The Park County Planning and Zoning Commission voted to approve Northwest College’s special use permit application for a structure that will serve initially as a temporary dining facility during the construction of a new student center.

 Later, the structure will be repurposed for locker rooms for soccer athletes and offices for soccer coaches. 

The commission’s vote functions as a recommendation to the Park County Commission, which will make the final decision on whether or not the SUP gets approval. 

Following Gov. Mark Gordon’s recommendation, the Wyoming Legislature approved in the last session half the funding for a $21 million new student center to replace the college’s aging DeWitt Student Center. The 50-year-old building is nearing the end of its life span and has a number of health and safety issues, including being out of compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. 

The college must match the state’s funding.  The matching funds are expected to come from a mix of private funding from the NWC Foundation, financing, college reserves and student fees. 

Two dead birds

The temporary dining building project has been part of the college’s master plan, NWC Interim Facilities Director Dennis Quillen said at Wednesday’s public hearing on the SUP. When college planners were planning temporary dining facilities to be used after the DeWitt building is torn down, they thought it best to “kill two birds with one stone” and convert the temporary dining hall into soccer facilities after the new student center was done. 

The building will be constructed just outside Powell city limits. 

County regulations require a SUP for anything that has a “major community use,” defined as a project the community uses and the size of all buildings are 5,000 square feet or more, or more than one acre of land is being developed for the use.

The area is zoned residential, but the county allows for major community use within the zone type, with the approval of a special use permit. 

The college-owned property is currently vacant and has been used as agricultural land for much of the past 10 years. 

The 3,360 square foot temporary dining facility “shell” structure will be a single-story, metal-clad building occupying about 1.5 acres of a 13-acre parcel sitting north of Eighth Street and west of Division Street. It will be 22 feet tall and have a gabled asphalt roof.

For dining purposes, students will be bused from campus to the facility, but food will be prepared off-site and transported to the temporary dining hall. 

Lisa Watson, NWC president, said in a June meeting of the college board of trustees, that college staff are negotiating with the county to use kitchen facilities at the Park County Fairgrounds to prepare food. 

According to the college’s SUP application, 250 to 300 meals per day will be served, with five to seven employees assigned to work there.  When the building is repurposed for use by the soccer program,  35 to 45 student athletes will use it, along with five to seven coaches. 

A parking area for the facility will be accessed through a gravel driveway coming off Eighth Street. 

Utility capacity

The planning staff noted some concerns about utility services to the site. The facility will use natural gas from Montana-Dakota Utilities Company and water and electricity from the City of Powell. However, neither entity responded to requests for confirmation that the required capacity to serve the facility exists. 

Erik Wachob, engineer with Engineering Associates, which is providing engineering services to the college on the project, explained that the college distributes its own electricity and water service from a central point, which is supplied by the city. So, in that respect, the college manages its own utilities. 

Addressing concerns about electrical capacity for the building, Quillen said the college had upgraded its electrical infrastructure to ensure it could accommodate future growth. 

The City of Powell had urged the college to do the upgrades, and they were completed in 2020. Prior to those upgrades, the college operated a 4,160-volt system, while the city had upgraded to a 12,470-volt system. The $400,000 upgrades were completed in the summer of 2020 while the campus was closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Quillen speculated that the City of Powell might not have responded to the county’s inquiry on capacity because the college handles its own electrical service. While the city supplies the power at a point by Seventh Street and Division Street, from there it “spiders out through campus.”

The county also had no response regarding solid waste service. Quillen said some campus facilities outside the city limits use Keele Sanitation LLC for solid waste services, but some are served by Powell’s solid waste service. He wasn’t sure which would be used for the temporary dining facilities.

Future growth

The college’s contractors are installing an in-ground septic system, which will handle the dining hall’s sewage. The system will be located north of the dining hall. Planning and Zoning Department staff said the system design is adequate to the task. 

County Planning and Zoning Department Director Joy Hill asked college representatives why these properties, which are proposed for future growth of the college, haven’t been annexed into the city. 

“It seems reasonable to me … when you could be served by central sewer,” Hill said, adding that the department wasn’t making annexation a condition of the SUP and only wanted to comment on it.

Quillen said that tapping into the city’s sewer system to serve the project would have been cost prohibitive. 

“It probably would have killed this project,” he said. 

Hill said she understands the cost considerations, but she urged NWC and the city to begin having that discussion in the near future. It would be a benefit for the campus and city, she said, as it would not only provide city services to the college, but also provide good urban development practices, such as the continuity of pedestrian walkways. 

“It’s something I think should be discussed for future planning,” Hill said. 

Irrigation and street access

Hill also said the county would need to get a response from the Shoshone Irrigation District concerning an irrigation drainage line that runs through the parcel. 

The developers of a subdivision north of Powell with an irrigation line running through it hadn’t properly consulted with the district, which ended up causing all kinds of issues, she said. Since there’s likely an easement associated with that irrigation drainage and the college builds in the district’s easement associated with the drainage line, Hill explained, district workers could tear up that land at some point. 

Wachob said the planners were aware of the irrigation line and had sited the building to avoid any conflicts with it. 

Park County Engineer Brian Edwards said he’d been in discussions with Powell City Administrator Zack Thorington about road access, which will be from a city street, and together they’re reviewing the college engineer’s drainage plan to make sure runoff won’t impact surrounding properties. 

“I don’t think we’re anticipating anything significant there,” Edwards said. 

Mary McKinney, assistant supervisor for Park County Weed and Pest, said the department wants to see seeding and landscaping done as soon as possible for weed control, but otherwise Weed and Pest had no concerns. 

“They’ve always been a good cooperator with us, so I don’t foresee any issues with them,” she said. 

No public comments were given on the college’s application. 

The planning commission’s recommendation for approval of the SUP was based on the condition that the project be in compliance with all county regulations, such as those regarding lighting, confirmation of sound erosion control, confirmation from the City of Powell and the Montana-Dakota Utilities Company on power and gas capacity and a response from the Shoshone Irrigation District.