Hayden Lake area growth

Kelsey Hanlon moved into a four-bedroom home near Lancaster Road in January to care for her ailing father. The Bremerton, Wash., native had just finished her routine hike along the trails of English Point when she stopped for a quick interview. She stressed that while she’s enjoyed the area’s scenic beauty and friendly people during her time here, she doesn’t consider herself a transplant, and that she’ll move back when the time comes.

“I told my dad, ‘I can’t keep the house,’” she said. “I could never afford the taxes.”

It’s a common song stuck on repeat: The real estate demand in North Idaho drives housing prices higher, which in turn drives assessments higher, which in turn drives taxes higher.

The desire for a rural lifestyle, mixed with growing contempt of urban centers, is pushing more and more from across the country to the woods, lakes and mountains of Idaho. But as that desire for natural landscapes swells, those rural areas shrink. Even though Hanlon has only lived near the lake for seven months, she could identify the issue with the simple point of a finger.

“Just over there,” she said as she caught her breath, pointing to the land just north of Lancaster, across from the English Point parking lot. “They’re ready for a hundred new houses, or something like that.”

Closer to 150, actually. The property in question stretching over 35 acres is zoned Restricted Residential, with an option for another 60 acres zoned Rural. The land was given preliminary approval for up to 220 sewer hook-ups, with available access to an 8” water line. But from a zoning perspective, the property couldn’t handle 220 units.

David Callahan, Kootenai County’s community development director, said the minimum lot size in the Restricted Residential Zone is 8,250 square feet, and there are 43,560 square feet in an acre, so the theoretical number of lots on 35 acres is less than 185.

"Because roads typically use as much as 30 percent of development property, once roads are included in the equation, it is more likely that the number of lots allowed on this 35 acres would be more along the lines of 150," he said.

All of that math is still hypothetical, Callahan pointed out, because any future development would still require a public planning process, and a prior attempt to subdivide the area was unsuccessful. For just under $4 million, the 35 acres are up for sale for developers looking to cash in on one of the biggest growth spurts North Idaho has ever seen.

Craig Hunter of Coldwell Banker Schneidmiller Realty sells commercial real estate, including the 35 acres on the Lancaster Road property. He said the demand for development property has reached an unheard-of peak since the coronavirus pandemic took hold.

“We’ve had so much demand from people and companies relocating from different states,” Hunter said. “We’ve already had so much demand from people wanting to come here, but since January and COVID and all the unrest in more blue, coastal areas, we’ve been five times more busy.”

That need to sell to residential developements stems from companies looking to relocate as well, Hunter said, illustrating his point with a recent example of a Western Washington-based business looking to Idaho for relief.

“There’s this company located out of Seattle,” he said. “They’ve got 50 or so employees. They decide: ‘Yes, we’re moving to the Coeur d’Alene area.’ Now, as it turns out, 40 of their 50 employees are relocating with them. They need somewhere to live.”

That need to develop is bumping up against a deceptive perception of density requirements. Under Kootenai County’s comprehensive plan, the nearby community of Hayden Lake (not to be confused with the actual lake) has a designed area of impact that was agreed upon in 1995. That area of impact stretches north of the city to Lancaster Road — but not beyond.

The comprehensive plan was amended to require one-acre parcels with each new residential property in Hayden Lake’s area of impact. As a result, density to the south of Lancaster follows particular unit-per-acre requirements that don’t match potential development to the north. Generally speaking, a house built south of Lancaster and east of North Strahorn Road would face acreage minimums, while a housing development north of Lancaster and east of Strahorn would still go through with far tighter land minimums.

Hence the 220 possible sewer hookups within a 35-acre perimeter.

Todd Walker does not have what can be readily characterized as an easy job.

“Two hundred and twenty is quite a bit for that area,” the lake manager of the Hayden Lake Watershed Improvement District said. “Everything in that (area) is at least one-acre to five-acre lots, so when you put a large development like that in an area that isn’t so dense, it’s going to stand out.”

Don’t let his folksy, down-home charm fool you: Walker’s standard of standing out differs from the usual homeowner’s or visitor’s standard. Initially funded by the Kootenai Environmental Alliance and the Hayden Lake Watershed Association, Walker works as the operational head of the Improvement District, spearheading the on-the-ground efforts of a small staff of scientists devoted to helping the quality of the water in Hayden Lake. That means documenting and — if possible — minimizing the damage from contaminants that can seep into the water.

“It is still considered an endangered lake,” Walker said. “We have a TMDL, but for the last 20 years, (lakewater quality has) stayed the same. We’ve been keeping it steady, which I know doesn’t sound like much, but considering the growth we’ve had around here, we could be doing a lot worse.”

The TDML — Total Maximum Daily Load limits — is a mechanism of an endless effort to protect the lake from phosphorus and other contaminants, be it through the spillage of nearby heavy equipment preparing land for construction or direct run-off from properties.

“Any impervious surface,” Walker said, “which you can imagine around here is a lot, will impact the level of contaminants in (Hayden) Lake. Every road that’s built (and) every driveway is a place where cars drop oils and other contaminants. Rain comes and washes it down into the lake.”

