If you’ve been making a mental list of day trips you’d like to take around Puget Sound, put this destination near the top:
Ebey’s Landing National Historic Reserve on Whidbey Island.
It’s literally a national park, run by the National Park Service. When you visit, you’re taking a step back in history at the same time you’re watching history unfold.
This 17,400-acre central-island jewel, which includes the Town of Coupeville, was created by Congress in 1978. It’s a collection of mostly privately-owned parcels that includes sandy beaches, forest, prairie and working farms. It includes historical buildings and criss-crossing farm patterns that tell the story of Euro-American settlement on the island, beginning with Isaac Ebey in the mid-1800s. At its heart is a passionate effort, supported strongly by the reserve’s 5,000 residents, to preserve and protect its rural character and the historic record it provides.
To that end, the park service is asking Congress for a $500,000 appropriation from the Land and Water Conservation Fund to acquire an easement that would permanently protect a 35-acre parcel surrounding the historic Ferry House at Ebey’s Landing.
But the money would do much more. The proceeds would be used by the Nature Conservancy, which owns the land, to establish two endowments to preserve and maintain historic structures and trails, along with other ecological stewardship, within the reserve. The endowments, combined with matching grants they could generate, would provide a steady stream of income to allow the reserve to be enjoyed by people from near and far.
It’s the kind of market-based approach to land conservation that Congress should encourage, the kind of private/public partnership that spawns creative solutions. Congress should show its support by approving the park service’s request.
The park service, which owns the Ferry House, already is doing careful restoration work on the building, which used to serve as a way station for people traveling between the mainland and Olympic Peninsula.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund, which receives money from royalties collected from off-shore oil drilling, “is intended to create and maintain a nationwide legacy of high quality recreation areas and facilities and to stimulate non-federal investment in the protection and maintenance of recreation resources across the United States,” according to the park service.
This appropriation couldn’t fit that mission more perfectly. Ebey’s Landing National Historic Preserve is a natural and cultural landscape worth protecting – and enjoying. Put it on that travel list.
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