OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK –– A man who moved the historic Enchanted Valley chalet in 2014 says it needs to be moved again.
Jeff Monroe, proprietor of Monroe House Moving Inc. of Carlsborg, said during a scoping meeting in Port Angeles on Monday night that he was surprised the National Park Service hasn’t proposed an idea that would preserve the chalet.
The Park Service is asking for public input in deciding the final fate of the chalet and has proposed three preliminary proposals: tearing down the chalet, providing a new foundation or leaving it as is.
All of the preliminary proposals from the park would leave the chalet closed to the public and could result in it being taken off the National Register of Historic Places, officials said.
Timing is important, according to Rod Farlee, vice president of Friends of Olympic National Park, who said that although the chalet was moved 100 feet from the river in 2014, the river has now meandered within 30 feet of the chalet.
“We threw out some ideas mostly to get people thinking,” said Sarah Creachbaum, Olympic National Park superintendent.
“Some folks think that we should tear down the chalet and have nothing up there because it’s a wilderness area and the Wilderness Act requires us to manage those lands differently.
“Other people want us to do everything we can to maintain the chalet in Enchanted Valley.”
The goal is to get more ideas from the public, she said. Public comment will be taken through Aug. 31 on the possible alternatives for the permanent fate of the remote chalet.
Monroe believes the chalet should be moved about 150 yards from its current location, preserved and opened to the public.
The park’s three preliminary proposals are “all wrong,” he said. “That’s not what the people want.”
Monroe said he knows the chalet can be moved because he’s moved the 64-ton structure before.
Monroe and a team of six volunteers moved the chalet about 100 feet away from its precarious perch above the East Fork Quinault River in September 2014 after the river had migrated to within 18 inches of it.
With that experience, Monroe and others who support the idea say the chalet could be moved about 100 feet per day and would have less of an environmental impact than the park’s proposals.
At the time of the 2014 move, the park’s goal was to protect the river from environmental harm, not to protect the chalet, park spokeswoman Barb Maynes pointed out at the time.
To Monroe, saving the chalet and its history was the goal.
“I love that building, the setting it’s in,” he said. “Once you get up there and see it in that setting, you’ll fall in love with it –– but you have to see it. Pictures don’t do it justice.”
The Enchanted Valley chalet — which is deep within the Olympic wilderness, located 13 miles from the nearest road — was built by Quinault Valley residents in the early 1930s before the park was established.
For several decades, it was used as a backcountry lodge and then as a wilderness ranger station and emergency shelter. The chalet was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.
Farlee said the location proposed by those who want to preserve the chalet would protect it from the meandering East Fork Quinault River, which has already threatened the building.
“Not having a proposal that saves the chalet is definitely an oversight in scoping that’s gone on by the Park Service,” Farlee said.
“They are very aware of how easy it is to move the chalet. There’s no need to abandon it to the river; we can save it easily.”
The proposed site appears to be underlain by large boulders of an ancient landslide and is sheltered from the river’s course by a ridge, Farlee said.
Back Country Horsemen of Washington, The Olympians of Grays Harbor, Friends of Olympic National Park, the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Trust for Historic Preservation all support the proposal, Farlee said.
A draft environmental assessment is planned by this winter, with a final plan released by next summer.
Farlee is concerned the chalet might not survive while the environmental assessment process continues through the summer of 2017.
For more information and to comment online, go to http://tinyurl.com/PDN-enchantedvalleychalet.
Information also is available by calling the park at 360-565-3004.
Those who cannot use the electronic version can send the hard copy of the form from the website and/or a letter to Superintendent Sarah Creachbaum, Olympic National Park-EVC Scoping, 600 E. Park Ave., Port Angeles, WA 98362.
Another open house is scheduled in Port Angeles from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. July 19 at the Port Angeles Library, 2210 S. Peabody St.
Other meetings are being held off the North Olympic Peninsula.
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Reporter Jesse Major can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56250, or at jmajor@peninsuladailynews.com.
