ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ELEMENT PRELIMINARILY APPROVED

JUNE 3, 2025 UPDATE

At a May 21, 2025 Work Session, the Community Development Board preliminarily approved the Economic Development Element Vision Whitefish 2045 with rewrites as submitted by Heart of Whitefish. There has been a significant amount of public comment since this time, and the economic development edits was a topic of robust discussion during a June 2, 2025 growth policy update to the Council. All drafts will come back in front of the Community Development Board in a finished document toward the end of the process, likely in winter or spring 2026, and the City Council is the final approval authority of Vision Whitefish 2045.

The most recent version of the economic development element is located in "Documents / Draft Plan Chapters" on the right hand side of this page and is linked HERE.

All public comment is located in "Documents / Public Comments / Economic Development Public Comments" on the right hand side of this page and is linked HERE.

Video of work sessions are posted on this webpage when they are available.

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The Montana Land Use Planning Act (MLUPA) has specific requirements regarding economic development. These include assessing existing and potential commercial enterprises, summarizing job composition and labor force, assessing local constraints to commercial enterprises, inventorying existing and potential commercial sites, and analyzing local facilities and financial feasibility of supporting existing and potential commercial enterprises for the projected population.

Due to the expertise needed for this analysis, staff retained a consultant to complete the study. The consultant reached out to more than 30 business and industry stakeholders over a 6-month period, met with many stakeholders individually, held two group economic forums and coordinated extensively with staff. Seventeen stakeholders participated. Based on the study and the existing growth policy, Staff drafted initial goals and objectives, and these were presented to the Community Development Board along with the report in two separate public meetings - April 18 and June 20 of 2024.

In September of 2024, several members of the Community Development Board began mentioning their desire to discuss the economic development goals and objectives further. This topic was raised at each subsequent work session, although the Economic Development Element had not yet been completed. At a March 19, 2025 work session intended to discuss the Natural Resources Section of Vision Whitefish 2045, the Board again raised the economic development goals and objectives. The Board moved to put this topic on the agenda for a May 21, 2025 work session at 6PM. At least one Board member has noted their intent at this upcoming work session is to give direction to staff regarding whether Whitefish aspires to be a “rapid growth” or “moderate growth” community.

Planning Staff had initially hoped to present this draft plan element later in the process, while the land use and housing elements were underway. However, staff did not want the upcoming discussion at the work session to occur with limited information or uninformed participation, so we decided to get in front of it, finish a draft of the plan element chapter, and get it out for review so all interests were informed equally. The chapter draft was also sent out to the participating stakeholders and the consultants for comment. Please note the Economic Development Element as prepared by staff does not mention moderate versus rapid growth scenarios – it recommends strategies to increase economic diversity and access to daily goods and services - which were overwhelmingly mentioned by participants during recent visioning sessions.

HERE is the staff report and completed economic development element.

HERE is the economic development study which was completed and presented to the Board in June which was used the primary resource for this plan element.

If you have any written comments on the Economic Development Element, please submit them to Alan Tiefenbach at atiefenbach@cityofwhitefish.gov by 5PM ON FRIDAY, MAY 9, 2025.

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