Page 13 - Flathead Beacon // 1.14.15

FLATHEADBEACON.COM NEWS JANUARY 14, 2015 | 13 Planning Board to Review Proposed
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Downtown Whitefish Hotel
Developers address parking concerns, stormwater drainage and increased traffic
By TRISTAN SCOTT of the Beacon
The Whitefish Planning Board is slated to consider a pro- posal to build a prominent boutique hotel at the gateway of downtown Whitefish Jan. 15, less than a month after telling developers that more time was needed to review additional in- formation.
The site of the proposed three-story, 89-room hotel, along with 67 parking spaces, is on the corner of Second Street and Spokane Avenue, directly south of the Whitefish Middle School. If approved, it would be built adjacent to the historic Old Town Central District, a residential neighborhood where some homeowners have raised concerns about the project’s scope.
On Dec. 18, the Planning Board unanimously approved a motion to continue the public hearing because it wanted time to review new information presented by the applicant at the meeting, and requested additional information both from the applicant and the city.
The new information included a revised site plan and a draft traffic study that the board hadn’t had time to review.
The board also requested additional information on the following topics: Management of contaminated groundwater at the site; closing the alley access onto Kalispell Avenue so that all traffic would exit and enter from East 3rd Street; and managing parking on residential streets.
The owner behind the current project is Sean Averill, of the Whitefish Hotel Group, who along with his brother Brian and father Dan Averill owns and operates The Lodge at Whitefish Lake.
The Averills also own the site where the hotel would be built, called Block 46, and they have lined up an investor to
Rendering of a proposed hotel. COURTESY OF MONTANA CREATIVE ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN
provide financing for the project.
Averill is seeking approval from the planning board be-
cause the size of the project requires a conditional use permit. The proposed building’s footprint is just shy of 15,000 square feet, and the site’s zoning district requires permitting for any building footprint that exceeds 7,500 square feet.
Adding a boutique hotel to the downtown area was an el- ement of the Whitefish downtown master plan adopted in 2006, but earlier proposals at other sites have been unsuccess- ful for various reasons.
Wendy Compton-Ring, senior planner for Whitefish, rec- ommended approval of the conditional use permit subject to 20 conditions, including that the project receive approval from the city’s Architectural Review Committee.
If approved at the Jan. 15 meeting, the Whitefish City Council would consider the matter at its Feb. 2 meeting.
Some planning board members expressed concern that the scale of the project was not a good fit with the historic in- tegrity of Whitefish’s downtown center.
Scott Elden of Montana Creative Architecture and De- sign, the firm that is designing the building, said the style of the proposed hotel is “a locally developed unique design to suit our town” and will meet all guidelines of the Whitefish Archi- tecture Review Committee.
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Preliminary NTSB Report Reveals Details of Fatal Lake County Plane Crash
Report states plane made several erratic moves before crashing into the side of a hill
By JUSTIN FRANZ of the Beacon
The plane that crashed near Ronan last month, killing the pilot and injur- ing a passenger, made “several erratic maneuvers” before slamming into a hill- side, according to the National Trans- portation Safety Board’s preliminary re- port issued last week.
On Dec. 16, the Lake County Sher- iff’s Office received a report of a small plane crashing at Round Butte. The pi- lot, 33-year-old Brett Thoft of Alaska, was pronounced dead at the scene. The passenger, Tim Schauss of Lake County survived and was airlifted to Kalispell
Regional Medical Center.
The following day, NTSB officials ar-
rived on scene to investigate the crash. According to the preliminary report, is- sued Jan. 6, Schauss had purchased the plane on Sept. 30, 2014 and was learning to become a pilot. Just before the crash on Dec. 16, Thoft, a Federal Aviation Administration certified mechanic, re- placed the propeller on the Piper PA-18- 150 Super Club plane.
At 4 p.m., the plane departed the Ronan Airport on a sightseeing flight. No flight plan had been filed with the airport authority. Fifteen minutes later the plane crashed into the side of a hill about five miles from the airport. The NTSB investigator talked to multiple witnesses who said the plane made “sev- eral erratic maneuvers” and was low to the ground before the crash. Witnesses also said the plane’s engine accelerated and revved up just before impact.
According to an NTSB spokesper- son, the final report could take any- where from 12 to 18 months to complete.
Thoft, the pilot, owned Full Curl Aviation LLC, an air taxi service in Wasilla, Alaska that caters to hunters and rafters. According to news reports, he had attended high school and col- lege in Montana and still had family in the area. In December, a friend told the Alaska Dispatch News that Thoft was “an exceptional pilot.”
“I spent a lot of time in the plane with him,” said Bob Summers of Deltana Outfitters. “He was exceptional in every sense of the word. He was a legend in the making.”
An online fundraiser is being held to support Thoft’s young family and so far more than $16,000 has been raised. For more information visit www.gofundme. com/Brett-Thoft-APHA.
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