Page 8C
OUTSIDE
East Oregonian
Saturday, December 30, 2017
Fire lookouts face uncertain future in the Pacifi c Northwest
By JAMIE HALE
The Oregonian/OregonLive
PORTLAND
—
Imagine
waking up to the sun cresting a
ridge of the Cascade Mountains.
You look out the window, and
through the dawn light you can
see clouds still settled over a lush
alpine forest. You’re in a tower in
the sky, in the shadow of our tallest
peaks, surrounded by wilderness.
Camping in a fi re lookout tower
is like no other experience in the
Pacifi c Northwest. It’s a unique
opportunity to sleep above the tree-
tops, living like an old fi re lookout,
more cheaply than at most motels.
It’s no wonder the towers have fast
become the hottest rentals in the
region.
But booking a night in a fi re
lookout can be harder than getting
a ticket to “Hamilton,” thanks to
high demand, short supply, and
prices from $35 to $65 a night.
Of the hundreds of lookouts in
Oregon and Washington, only 22
are available to the public. The
rest are either in disrepair, still in
use or stuck in bureaucratic limbo,
refurbished but waiting to house
travelers.
As technology makes fi re
lookouts obsolete, federal and state
agencies are stuck with the ques-
tion of what to do with the towers.
Should they be turned into vacation
rentals? Torn down? Preserved in
public parks and museums?
The answers are few and far
between.
Sky high demand
Let’s say you want to rent a
lookout tower. You’ve found the
perfect location and scheduled your
vacation days. You wake up early
on the day the lookout opens for
rental — six months before your
vacation — head to Recreation.gov
and pull out your credit card, only
to see that the lookout is already
booked.
That’s the frustrating reality
of trying to book a lookout in the
Pacifi c Northwest. All the planning
in the world can be undone by
another person just a few seconds
quicker, or by somebody who
booked it earlier for the maximum
14 days.
Constructed in the early 20th
century, often atop high peaks in
rugged wilderness, fi re lookout
towers are particularly susceptible
to lightning strikes, high winds and
heavy snows, which can take them
out of commission until diffi cult
and costly repairs are made.
Because of that reality, rela-
tively few lookouts are open to the
public. The U.S. Forest Service
manages 160 towers in Oregon and
Washington, of which 22 are avail-
able for rent. Of those, most are
available only seasonally - they’re
either occupied by the forest service
during fi re season or inaccessible in
the winter. And they can be booked
for one or two weeks at a time,
limiting the number of people who
have a shot at them.
Jocelyn Biro, a regional program
manager in charge of the forest
service rentals, said the agency is
considering limiting the maximum
stay to help curb competition.
Biro said the agency is also
trying to manage a tricky balancing
act between charging enough to
maintain the structures, keeping the
lookouts affordable and fi guring
out their fair market value.
“The bottom line is we haven’t
Staff photo by Tim Trainor
Sunrise from the Flag Point Lookout Tower, located east of Mt. Hood, in this 2014 photo.
been able to keep up with the infl a-
tion or the needs out there,” she
said. “Because we’re the govern-
ment and we do get appropriated
funding, we’re not operating it like
a private business.”
The Forest Service could sell
the lookouts to private concession-
aires, which run lodges, hot springs
and other destinations. But Biro
said the agency isn’t interested in
doing so because lookout towers
require more care and maintenance
than other properties.
“Be careful what you ask for,”
she said. A concessionaire “can
change those fees, but how much
of those fees go back into the
lookout?”
Even if the Forest Service
fi gures out a fair price, a long and
complicated process still stands in
the way of changing the fees.
Lookout limbo
Under federal law, any new fees
on forest service structures must
go before a recreation advisory
committee, an 11-person panel
whose members come from specifi c
backgrounds, like “non-motorized
guides,” as well as from environ-
mental groups and state tourism.
Biro said it’s diffi cult to fi nd
enough interested parties for the
committee. As a result, there
haven’t been any meetings since
2010. That forces the agency into
a state of limbo, where structures
are fi xed up only to languish. Right
now, the agency has several newly
refurbished lookouts and cabins
that it can’t put on the market.
“It’s kind of like building a new
hotel but not being able to rent
those rooms out,” Biro said.
The forest service can get
permission directly from state
governors to charge new fees, but
she said that course of action can be
onerous, too. Local forest offi cials
have begun the process of asking
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown for a
waiver, Biro said, but it could be
a long time before anything comes
of it. A spokesman for the gover-
nor’s offi ce said Brown hasn’t yet
received a request.
There are issues, too, with
simply raising existing fees.
