MISSOULA — Missoula County Commissioners Dave Strohmaier and Juanita Vero both voted to deny a rezoning effort in East Missoula that would allow for another storage facility near Ole’s.
The vote came during a virtual public meeting Thursday that included multiple comments from East Missoula citizens.
Locals in the area say they don’t need more storage and instead need more community development.
Strohmaier says that rezoning the area to allow the current plan for storage lockers would all but doom any development plans for the heart of East Missoula.
"I don’t think it hyperbole to say that with the intended use that would be associated with this rezoning it would be like driving a stake through the heart of East Missoula," Strohmaier said. "Can you imagine the outrage of mini storage units in downtown Missoula next to the county courthouse where a very different vision of what a community center might look like? What we are basically talking about is downtown East Missoula."
Proponents of the rezoning effort say that if the area was rezoned it didn’t guarantee that storage facilities would be added and they felt that opponents of the plan were too hung up on that idea.
