LAPUSH — Olympic National Park personnel want to reopen public access to Second Beach, one of the most popular tourist destinations on the Washington coast.
Quileute tribal officials want to gain higher land, out of the tsunami zone, on which to relocate the village center and expand housing and commercial enterprises.
Both want to settle a 50-year dispute about the tribe’s northern boundary, a dispute that last resulted in the tribe closing public access to the Second Beach trailhead,which is on the reservation.
Each party is working toward its goals step by step.
The park is surveying 274 acres of park land to the south of the reservation for its development possibilities.
The land could be traded to the tribe.
Park officials walked-through a portion of the acerage two weeks ago, in the third walk-through of the area.
Another walk-through is planned for this week, U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist Marc Whisler said.
Almost all of the 274 acres being surveyed lie south of LaPush Road between the Second and Third beach trails.
The land would provide the tribe with higher ground to relocate its school and houses in the tsunami zone, but it would not be enough for its long-term housing and economic needs, Quileute Executive Director James Jaime said.
With a homeless rate of 14 percent and unemployment rate of 30 to 35 percent on the reservation, the tribe’s need to expand its housing and commercial enterprises is crucial, Jaime said.
About 370 people lived on the reservation as of 2000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
The type of economic development the tribe would use the land for hasn’t been decided, but it would be related to the tribe’s current economic base of tourism and fishing, Jaime said.
The exact location and number of acres that can be developed in the 274-acre offer has yet to be determined, and is an important element in the land swap negotiations, he said.
But even if all of the acres can be developed it doesn’t mean a resolution will be reached.
The tribe has stated since the beginning of the land swap negotiations, which began in the spring of 2005, that they would need more than 274 acres for what they were being asked to concede, Jamie said.
“One thing we think it is important for people to remember is that while the park is clearly negotiating a settlement in good faith, they are not offering land to resolve this matter merely out of the goodness of their hearts,” he said.
In exchange for the 274 acres, the park is asking the tribe for permanent access to the Second Beach trailhead and sand spit south of the Rialto Beach, both of which are on tribal lands.
The tribe blocked access to the two popular tourist destinations when land swap negotiations came to a stand still in October after finding out much of the park land the tribe wanted was designated as restricted wilderness in 1988 by Congress.
The restriction requires that any settlement the tribe and park reach be approved by Congress.
