BELLE FOURCHE - Commercial and residential construction dipped in 2007 in Belle Fourche.

Total construction valuation of projects given permits in 2007 was slightly less than $6.8 million, compared to roughly $10.5 million in 2006.

City Engineer Terry Wolterstorff said the trend still is major growth for the community after years of relative stagnation.

Wolterstorff said that in 2006, there were 42 single-family homes - including "townhouse" structures - permitted at about $5.5 million. Homes given permits in 2007 came up to a total of 39, at a value of about $3.6 million.

"In 2006, commercial construction was up, and that's where I think we've seen the biggest difference," he said.

Plans for a business complex, including a McDonald's restaurant at the southeast corner of the junction of U.S. Highway 85 and S.D. Highway 34 had been expected to boost commercial building in 2007.

"I'm not sure what's going to happen to that project," Wolterstorff said. "It's a financing issue, like everything."

He said developers have been meeting with local officials to discuss a tax increment financing district that aides financing by more slowly increasing property taxes, but the last contacts were about three weeks ago.

Financing may have played a major role in the less-expensive housing projects in 2007.

Wolterstorff said that the majority of the homes at the Hat Ranch development in the newly annexed area far south of the city were permitted in 2006 and were more expensive.

Along with less-expensive new homes permitted in 2007, he said, the building-permit statistics indicate more homeowners were making renovations and additions instead of "trading up."

"We had an astounding year in 2006, and we're still doing pretty good," he said. "If we moved down to the 2002 level, I would be concerned."

The community experienced about seven years of flat construction values that hovered between $1.5 and $2 million.

In 2003, building permits rose 50 percent, from less than $2 million up to $3 million. In 2004, an even bigger leap took local permitted construction up to more than $5.5 million.

The pace slowed a bit in 2005, with construction permits increasing more than $1.5 million to a total of just over $7.1 million, and in 2006 came the leap to a total of more than $10.5 million.

Building-permit statistics don't include public buildings and building projects such as the Tri-State Museum project or the expected 2008 construction of a new city hall.