Dirt bike track dispute revs up

When Todd Stam purchased about 100 acres in a rural area south of Post Falls, he never imagined he would be ordered to limit how much he and his children could ride their dirt bikes on the site.

When some of the neighbors bought their homes years ago, they never imagined they would have noise concerns due to the motorcycles on a dirt track Stam constructed two years ago.

Neither side is pleased with a 2-1 decision by Kootenai County commissioners aimed at striking a happy medium by restricting how much the Stams can ride on their property off Greensferry Road.

Conditions were placed on approving the 11-lot Cedar Creek subdivision request of Aspen Homes, a construction company owned by Stam. The conditions included limiting usage of the track to once a week from noon to 4 p.m. for any number of motorcycles and for an hour a day for a limit of two motorcycles on the other days of the week.

Further, with Stam's helicopter, it will be allowed to only take off and land once a day under the conditions.

Welcome to one of the latest neighbor disputes in a land where property rights are paramount.

"He's unhappy because (riding) is limited, and we're unhappy because it's not limited enough," said Dennis Cooke, among the concerned neighbors who helped organize a petition drive protesting the noise.

Stam calls the restrictions "asinine," especially when he has purchased that much property in a rural area for his family and friends to enjoy.

"My hope is that they'll put their heads out and say that, 'There's no way we can do this,'" said Stam, who built the track two years ago. "If I can't buy 100 acres and ride dirt bikes, what else am I going to have to do? I have friends who ride on 5 acres in Post Falls and it is OK."

Stam said if commissioners sign the record of decision on Aspen's subdivision request as expected this month, he will ask them to re-consider the proposal. He has hired an attorney and land-use planner to assist him through the process. The subdivision is planned for the lower section of the site.

Cooke said the conditions on the track usage won't do much to improve the status quo.

"He's not riding much more than that anyway," said Cooke, who is the head of cardiology at Kootenai Health. "It doesn't look to us that they are cutting him back."

Cooke said the track is about 300 feet from his property line and 700 from his patio. He said there are times when he can't carry on a conversation outside because the noise is so loud.

"The only thing you can do to avoid the noise is go inside and turn the TV volume way up and even then you can hear them," he said. "The noise is inordinate and affects lives to a significant degree. He's destroyed the quality of life in the whole valley. These are unmuffled racing bikes."

Cooke said he and other neighbors have tapped their own attorney to find a resolution. Thirty-four residents who live in the vicinity signed the petition to the commissioners expressing their concerns over the noise.

"We wanted to go through the normal route — the commissioners — to see if they could help us first," he said.

Commissioners Dan Green and Marc Eberlein supported the subdivision request with the conditions on using the track.

"The challenge is balancing the rights of the property owner with the people who have already been living there," Green said. "I heard a great deal of concern about the amount of noise. The people were living there prior to the subdivision being proposed, so I respect their concerns. But that has to be aligned with the rights of the property owner as well, which is a challenge in land-use decisions."

Green said he realizes both sides are not pleased with the board's effort to strike a balance.

"When everybody goes away mad, maybe that's a good decision," Green said, referring to what former county economic development director Rand Wichman once told him. "That's the challenge of trying to find balance."

Wichman, Stam's land-use planner, said he believes many of the neighbors' concerns are "overblown." He also questions how the conditions on the track can be put on the subdivision request.

"The two are completely unrelated," Wichman said. "They're trying to regulate something in the subdivision process that is not related at all to the subdivision. It's an inappropriate mechanism to regulate that use."

Wichman said he was stunned over the conditions.

"God help us if we have to ask the county if we can ride a dirt bike on our property," he said.

But Green said commissioners have the ability to place conditions on subdivision requests as they see fit.

"If Todd hadn't come to us with the subdivision request, the neighbors would probably be calling the sheriff's office about nuisance complaints anyway," he said.

While the ordeal appears to be far from settled, it has already caused pause in permitting for the site.

