Salmon Creek neighbors rally around first neighborhood park

The North Salmon Creek Neighborhood Association has its 1994 beginnings in opposition to new apartment and retail store developments planned for the neighborhood. It has evolved into a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit that organizes community members and raises money for projects like its first local park.

Paul Scarpelli, President

scarpelli2338@comcast.net

Stephen Smith, Vice President

nscna.smith@gmail.com

Barbara Anderson, Secretary

barbara.anderson@msn.com

Samantha Guse, Treasurer

samguse@gmail.com

Chinook Park Fund-Raising

chinookpark.wa@gmail.com

Community Calendar

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“The way you get people involved is to have something going on in your neighborhood,” said Barbara Anderson, the association’s secretary. She noted that 2006 discussions about a proposed county park, as well as the Salmon Creek Interchange Project, reinvigorated the association.

The Chinook Neighborhood Park plan has since been accepted, and construction will start in 2012 if funding is available.

“We’ve been asking for a park in this area for years,” said treasurer Samantha Guse, in her third year with the association. Guse and other members are now trying to raise at least $75,000 for a gazebo and a few park benches.

They’re selling $10 coupon cards and $75 commemorative bricks, planning a garage sale and will operate a fund-raising booth at the Salmon Creek Farmers’ Market. They’re also planning a festival to support the park, but still need to pin down a date and location.

Willow Pointe/Fred Meyer Opposition and a New City

The association formed in 1994 after the county zoned property just west of the Quail Park subdivision for high density housing. Homeowners were worried about the effects of what would eventually become the Willow Pointe Apartments.

Averil Massey and many other community members also opposed the proposed 171,000 square-foot Fred Meyer store being planned at the corner of Northeast 139th Street and Tenney Road. They worried about the traffic it would bring to the already clogged artery near Interstates 5 and 205.

Jack Kelly was the first president, Jim Huddlestun vice president and Massey was treasurer. Between 1995 and 1997 the association negotiated with Fred Meyer to find a mutually beneficial agreement.

“It was a very amicable agreement toward the end,” Massey said.

The Fred Meyer opened in 1998 after striking a deal with the association to sell 32,000 square feet of its plot to the Fort Vancouver Library District for the eventual Three Creeks Library.

Concurrent with the Fred Meyer development was the negotiation on a new city that would have included Salmon Creek, Hazel Dell and Felida. All the related neighborhood associations were heavily involved in the negotiations. A measure on the general election ballot to resolve the matter failed in 1997, although the issue lingers.

Brought Back to Life

“I started it full of enthusiasm, bargained with Fred Meyer and then got over it,” said Massey.

The association experienced a time of relative inactivity after Fred Meyer and the new city plan, with no controversial issues to solve. In 1998, voters approved a $4.5 million bond to fund the library, which broke ground in 2000 and opened in 2002.

The association worked on opposition to Vancouver Treatment Solution’s methadone clinic and sound barriers along I-5.

The 2006 meeting led to the most recent resurgence of the association.