SEQUIM – The North Olympic Land Trust and Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe have agreed to purchase land along the Dungeness River for farmland and conservation.

The tribe helped secure a state loan for part of the purchase. Now, the Land Trust is raising the final $425,000 to wrap it up.

Called the “River’s Edge”, it is 104 acres bordered on the west by the Dungeness River and along the east by Towne Road.

Once purchased, most of the parcels will have permanent easements attached to them, stipulating they remain as farmland. Other wetland areas will be sold to the tribe to protect floodplain.

Land Trust executive director Tom Sanford says they’ve already secured a loan to cover purchase. The fundraising will help reduce the loan payback.

He says the land trust will eventually sell the parcels with conservation easements. He says that will bring in more money for future land trust projects.

Since this is a “buy-protect-then-sell model, one of the beauties of it is that as we sell the assets for farmland conservation in the end we get made whole. So these donations in the front end actually leave this project as a revolving fund for our next project. Not only does a donor get to help support this, but they know that the money then moves on towards next preservation and conservation projects.

Sanford adds a local donor has committed to match all donations to the campaign up to $200,000

They hope to have the “River’s Edge” purchase done by early next year.