More room for happy campers

After 10 years and an act of Congress, Lutherhaven Ministries hopes to close the deal this month on a 33 acre slice of heaven in the Idaho Panhandle National Forests.

The nonprofit corporation known for making faith-based outdoor recreation available to thousands of children over the years at Camp Lutherhaven on Lake Coeur d’Alene is expanding its mission with the purchase of the Shoshone Base Camp.

Lutherhaven has operated on the property since 1998 through a U.S. Forest Services special use permit. Last year, about 1,000 people stayed at the base camp, about 28 miles up the North Fork of the Coeur d’Alene River, said Bob Baker, Lutherhaven director for the past 12 years.

“Mutually, it has been a great relationship, Baker said. “It helps the Forest Service fulfill its mission to educate the public about the national forest.”

By purchasing the historic property and its 13 buildings from the government for $705,000, Lutherhaven becomes eligible for charitable grants and can move forward with its master plan for the base camp.

The corporation, owned by about 100 Inland Northwest Lutheran churches, is within $40,000 of the purchase price thanks to a $300,000 grant from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust of Vancouver, Wash., $150,000 from Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Foundation, $50,000 from the Inland Northwest Community Foundation and contributions from church members.

With its proximity to world-class mountain biking, rafting and hiking, the base camp will provide “boundless opportunities for recreation,” Baker said. “What we would like to see is a Western mountain ranch-retreat that is comfortable for everyone.”

Last summer, 700 youths from 14 states came to the Shoshone Base Camp to participate in Lutherhaven’s Idaho Servant Adventure program, a community services outreach that provided 11,000 hours of service to the Silver Valley.

In recent years, participants in the program helped build a Habitat for Humanity home, painted and reroofed homes belonging to the elderly and rebuilt a collapsed barn.

Baker said the Shoshone Base Camp allows the corporation to expand its summer camp program and provide a venue for corporate retreats and family reunions. Lutherhaven Ministries also contracts to provide camps to other religious denominations, including Roman Catholic churches in North Idaho.

The Shoshone Base Camp provides the perfect venue to teach children about river ecology, wildlife and watershed management, he said.

The base camp, once known as the Shoshone Work Center, was established as a logging camp in the 1890s. It also served as a camp for the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, the Youth Conservation Corps under President Lyndon Johnson and the Young Adult Conservation Corps under President Jimmy Carter.

The Forest Service stopped using the site in the early 1980s, and faced with increased maintenance costs, sought private proposals for use of the property in 1996, The Spokesman-Review has reported.

At one point the state wanted the site for a halfway house for prisoners, a proposition resisted by local residents.

Idaho’s Sen. Larry Craig and then-U.S. Rep. Butch Otter introduced legislation allowing the sale of the Shoshone Base Camp along with two other federal properties. A bill was passed by Congress and signed by President Bush in December 2004.

“There were environmental impact statements, hazardous materials studies and other hoops to jump through,” Baker said. “When we started, somebody in the Forest Service told us, ‘Be patient, it’s going to take a while.’ ”