Cost of wildlife restoration at former Cedars golf course could be $40-55 million, Clark County says
Restoring wildlife habitat at the former Cedars on Salmon Creek golf course while also creating recreation opportunities will cost between $40-55 million, according to the final master plan laid out by Clark County parks staff during a county council work session Wednesday.
"The Gordy Jolma Family Natural Area is a project that represents a major long-term investment in the county's natural systems, aligning with council priorities around conservation, watershed health, low-impact outdoor access, and it's a significant project and investment in a rapidly growing portion of the county," Ross Hoover, manager of the county's parks division, told the council.
The costs fall into two categories: recreation and restoration. The county will pay for the recreation work, said Kevin Tyler, the county's land manager. The habitat restoration work would be completed by others, such as the Lower Columbia Estuary Partnership, using state and possibly federal funding.
The property was added to the county's Legacy Lands program in September 2022 when the county purchased 118 acres of the 133-acre Cedars on Salmon Creek golf course. The county paid $2.57 million for the property. Most of the purchase was paid for using Legacy Lands conservation futures with $600,000 in Clean Water Funds allocated to address structural stormwater control requirements.
Tyler said the adjacent Salmon-Morgan Creeks Natural Area was purchased by the county in 2009, also using conservation futures. Another 12.5 acres were added in 2024, bringing the total for the two natural areas to over 200 acres.
Not long after the county bought the former golf course, parks staff began working on two preliminary plans to turn the space into a park or open space. As part of the planning process, the county sent mailers to residents, held two open houses in 2025 to seek public feedback and hosted an online survey.
"We worked collaboratively with the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and lots of data was collected at the site. With this data, we drafted two concepts that were shared with the public," said Evelyn Ives, capital project manager for the county.
The county also partnered with the Cowlitz Indian Tribe on a salmon restoration grant with the Lower Columbia Fish Recovery Board, Tyler said.
The plan calls for building new walking/biking paths, creating trailheads with parking, removing old unstable bridges and adding new bridges and boardwalks, along with new shelters, restrooms, bird blinds, picnic tables and benches, bike racks and other structures. The recreation work is estimated at $19.9 million.
By comparison, the restoration work is estimated at $25-35 million. It includes removing existing shallow, warm water ponds, removing fish passage barriers, repairing salmon spawning grounds, reconnecting the floodplain to improve habitat and reduce flooding risks, and planting native plants, trees and shrubs.
The Gordy Jolma property includes about 2.2 miles of Salmon Creek that were impacted by the addition of the golf course in the 1970s.
"Sand and gravel were used to fill low-lying areas. Vegetation was replaced with grass and dams and culverts were used to pond water from a small tributary that would have naturally fed Salmon Creek," Ives said.
Additionally, the golf course was irrigated with water from Salmon Creek each summer. At the time of the purchase, irrigation records showed the golf course pulling 17 million gallons of water from the stream each year, Ives said.
"Since our purchase, we've placed these rights into a trust with the state Department of Ecology to keep them in the stream," she said.
Tyler said the final plan should be adopted by the county council later this summer. Meanwhile, Lower Columbia Estuary Partnership has applied for a grant through the Lower Columbia Fish Recovery Board to begin the restoration work.
As for funding the recreation work, Hoover said the county will likely rely on a phased approach rather than a single, large project. This would also give the county time to pursue available grant funding and look for opportunities to partner with other agencies and organizations to "bring this vision to life," he said.
This story was made possible by Community Funded Journalism, a project from The Columbian and the Local Media Foundation. Top donors include the Ed and Dollie Lynch Fund, Patricia, David and Jacob Nierenberg, Connie and Lee Kearney, Steve and Jan Oliva, The Cowlitz Tribal Foundation and the Mason E. Nolan Charitable Fund. The Columbian controls all content. For more information, visit columbian.com/cfj.
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