Bellingham buys this land to protect Lake Whatcom watershed
Bellingham is buying another large tract around Lake Whatcom, part of its continuing effort to preserve land in the watershed of its primary drinking water source and preserving steep, forested land that likely would have been logged.
City Council members voted unanimously Monday night, April 11, to approve a $351,000 deal for 131 acres on the lake’s southern end.
Monday’s action puts a majority of the land on Lookout Mountain south of Sudden Valley in public hands, said Eric Johnston, director of the Public Works Department.
“This completes that last block” of land on the southwest side of the lake, with the exception of shoreline homes along Lake Whatcom Boulevard, Johnston told The Bellingham Herald.
Monday’s vote approves a deal with CBC Brothers LLC, a corporation owned by the heirs of the late Henry Semple, who owned the site for many years.
Timber companies had sought to buy the heavily forested site for several years, but Semple always intended to see the land preserved, Johnston said.
It is zoned for commercial forestry and had the potential to provide 493 million board feet of timber, Johnston said.
Lake Whatcom provides drinking water for more than 100,000 people, including the city of Bellingham, the community of Sudden Valley and residents along the lake’s north shore.
A land acquisition program that the city started in 2001 has protected 2,602 acres at a cost of more than $35 million, Johnston said.
Other areas around the lake are protected by Whatcom County and the state of Washington.
In September 2020, the city bought 125 acres of forest and wetlands along the lake’s north shore for $1.8 million from Chris and Nancy Secrist of Bellingham and the Oeser Co.
This story was originally published April 12, 2022 at 10:42 AM.