Neighbors questioned if Stam had a site disturbance permit to construct the track. While Stam had such permits for the road construction and for a barn, he doesn't have one for the track but is now pursuing one, Wichman said.

Wichman said whether a permit is needed for the track is questionable, but Stam plans to request one for the entire site that will encompass the future homes, track and any other uses.

"We want to clear any concerns," he said.

David Callahan, the county's community development director, said the county has not red-tagged the property or told Stam the track can't be used.

"Since long before I was hired, the county commissioners have directed staff to enforce our regulations by complaint only," Callahan said. "So unless we happen to have first-hand knowledge of a violation, we wait for a complaint before contacting anyone about a possible zoning or building code infraction.

"In this particular case, there had not been a complaint from neighbors, and our staff had not actually been to the area on Stam’s property that includes the motocross area, so we had no way of knowing that the motocross area should have required a disturbance permit."

Callahan said all the county was aware of was neighbors were upset about the noise.

"None of the neighbors told us that there had been extensive earth grading," Callahan said. "If they had, we would have pursued this earlier. As it happened, I first learned about it during the commissioners' hearing for the proposed subdivision. The day following the hearing, we contacted the applicant’s representative (Wichman) and confirmed that the Stams will soon be applying for a permit."

The neighbors also believe Stam should have a conditional-use permit to utilize the track as such permits are intended to reduce nuisance factors. But Callahan said he doesn't believe a CUP is required.

"The track is for personal use and does not rise to the level of a race track," said Callahan, adding that is his opinion.

"An interpretation is necessary because the code doesn’t actually define a race track."

Callahan said he considered a dictionary's definition of a race track and the language of the code to make his determination.

Stam said he occasionally invites friends to ride with his family at the site, but it isn't a public or commercial track.

"I have some neighbors who make it sound like I'm charging admission and have grandstands," he said. "I'm busy so we've only ridden two or three times in the past two months. It's something that gets used very little in the summertime (due to the hot weather). We try to use it more in the spring and fall when it's damp."

Stam calls some neighbors' assertion that the track is regularly used for racing several motorcycles at a time is "a complete joke."

"They say it's a commercial track with people coming and going all the time, but I have too much on my plate for that," he said. "It's not that I don't bring a friend occasionally, but it's not a public race track."

Stam said there are other property owners in that area who also ride motorcycles, but he seems to take the brunt of the blame for the noise.

Stam and Cooke disagree on the overall amount of concern from neighbors about the track and noise.

Stam doesn't live on the property, but he plans to build his home on one of the 11 lots. He said the site was originally approved to have 25 homes, but he's going with a less-dense project he figured neighbors would be happy about.

Stam said some neighbors have also complained about dust the motorcycles generate, but he waters the track before he rides to limit that.

He said they also have concerns about his helicopter flying overhead, but he uses it sparingly and has contacted the Federal Aviation Administration for assurance he's within the agency's regulations on its usage.

"I don't have any plans to fly it more than once a day (as the conditions state), but I'm also sure not going to let neighbors dictate the airspace around my property," he said. "I don't run up to my neighbor and complain when he's been running his chain saw all day. It's Kootenai County, and you can do it."

Stam said he voluntarily went to a homeowners association meeting about a year ago to discuss his proposed less-dense subdivision with neighbors, but he said it wasn't constructive because the talk focused on the track.

"It was a bitch-fest on Todd," he said.

He said one neighbor told him they couldn't hold a wedding on their property out of concerns his track may be used at that time.

"All you have to do is pick up the phone and call me and say, 'Is there any chance you not ride on that day?'" Stam said, adding he's willing to work with such requests. "But they don't seem to want to talk or work things out. I've been building homes here for 20 years so the last thing I want to do is be a jerk."

Cooke said he realizes Stam has rights on his property, but it's also affecting neighbors who have been living in the vicinity for years before the track was built.

"It seems like he just thinks that it's his property, it's his right to do as he wishes and nothing else matters," Cooke said. "I get it, but he's impacting a lot of people's lives. We'd love to have him as a neighbor, but he's got to be neighborly."