purposes, like housing. The 111-acre site sits on the banks of the Columbia River.

Landfills side, there still is a lot of acreage north and west of the CFAC plant that could have development potential. The board took no action on the matter — the hope being that CFAC in the future might lend more insight as toits plans for the property. A cleanup, under the Superfund law, is still years away.

The planning board also looked at other possible changes to the map, including the potential for higher density housing in the Vetville area. Northern expansion of the city would be the most logical, board members noted, since agricultural land to the west is owned by a couple of families that aren’t likely to sell soon and development to the east, while possible, would require drilling under the Flathead River — an expensive proposition.

The plan is to have the growth policy updated by May. The planning board took no action on the map and will begin looking at the growth policy document itself when it meets again in January.