Weekend flooding highlights neighborhood concerns over proposed Spokane Valley development

Recent rainfall and snowmelt highlighted why residents of Spokane Valley’s Painted Hills neighborhood are in opposition to a developer’s plan to convert a defunct 100-acre golf course into housing.

For more than a decade, Dave Black of NAI Black has wanted to build a 584-unit, multi-use development on the former Painted Hills Golf Course. His biggest obstacle, both physically and in contending with the neighborhood opposition to his plan, has been the water that floods the site seasonally.

The golf course sits within the historic flood plain for nearby Chester Creek, and neighbors have long worried any action taken to mitigate seasonal flooding could push that flood risk onto their properties.

A drive along the streets bordering the property over the weekend highlighted the flooding, as water submerged roadways, fields and trails.

East Thorpe Road had a few inches of water stretching across both lanes of traffic, while a large moat formed along the property’s border along South Madison Road. The lowest points of the driving range, the only still functional aspect of the course, became pools.

NAI Black has proposed infilling the property with around 330,000 cubic yards of dirt atop the old course to bring it above the floodplain – the equivalent of more than 21,000 commercial dump-truck loads. That’s on top of a large, multifaceted flood -control system, which includes a network of culverts and pipes directing water to swales, an infiltration pond and an empty 4-acre field.

The city of Spokane Valley approved the project last March, but on the condition Spokane County form a flood -control district to oversee the long-term operation and maintenance of the elaborate stormwater system. Black, who had wanted a homeowner’s association to oversee the system, has sued the city alleging the condition was a “poison pill” intended to prevent the development from ever happening.

The Spokane County Commissioners voted against forming a flood -control district for the property on Feb. 4, citing the belief the county would be overstepping into the matters of one of its cities, that most of the property falls within Spokane Valley boundaries and a belief that other management models are available to the city.

Black told The Spokesman-Review last month he is holding out hope the development could still get off the ground. There may be a path forward through a settlement with the city over the ongoing lawsuit, he said.