Fee increases are necessary
Staff photo by Tim Trainor
The four-story fi re lookout at Flag Point, east of Mt. Hood, offers
unparalleled views when the weather permits.
for long-term maintenance but
must be approved by the federal
government, a process that can
take months or years. According to
the agency, the Forest Service has
11 lookouts and 11 cabins across
Oregon and Washington awaiting
approval for a fee hike.
Raising fees and putting more
structures on the market could
help stem competition for lookout
rentals, but even if the forest service
gets through the red tape, hundreds
of fi re lookouts across the Pacifi c
Northwest will still sit unused,
falling slowly into disrepair.
Lost legacy
According to the Forest Fire
Lookout Association, a national
organization dedicated to restoring
historic lookouts, there are just
more than 200 standing lookouts
in Oregon and more than 100
in Washington. The U.S. Forest
Service owns 160, while the rest
are on a mixture of private and
public lands.
In Oregon, a few dozen remaining
lookout towers are managed by the
Oregon Department of Forestry,
which until the 1990s staffed the
towers in its six state forests. Since
then, towers have been replaced
by smoke-detection cameras and
aerial observation.
“We’re most proud of the people
that were in those stations, and I
think as Oregonians we all owe
those men and women a debt of
gratitude,” department spokesman
Jim Gersbach said. But the cameras
are simply more effi cient. “They
don’t go to sleep and they don’t
blink. They don’t need to make
breakfast. They’re a nice tool in
that they’re always on the job.”
Since the switch, different fates
have befallen towers managed
by the department. Some are still
in use as mounts for the cameras;
others are simply torn down. The
department’s job is to protect the
forests, not the lookouts, Gersbach
said, and when the lookouts are no
longer of use, they’re a potential
liability due to hikers who might
seek them out or climb them.
It would be nice to keep the
structures, he said — and the
department isn’t against working
with private landowners to do so
— but the department of forestry
isn’t the parks department, and
unlike the U.S. Forest Service it
has neither the funds nor resources
to rent to the public.
That mindset is certainly logical,
but it has riled up the people who
see the towers with a more romantic
eye, as invaluable artifacts of our
Northwest legacy.
Howard Verschoor, the Oregon
director for the Forest Fire Lookout
Association, said if it wasn’t for the
U.S. Forest Service rental program,
few would care enough about the
lookouts to keep them. He said he
doesn’t understand why the towers
can’t be dismantled and recon-
structed in parks or fairgrounds.
“Oregon
Department
of
Forestry, they’re tearing out a part
of our history,” he said.
Over the last few years,
Verschoor has made a concerted
effort to raise awareness and
support for the lookout towers. He’s
started two Facebook groups, he
said, and has developed a following
among those who see the romance
and history in the lookouts.
Ultimately, the Forest Fire
Lookout Association aims to raise
funds and gather volunteers to
restore old lookouts. Those projects
can range from $5,000 to $100,000
to complete, Verschoor said, and
can come with a host of unforeseen
complications.
Verschoor said it’s nice to have
renewed public interest in the
lookout towers, though it appears
to have done little besides adding
to the competition for rentals.
Representatives from the Oregon
Department of Forestry and the
U.S. Forest Service said they, too,
feel the romantic allure of the
towers, but most are simply too
diffi cult to maintain.
“Like lighthouses, they were
built with a very specifi c purpose
in mind,” Gersbach said. “These
structures are like any other equip-
ment that becomes obsolete — let’s
not burden the taxpayers with that.”
Fans of the lookouts argue that
paying a little extra to fi x them up
or to reconstruct them in a public
park is money well spent.
“People don’t realize how much
history there is on these moun-
taintops,” Verschoor said. “It’s
heartbreaking.”
Fire lookout towers were tools
for early foresters as well as homes
for men and women who spent
countless hours peering at the tops
of the trees, waiting for a plume of
smoke to rise.
Today, if you’re lucky, you can
get some idea of the life those
lookouts lived — you just might
not have that opportunity for long.
BRIEFLY
Whale-watching week
begins on Oregon Coast
DEPOE BAY (AP) — State
Parks and Recreation offi cials say
this week is an excellent time to see
whales on the Oregon coast.
Ranger Luke Parsons from the
Whale Watching Center in Depoe
Bay says an estimated 20,000 gray
whale are traveling south from
Alaska to warm lagoons off the
coast of Baja, Mexico.
The parks department marks its
annual whale-watching week by
designating 24 “Whale Watching
Spoken Here” sites that offer the
best viewpoints. Volunteers staff the
sites from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., offering
viewing tips and facts about whales.
Whale-watching week began
Wednesday and ends Dec. 31.
