City Buying Land With State’s Help Funds Will Help Preserve Parcel On Sensitive Part Of Latah Creek

People who eat giant Puget Sound clams are helping the city of Spokane buy 24 acres along Latah Creek.

The state Department of Natural Resources is giving the city $128,000 - some of the money it earns leasing aquatic lands - to make the purchase.

“It’s a very natural, environmentally sensitive piece of land,” said Mike Stone of the city parks department.

The city hasn’t completed negotiations with the owner, but the state money should cover the purchase price plus closing costs, said Stone.

Knee-high in weeds and dotted with Ponderosa pines, the undeveloped parcel is wedged between the stream - called Hangman Creek by some - and U.S. Highway 195 just north of the Hatch Road bridge. The land abuts more than 500 acres already owned by the city.

The shoreline bristles with shrubs that are important to wildlife. Rusted farm implements rest under one cluster of trees.

Left in private hands, the 24 acres almost certainly would be developed.

Hangman Valley in recent years has become one of the fastest-growing pockets of the city. The city’s Creek at Qualchan Golf Course, which opened in 1992, became the anchor for upscale subdivisions like Meadow Greens and Bridle Wood, which perch on Latah Creek’s banks.

The state money is part of $4.5 million in the DNR’s aquatic lands enhancement account slated for water-related conservation projects in 1995-96.

The money comes from businesses that lease state-owned tidal flats, shorelines and lake beds. Among the biggest contributors are commercial harvesters of geoducks - clams that reach 10 pounds.

The state parks department recently received $142,000 for improvements in the Little Spokane River Natural Area. The money will be used to buy 3.5 acres near the mouth of the river, to repair damaged trails and to improve a canoe access.

, DataTimes