Priest Lake Cabin Owners Oppose Sell-Or-Swap Idea, Letters Show

Gov. Phil Batt said Tuesday he has received half a dozen letters from Priest Lake cabin owners who oppose any move by the state to sell or exchange the land their cabins occupy.

“I haven’t seen any favorable,” Batt said.

Batt won the state Land Board’s approval Tuesday to form a committee to look into the issue.

Cabin owners who rent their land from the state at Payette Lake near McCall want to own their land and have pushed for the state to sell or trade.

“There’s been quite a bit of interest in McCall,” Batt said.

Idaho has 355 cottage sites at Priest Lake leased by individual cabin owners.

It has 241 at Payette Lake.

The committee named by the governor includes state Controller J.D. Williams, Secretary of State Pete Cenarrusa and state Superintendent of Schools Anne Fox.

All are Land Board members.

The three will report back to the full board.

“My feeling is this requires a great deal of thought. It’s a complicated issue,” the governor told the board.

Williams has said previously that he thinks it makes more sense to exchange the McCall cabin sites than it does at Priest Lake.

That’s because the state owns more surrounding land adjacent to the cabin sites at Priest Lake.

McCall cabin owners have proposed that they come up with timberland or other land attractive to the state and make swaps.

, DataTimes