Dungeness crabbing
season to open Jan. 15
ASTORIA (AP) — The Oregon
Department of Fish and Wildlife
says the Dungeness crab fi shery
from Cape Blanco to the Columbia
River and into Washington state will
open Jan. 15.
The fi shery traditionally starts
Dec. 1, but was delayed to give the
crabs more time to fi ll with meat.
Fisheries managers use “meat
fi ll” tests to determine how well the
Dungeness have rebounded from the
late summer shedding of their shells
in a process called molting.
After the molt, the crabs fi ll with
water as their shells harden and they
grow new muscle.
The minimum threshold is 25
percent meat, meaning a 2-pound
crab must yield at least a half-pound
of meat.
Hugh Link is executive director
of the Oregon Dungeness Crab
Commission. He tells The Daily
Astorian that crabbers aren’t thrilled
with the delay, but understand it is
necessary for a healthy market.
Timberline, Squaw
Valley, tabbed as
Olympic training sites
RENO, Nev. (AP) — A ski resort
at Lake Tahoe steeped in Olympic
history has signed a fi ve-year
agreement to be one of the fi ve
offi cial training sites for the U.S. ski
& snowboard team.
Offi cials at Squaw Valley Alpine
Meadows north of Tahoe City,
California announced they reached
the agreement last week with U.S.
Ski and Snowboard based in Park
City, Utah.
Luke Bodensteiner, the
organization’s chief of sport, says
the Tahoe resort has produced
some of the nation’s best skiers and
snowboarders since Squaw Valley
hosted the 1960 Winter Games.
Todd Kelly, ski team program
director at Squaw Valley Alpine
Meadows, says it’s a “true honor”
to be designated one of the elite
training sites.
The other resorts currently
under similar agreements are Deer
Valley in Utah, Copper Mountain
in Colorado, Timberline Lodge in
Oregon and Mammoth Mountain in
California.
Wildlife offi cials kill
mountain lion that
attacked pet dog
POCATELLO, Idaho (AP) —
Wildlife offi cials killed a mountain
lion after it killed a family’s dog
near Pocatello in eastern Idaho.
A woman found her dog
apparently mauled by a mountain
lion Wednesday morning, the Idaho
State Journal reported.
The woman told offi cials she
had let her dog outside at 2 a.m. and
immediately heard a commotion.
The owner went to check on her
pet, but could not fi nd it in the dark
and the dog would not respond to
her calls.
The woman and her husband
found the dog after the sun came up,
and suspected it was attacked and
killed by a larger predator.
Wildlife offi cers confi rmed the
mountain lion attack, said Mark
Gamblin, the regional supervisor
for the Southeast Regional Fish and
Game offi ce.
The dog was medium sized
and possibly part boxer, said Scott
Wright, a regional conservation
offi cer.
Wright believes the adult male
lion may have come closer to town
looking for easy prey since it had a
severe neck injury.
“A pet is easy pickings for a
wounded lion,” Scott said.
Offi cers located the lion and
determined that it should be put
down since it was already mortally
injured and for public safety reasons.
The lion’s remains are being kept
at the Idaho Fish and Game offi ces
for processing.
“We will take the lion’s pelt
and any other important data
and information that can be used
to improve our mountain lion
management program before the
animal is processed appropriately,”
Gamblin said.
Frigid temperatures
spur cancellation of
polar bear plunges
VENTNOR, N.J. (AP) — Polar
bear plunges planned in two
southern New Jersey towns on New
Year’s Day have been canceled
because organizers think it will be
too cold outside.
Ventnor offi cials say the event’s
organizers recently contacted them
with concerns about the safety of
participants who would be jumping
into the Atlantic Ocean. They noted
that the forecast calls for a high of
around 20 degrees on Monday while
water temperature likely will be in
the mid-40s.
City offi cials agreed the event
should be postponed saying they
would rather “err on the side of
safety.”
SKI REPORT
Spout Springs
Tollgate, Ore.
CLOSED FOR SEASON
Anthony Lakes
North Powder, Ore.
New snow: 2”
Base depth: 24”
Conditions: Groomed
runs, special Saturday
music 3-6 p.m., open
New Year’s Day. Some
unmarked obstacles.
Ski Bluewood
Dayton, Wash.
New snow: 2”
Base depth: 25”
Conditions: Fresh snow,
good powder, open
New Year’s Day. Early
season conditions in
places.
Ski Fergi
Joseph, Ore.
New snow: 8”
Base depth: Unknown
Conditions: Rock skis
recommended, special
New Year’s Eve Torch-
light Ski Parade
Mt. Hood Meadows
Government Camp, Ore.
New snow: None
Base depth: 38”
Conditions: High
overcast with possible
sprinkles and moderate
wind. Get up early for
the best riding.