The great experiencing of nature on our Olympic Peninsula must be earned, whether slogging up the “poopout drag” to Marmot Pass or climbing ladders over headlands between Pacific Ocean beaches.
It’s likewise with visionary legislation. The Wild Olympics bill, designed to protect 126,500 acres of wilderness and put streams under the federal Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, has been before Congress for more than a decade.
And that’s where it’s likely to remain, unless chief sponsor Senator Patty Murray can navigate through the tricky climate of an election year.
Wild Olympics is wildly popular in these parts, at least when measured against the state’s past wilderness battles. It is, in words of House sponsor Representative Derek Kilmer, D‑Washington,“a proposal that works for folks across the community.” Or hear from ex-Secretary of State Ralph Munro: “The legislation is a marvel of civic involvement, compromise and involvement.”
The proposal is locally crafted, but the Olympic Peninsula is also getting national recognition. A magazine survey recently rated Olympic National Park tops among America’s “crown jewels,” celebrated for its size, its combination of mountains and ocean beaches, and its fabled rain forest.
Hikers line up at the backcountry permit desk at its Port Angeles visitor center. Guests at Lake Quinault Lodge witness Forest vistas that made President Franklin D. Roosevelt a park advocate. FDR got around.
“Steady progress each successive Congress” said a release from Kilmer, celebrating Senate committee approval. The congressman is a product of Port Angeles, where schoolchildren in 1937 greeted a visiting Roosevelt with a banner advocating the national park he would create.
But progress is more uneven than steady. Kilmer pushed Wild Olympics through the House of Representatives last year, only to see it die in the Senate.
The process may work in reverse this time around.
What’s the problem? Every Republican on the Senate committee voted against Wild Olympics. Such is the Senate that one member can hold up even the most popular legislation. Witness ultra MAGA Senator Tommy Tuberville, R‑Alabama, blocking Pentagon promotions for months.
Republicans in years past have helped preserve more than a million acres of land on the Peninsula. President Theodore Roosevelt used the Antiquities Act to create a national monument that was the precursor to the national park. He acted to head off slaughter of the elk that now bear his name..
As governor and Senator, Dan Evans was instrumental in getting Shi-Shi Beach and Point of Arches put in the park, and crafting the 1984 Washington Wilderness Bill to protect wilderness in Olympic National Forest surrounding the park.
The bill included mountains that make up Seattle’s sunset skyline.
The Washington congressional delegation used to be a model of bipartisanship, hammering out compromises on the future of lands. President Gerald Ford signed legislation creating the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. Ronald Reagan signed the Washington Wilderness Bill and legislation creating the Columbia Gorge National Scenic Area. George W. Bush signed into law the Wild Sky Wilderness.
In today’s polarized climate, however, the likes of Evans and Munro — and even the revered Teddy Roosevelt— get labeled RINOs, or Republicans in Name Only. Local opposition to Wild Olympics is confined to tiny pockets, such as the south shore of Lake Quinault, but ideology rears its ugly head at the national level.
The legislation has been carefully crafted, by Kilmer, not to cost timber jobs.
Its economic benefits extend beyond recreation.
It would “permanently protect some of the healthiest intact salmon habitat left on the Peninsula,” said Ron Allen, longtime Jamestown S’Kallam tribal chairman, who formerly headed the National Congress of American Indians.
Or listen to Bill Taylor, head of Shelton-based Taylor Shellfish: “Our oyster beds depend on the clean, cold silt-free water that drains off Olympic National Forest into Hood Canal. Protecting these watersheds allows our industry to grow, expand and continue to benefit the economy and ecology of Washington state.”
Years ago, the timber industry schemed to get rain forests of the Bogachiel and Calawah Rivers excised from the national park. A Seattle writer, Carsten Lien, blew the whistle in his book Olympic Battleground.
Other battles were fought to preserve the wildness of the Peninsula. U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas twice led treks along the park’s coastal strip, to preserve its wilderness character and thwart a proposed coastal road. During the Trump regime, Democratic Attorney General Bob Ferguson and Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Bryant (Inslee’s 2016 general election opponent) led beach hikes in opposition to offshore oil drilling.
Nowadays, however, recreation is an economic driving force.
“The Wild Olympics bill has taken great care to preserve and enhance recreational access to areas it is protecting,” said Dan Evans.
The Peninsula is also site of a landmark (or waterborne) environmental restoration effort. Two aged, salmon-blocking dams have been removed from the Elwha River, the Peninsula’s greatest stream.
Seventy miles of spawning habitat, almost all of it in the park, have been reopened. Elwha restoration found a champion in New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley.
Can Wild Olympics be moved through this Congress?
Don’t bet on it, but there are paths of hope, albeit as steep as the trail into Lake Constance (which gains 3,000 vertical feet in two miles).
Representative Kilmer is retiring from Congress.
Well-regarded, he was able to get non-controversial bills through the House in a previous period of Republican control. He has chaired a bipartisan panel charged with improving the efficiency of Congress’ operations.
Senator Murray is chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, an ideal position from which to engage in end-of-session horse trading.
Senator Maria Cantwell helped write the Great American Outdoors Act during a period when the Republicans controlled Congress’ upper chamber.
In 2014, Murray persuaded retiring, arch-conservative Representative Doc Hastings, chair of the House Natural Resources Committee, to go along with expansion of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness and protection of the Middle Fork-Snoqualmie River. Doc has a few items of his own that were tucked into an omnibus spending bill. Murray was also able to push through Wild Sky.
Wild Olympics is a worthy cause. Visionaries, notably both Roosevelts, have protected the Peninsula’s core mountains and wild coasts. It’s time to build on that vision… to protect ancient forests, bring back once-great salmon runs, preserve wildlife habitat, and allow our species to experience the natural world.
