Billings has a buyer for Lampman Park. The roughly six acres off Monad Road on the West End were listed at $825,000 and drew three offers. The highest was $834,800, from local homebuilder Cal Kunkel. The purchase-and-sale agreement goes to a public hearing at tonight's City Council meeting, Monday, Oct. 12, 2026. Montana Free Press lists the start time as 5:30 p.m. City staff recommend approval.

Even with council approval, the contract only closes once the parcel gets new zoning, and that zoning depends on a citywide map the buyer is waiting on. For anyone who walks Monad Road, the answer to "when does this change?" depends more on the Billings 2045 planning process than on anything decided tonight.

The parcel has been eligible for sale since 2013

Lampman Park is dedicated parkland in the Lampman Subdivision. It was recorded on Feb. 15, 1956, and covers about 6.04 acres at 3050–3104 Monad Rd., ZIP 59102. The parks department's own disposal page lists it at 6.01 acres. It was never built out as a park. When KTVQ reported on it in March, the site was still undeveloped. A nearby resident told the station, "you'd be surprised at how many people take their dogs and walk them right there everyday."

Selling city land in Billings takes two steps. First comes a resolution of intent, with public notice, a hearing, and a council finding that the city no longer needs the property. Second comes another notice, another hearing, and a final council vote on the sale itself. According to the agenda item, Lampman cleared the first step 13 years ago through resolution RES 13-19314. That explains why tonight's agenda handles Lampman as a final sale. Beartooth Parcel, Career Center Park and Wilson Park, on the same agenda, are only at the resolution-of-intent stage.

The notices for tonight followed the required steps. Legal ads ran in the Yellowstone County News on Sept. 28, Oct. 2 and Oct. 9, and a notice was posted on the property on Oct. 2. The listing was open from Aug. 21 until 5 p.m. on Sept. 21. Two of the three offers matched the $825,000 asking price, and one went over it.

A budget gap put the old resolution back in play

The 2013 resolution sat unused for more than a decade. According to a March 2, 2026 city work-session memo, the renewed review began with a parks maintenance budget shortfall discussed on Dec. 2, 2024, along with concern about maintaining land the city might eventually sell anyway. A disposition committee met nine times between April 21 and Oct. 27, 2025, toured parcels, and sent an 11-property Phase 1 list forward. Committee members included the parks director, a parks board member, two council members, the Audubon Society, the Yellowstone River Parks Association, a high school student and a local business representative.

The money on each side is lopsided. The same memo estimated $13,500 a year in maintenance savings across seven proposed parks-department property sales combined. Lampman alone would bring in a one-time $834,800, minus realtor fees. The parks department has asked council to keep those proceeds within Parks, Recreation and Public Lands for one-time costs. Councilmember Mike Boyett told KTVQ in March that he favored sending proceeds back to parks to improve existing facilities. He also called the parcel "plain old dirt" and said a sale could put it on the tax roll.

Lampman was originally on the agenda for April 13, 2026, but that discussion was taken off and pushed to the fall, as the Billings Gazette reported. After the postponement, city staff moved forward with the sale of Lampman and 802 Yellowstone Ave., according to the Gazette's October report.

The contract waits on zoning, and the zoning waits on a map

The agenda lists these contingencies on the sale:

1. The parcel must receive N2 zoning.
2. The area must be mapped to either the Urban Residential or Urban Residential Limited placetype.
3. The buyer begins the zoning process "as soon as available, once the Placetype map is updated."
4. The buyer can extend the release date twice, by 30 days each time.
5. If zoning is approved administratively, closing can move up to 10 days after final approval.
6. If acceptable zoning isn't obtained by the release date, including any extensions, the buyer may terminate and get the earnest money back.

The agenda words the release date as "120 days from execution of 15 days after acceptable approval for said zoning," and the published text doesn't make clear exactly when that clock starts. The contingencies do make clear that the buyer's zoning work begins only once the map is updated. Until the contingencies are met and the property is conveyed, the city still owns the land.

The two placetypes allowed under the contract would produce very different neighborhoods. Here is how the city's Billings 2045 placetype boards describe them:

These figures are averages across a whole development area. They are not lot-size rules, and the specific standards of the N2 district weren't available in the materials we reviewed. The Gazette also reported that no development plans were included with tonight's agenda. No unit count has been made public. The Gazette notes that Kunkel has built Superbowl Townhomes, Home Run Patio Homes and the under-construction Big Island Development, and that council approved his plans for 300 to 360 workforce housing units on the old Barber farm in April.

Where the Billings 2045 map stands

Billings 2045 is the city's long-range land-use plan and Future Land Use Map. The city's original scope split it into two phases. The first sets policy and the map. The second rewrites the zoning and subdivision rules, and it carried a May 2026 implementation target. In March, KTVQ reported that the draft map was still being shaped by public feedback, with community workshops planned for April 6 to 8. A version of the map attached to a May 2026 planning packet says on its face that it doesn't yet reflect public feedback on the plan.

Since then, a July 17 city administrator report previewed a July 27 public hearing and resolution on Billings 2045 plan amendments. The Billings 2045 project site now announces that "The Final Plan is here." Even so, the Lampman contract, written for an October meeting, still treats a placetype map update as something that hasn't happened yet. The adopted plan and the parcel-level map appear to be separate milestones. We couldn't confirm a date for the map update that the Lampman sale depends on.

Other parcels on the list are earlier in the process

The parks department's disposal page lists the parcels under consideration along with how the committee and the parks board voted. It also says the next phase "will be revisited in FALL 2026."

The March memo says nine of the 11 Phase 1 properties were deferred so the city could move ahead with Lampman and 802 Yellowstone Ave. first. Among the parcels on this list, only Lampman had an older council resolution already in place. The others would each go through both steps, with notices and hearings, just as Career Center Park and Wilson Park are starting to tonight. The parks page has a contact form for comments, and only comments about the listed properties go into the council report.

If you own a home near Monad Road and want to know how a pending zoning change nearby could factor into a sale or purchase, Huskey Real Estate Group will go through the public record with you. Schedule a consultation.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.