Aiming for top gun

Responding to the growing popularity of shooting sports, the state of Idaho has plans to remodel and expand the Farragut State Park shooting range.

The development will occur in phases as grant money becomes available, but state officials say the final result will be one of the premier shooting facilities in the region. A recently completed master plan calls for everything from a trap and skeet shooting area to “action” pistol shooting and a three-dimensional archery course.

“It would be a top-of-the-line, high-class shooting range,” said Dave Leptich, regional wildlife habitat biologist with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. “It would be a regionally important facility.”

The expanded facility would also have a rifle range built long enough for training by military reservists and National Guard soldiers. The soldiers currently must travel to Seattle or Yakima to use a 500-yard range, Leptich said.

The total cost is expected to be around $2 million, Leptich said. “We’re going to have to do this in phases,” he said.

About $60,000 in grants has been secured from Idaho’s hunter education range development fund. The money will go to completing the first priority of the shooting range plan: increasing safety.

The state hopes to begin erecting a fence around the current range before winter, Leptich said. Grading and excavation of the range will then be conducted and a new range building will be constructed. The building will house a range supervisor and will also have space for training classes or shooting competition scoring.

After the existing range is remodeled, officials hope to add trap and skeet fields, mounted cowboy action shooting areas and an improved action pistol range. Plans also call for 200-, 300-, 500- and 600-yard high-power rifle ranges and a variety of shorter pistol ranges.

Details are still being worked out, but Leptich expects the cost for using the range to be in the neighborhood of $5 per day.

Shooting remains legal and free in most areas of the Idaho Panhandle National Forests, but the region’s growth has made it increasingly difficult to find places to plink without endangering nearby houses or other forest users. In June, the U.S. Forest Service cited safety and litter concerns when it closed a popular free-for-all shooting area along Fernan Lake Road near Coeur d’Alene.

“As we see additional development in North Idaho, this is a resource that’s going to be under increasing demand,” Leptich said.

According to a 2002 survey conducted by the State Parks and Recreation Department, about 35 percent of respondents participated in target shooting activities, which is roughly the same number of respondents who had bicycled or bird-watched.

When completed, the shooting range will likely be the site of competitions that draw shooters from across the West, said Hayden Lake gunsmith Jim Self. Farragut State Park’s location halfway between Coeur d’Alene and Sandpoint will also make the facility popular for locals.

“We need it bad,” Self said. “If it’s run correctly it could be a very great thing for the community. There is a tremendous amount of people moving into the area that shoot.”

Self said his gunsmithing business has quadrupled in the last few years. “Believe me, shooting around here is very big,” he said.

The existing shooting range dates back to the 1940s, when the U.S. Navy used the area as a massive training base. “It hasn’t really undergone much in the way of improvement since the Navy days,” Leptich said.

Although the project has already received all the necessary approvals – it was approved as part of Farragut Wildlife Management Area’s recent master plan update, Leptich said – the idea of an expanded shooting range has prompted some concern about a boost in noise level.

Leptich said sound measurements were taken during a recent Kootenai County Sheriff’s Department target shooting session. The deputies were asked to fire a variety of weapons at the same time as a noise meter was used.

“You could hear it, but in terms of being a noise nuisance, it just didn’t register. Nearby truck traffic is far more noisy,” Leptich said. “It’s not going to be a loud facility.”