Supreme Court considers right-to-know issue in Flathead Lake development battle
By MIKE DENNISON
HELENA – Another right-to-know case is before the Montana Supreme Court, as it considers whether a Flathead Lake citizens group was improperly hindered from scrutinizing an exclusive, private golf-and-housing development in Lakeside.
At issue is whether the Lakeside sewer district failed to provide adequate notice to the public, or accompanying documents, before approving a service agreement last year with the developers and awarding related bids to expand the local sewer system.
Citizens for a Better Flathead, a local nonprofit group questioning various aspects of the development, asked a state district judge last year to block the sewer work, saying its right-to-know and participate in the process had been illegally impeded.
District Judge Paul Sullivan of Kalispell rejected that request last August and Citizens for a Better Flathead appealed that ruling to the state Supreme Court.
The citizens’ group says when the sewer district considered and approved the agreement with Territory 1889 in 2024 and 2025, it failed to provide requested documents and approved projects under a new developer name, without notification.
Sullivan’s ruling “ignored the fundamental link between the right to participate and the right to know, (so) its finding that (we) were afforded the right to know and participate should be reversed,” the citizens group told the Supreme Court in documents late last year.
“Once that desire (to review documents) is expressed on an issue of significant public interest, the burden is on the agency to provide adequate notice, including supporting documentation of a proposed decision,” the group said in another filing in February.
Territory 1889 and related companies are planning to build two private golf courses, a 359-home development, a new marina at Lakeside and a private club on the lake. Lakeside is a small community on the west shore of Flathead Lake, about 15 miles south of Kalispell.
The developer is Discovery Land Co., which operates other private, high-end residential communities in Montana, such as the Yellowstone Club at Big Sky and Crazy Mountain Ranch, northeast of Livingston.
Citizens for a Better Flathead members told the Missoulian newspaper recently that they’re concerned about potential negative impacts from the development.
Discovery Land Co. refused an interview request from the Missoulian, but did email a statement in response to 20 written questions, and said it is “committed to working closely and collaboratively with the local officials and the community.”
Citizens for a Better Flathead members disagreed, telling the Missoulian that Flathead County, the sewer district and the developers have ignored the voices of critics, conducted less-than-open procedures, and violated laws.
Citizens also sued the county this February, saying it improperly approved a variance to allow the development to build a dock at Lakeside 59 feet longer than current regulations allow.
In March, state District Judge Dan Wilson of Kalispell said the county likely violated Lakeshore Protection Act provisions that require a more extensive review of the dock variance, and a stop-work order was issued while the lawsuit plays out.
Citizens also has joined the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes in a lawsuit against the state Department of Environmental Quality, alleging that DEQ did not adequality consider the impacts to Flathead Lake of a permit granted to the Lakeside sewer district, related to the Territory 1889 development.
In the right-to-know lawsuit before the Supreme Court, Citizens said it asked the Lakeside sewer district in December 2024 for a copy of its proposed service agreement with Discovery Land Co.
The district said the agreement wasn’t complete and wouldn’t be released until it was. Then, at a March 2025 meeting, the district had an “action item” on its agenda for an agreement with Territory 1889 for the same development – a name that the group said it had not heard before.
The district then approved the agreement at that meeting.
Citizens said its members also asked for copies of bid awards for the first phase of the sewage improvements associated with the development.
The district said no bids had been awarded, but a week or so later, the district noticed a special meeting and awarded the contract, without providing related documents, the group said.
In its reply to the Supreme Court filed last December, the sewer district said it had answered truthfully to the Citizens requests and had no responsibility to follow up. It also said it gave the public several days notice of its meeting agenda and a “mechanism” for requesting documents, but that Citizens “did not avail themselves of this process.”
Citizens said the sewer district shouldn’t be able to defeat right-to-know claims by saying the person requesting information “must incessantly request documents on every government agenda to be informed of proposed decisions.”
Mike Dennison is president of the Montana FOI Coalition