AIRPORT: Planning, zoning pay dividends
As a homeowner and taxpayer in Kootenai County, I have lived in the airport approach and departure flight paths for 30 years. Before we purchased our home, we were cognizant of the airport location and orientation as well as the associated problems that could and in time would develop with growth in Kootenai County and North Idaho. This is not rocket science.
The Airport Advisory Board, the airport manager, and ultimately the FAA are the accepted arbiters regarding airport and aircraft safety rules and regulations. They have shown wisdom in assessing the expanding needs of the airport in a busy residential and transportation corridor. The exclusion of these folks in the planning process, in any way, whether by design or ignorance, is ludicrous. In addressing the matter of highway and road construction, rerouting around the airport may be annoying in the short run, but will prove less costly to taxpayers than moving the entire airport facility to an unknown — not likely to exist — location.
We have continued to hope that voters through careful study and considered voting would elect informed and comprehensively oriented community officials and decision makers aware of the scope of needs and goals of Kootenai County at large as well as its place in the Panhandle community of counties. Objective planning and decision making are essential in the very delicate balancing act required for reaching fair and forward looking plans for all parties involved whatever their personal or financial interests.
This may be a case of the Monday morning quarterback, however, the fiasco as presented in the news concerning the airport is only one in a series of instances in which planning and zoning and ultimately elected and appointed officials have failed to recognize the long range consequences of their decisions. It is troubling that our elected officials have appointed, contracted with, or hired expensive advisers who at times are politically and/or financially influenced when presenting their findings and ideas. Or can it possibly be that our elected decision makers fail to study and to act properly on those findings.
There is no doubt that growth will occur, and is necessary for providing revenue and its resulting benefits to our communities. There have been many opportunities for the master plan to zone for airport expansion needed in the future. Many cities have dealt with the same concerns, and have had the foresight to zone airport neighborhoods for light to heavy industry with proper safety zones as mandated by FAA regulations. Those communities failing to do so, which allow residential construction close to an airport, have cost taxpayers extra millions, and in some cases loss of life and property destruction.
I hope our newly elected officials and their deputies recognize their responsibilities to the whole community by starting the admittedly grueling process of comprehensive zoning and planning before the inevitable growth spins further out of control.
BILL RODGERS
Post Falls