King County, business and conservation partners celebrate Snoqualmie Forest preservation

King County Executive Ron Sims and his fellow participants had a lot to celebrate at the Mountains to Sound Greenway annual dinner held this week in Seattle.

Just three months ago, Sims announced King County's purchase of the development rights to the Snoqualmie Forest. The action ensured that 90,000 acres of working forest land in East King County will serve as a permanent barrier to the spread of sprawl into the Cascade Foothills, while maintaining existing timber jobs and revenues.

"The 'Wall Against Sprawl' will never be broken," Sims said at the time.

For $22 million—less than $250 per acre—King County stopped future development of the sweeping tract, an area twice the size of Seattle. The Snoqualmie Forest will serve as a buffer between the Alpine Lakes Wilderness and the county's eastern suburban cities.

The Snoqualmie Forest remains under the ownership of Hancock Timber Resource Group, a Boston-based company with a longstanding commitment to environmental stewardship.

The innovative deal was funded through King County's Conservation Futures Tax, a funding source which has allowed the protection of some 15,000 acres of land in the past 15 years. Because most of that land was purchased outright, the Snoqualmie Forest preservation deal was accomplished at a fraction of the cost of past protection efforts.

The property, long known as the Snoqualmie Tree Farm, was owned by Weyerhaeuser until last March. Part of the acreage was included in Frederick Weyerhaeuser's historic 1900 property purchase from the Northern Pacific Railroad.

The three-year effort to preserve the Snoqualmie Forest featured contributions from many Northwest leaders. Gene Duvernoy, president of Cascade Land Conservancy, was a driving force behind the private efforts to acquire the land. King County Council member Larry Phillips brokered the all-important legislative negotiations on the use of the Conservation Futures Tax money.

Sims predicted that the challenges of preserving the forest will be forgotten by future generations gazing on the unbroken sea of green preserved through this remarkable collaborative achievement.

"One hundred years from now, no one will remember who was responsible for this," Executive Sims said in September after signing the agreement. "What they will notice and appreciate is the absence of any housing developments in that forest."