Walker added that the 35 acres share the same innocent quality of virtually every other property around the lake, a quality that nevertheless endangers the health of Hayden Lake: gravity.

“I mean, it’s on a hill," he said. "Part of that area doesn’t drain to the lake, but part of it does, just like everywhere else.”

What winds up in Hayden Lake doesn’t stay there, though. Approximately 45 million gallons of water finds its way into the Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer each day, according to the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality. According to the Hayden Lake Watershed Association, one quart of oil can contaminate up to two million gallons of water. Walker said that as much as 20 percent of the phosphorus in the lake — a number that once peaked at 26 percent, he added — could be tied to new construction.

But with the give-or-take 10 trillion gallons of water in the Spokane River-Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer and the economic forces driving people to the area, the measurable markers to allow for future growth — sewer hook-ups, in this case — likely won’t be in short supply.

“For us, the question is, ‘Can we service the need?’” said Ed Short, vice-chair of the Hayden Area Regional Sewer Board posed. “For us, we look at the property and ask if we have the infrastructure to handle it. In this case, it took over a year of review, but ultimately, we decided we have the capacity and we have the infrastructure.”

Short also serves as board member for the city of Hayden Lake. The longtime local knows first-hand how growth has exploded not only around the lake but across North Idaho over the years, but his position on the HARSB gives him the data to back it up. But he added the task of managing growth doesn’t fall on a sewer board.

“For us, we’re really just a box that you check off,” Short said. “‘Do we have the ability to service this request? Managing growth isn’t something that’s up to us. That’s up to a governing body.”

Kootenai County Commissioner Chris Fillios doesn’t like to couple the word “managing” to the word “growth.”

“For me,” he said, “it’s really about accommodating growth. How do we accommodate the growth? ‘Managing’ implies stopping, and you’re not going to stop the growth. You’re not going to stop people from crossing the border. But you can accommodate the growth.”

Fillios, along with fellow commissioners Bill Brooks and Leslie Duncan, approved an update to the comprehensive plan back in February that highlights both watershed protections and resource management. He said one key to responsible growth comes in bundles of water and sewer hook-ups, making those basic utilities not only readily available but relatively uniform.

“As long as you can package water and sewer systems, you can leave yourself room to grow responsibly," he said. "But if you try to accommodate with individual wells on each property, it’s not going to work.”

Fillios added that septic systems run a greater risk of polluting the aquifer, a lesson residents around Hayden Lake (again, the actual lake, not the official city) have already come to understand.

Furthermore, the Board of County Commissioners requested Callahan’s department provide a background paper on growth management measures, evidence Callahan pointed to as leadership by the commissioners to examine planning under constantly swelling growth conditions.

Jan Wilkins agrees with the need for sewer lines and said a plan for the outlying areas that considers the watershed — as well as schools, roads and everything else growth includes – can’t come fast enough.

“It has to be intelligent development,” the vice president of the Hayden Lake Watershed Association said. “It has to be done with a clear understanding of the impacts of decisions ... If the development is not planned intelligently with a sophisticated understanding of water deterioration, we’re going to have very negative consequences.”

Wilkins stressed that everything that happens upstream has consequences downstream when it comes to watershed management, and she doesn’t envy Kootenai County commissioners charged with striking a balance between inescapable growth and the beauty that lures people here in the first place.

“How do we grow in a way that doesn’t kill the goose that lays the golden egg?” she asked. “How do we grow in a way so that it doesn’t alter the thing we’ve come to enjoy the most? How does the area grow responsibly? I really feel like the infrastructure has to come before growth, but I think growth comes before infrastructure in so many places, and you can see that here.”

While Wilkins said many lay the issue at the feet of Kootenai County, the solution likely isn’t found in a single government building.

“It’s so easy to be finger-pointing,” she said. “What’s so interesting about this patchwork way we’ve been doing things is, when you have all these different, competing groups, none of us are looking at the whole picture. It’s easy for us to say, ‘That jurisdiction is more responsible than ours, so it’s their problem.’ But that doesn’t give us any solutions.”

The solution, Wilkins urged, is for everyone to step back and see the bigger picture.

“Responsible growth looks like everyone is working collaboratively, where when one decision is made, and others can support it," she said. "When that many homes are going to be put in, do the questions get asked? Can the watershed handle it? Can the schools handle it? How does it impact the neighborhood?”

Callahan concurred that growth has to be a team effort.

“The Community Development staff is committed to planning practice that reflects the views of the citizenry,” he said, “and is continuously working with the Planning Commission to stay abreast of growth concerns while balancing these concerns against the preservation of land owner’s property rights.”

They’re rights Kelsey Hanlon says she’ll likely never see. She took off her running shoes as she climbed into her car at English Point. “I’d love to live here, though,” she admitted as she her engine sprung to life. “But at least I get to enjoy the peace and quiet for as long as I can.”

The Press has updated this story to correctly reflect Jan Wilkins as the vice-president of the Hayden Lake Watershed Association.