Streamside setbacks resurrected

HELENA — The dream homes sprouting along the banks of the Yellowstone, the Gallatin and the state’s other major rivers are choking the waterways to death, say advocates who are once again pushing for legislation mandating statewide streamside setbacks.

   “This is a one-time shot,” Brett Tudsbury, a Bozeman Realtor, said. “The demand is higher than it ever was for riverside property.”

   A bill sponsored by Sen. Bob Hawks, D-Bozeman, would require that any new construction come no closer than 250 feet of the high-water mark of a major river and provide a vegetative buffer at least 100-feet wide.

   New construction along a river’s tributaries must be set back at least 150 feet and provide a vegetative buffer at least 50 feet in width, if the tributary drains an area at least 25 square miles in size.

   It’s a repeat of a bill Hawks brought in 2005, when it died in the Senate by a single vote. This time several changes have been made to make the bill more palatable to critics, including not requiring the setbacks in cities, towns and zoning areas or unincorporated areas with their own sewer and water districts, like Big Sky.

   Developers are no happier with the bill than they were last time.

   Senate Bill 345 completely ignores the fact that land-use decisions are best left to local governments and their citizens, Glenn Oppel of the Montana Association of Realtors told the Senate Local Government Committee, which held a hearing on the bill Tuesday.

   Many counties have already have setbacks, but those will be overruled if they’re smaller than what’s spelled out in the bill.

   “Hence, local regulations are stumped by the state mandate,” he said.

   It was a debate that occasionally got emotional, with a proponent crying when describing watching all the “McMansions” popping up alongside rivers, and an opponent crying as he described his plans to give his riverside land to his grandchildren.

   Montanans are seeing more and more streamside development that erodes water quality, decreases safety for neighbors and degrades people’s outdoor experience on rivers, Hawks said.

   He was followed by a long line of supporters, including several people in the real estate business who said they were baffled by their industry’s opposition to setbacks. Look at pictures of Malibu and the homes lining its beaches, Richard Smith, a Polson Realtor, said.

   “If we had that along the river in Montana, we would not have enhanced property values, we would have decreased property values,” he said.

   The governor’s office also voiced support for the bill.

   Following supporters was an equally long line of detractors, including several riverside landowners who said the bill would take away their private property rights.

   “The state has the right to the (stream), but they do not have the right to the land,” Andy Skinner of Helena said.

   Local governments would have the ability to craft their own setbacks that trump the state setbacks, if the setbacks are based on peer-reviewed science. The bill would also give local governments the ability to grant variances from the setbacks.