>La Grande Observer | Union and Wallowa Counties' News Leader

The chance for Union County to own a piece of Mount Emily and control what happens there is simply too good to pass up. The Observer urges local residents to vote yes on the upcoming Mount Emily Recreation Area advisory referendum.

The story by now is very familiar to local residents. Union County, at the behest of the Mt. Emily Recreation Coalition, has worked out a deal to buy 3,700 acres of land on Mount Emily from Forest Capital Partners.

The plan is to manage the parcel for motorized and non-motorized recreation, and for natural resource use. But it is by no means a done deal. The county has referred the question of whether it should proceed with the purchase to voters.

Total asking price, for land and timber, is $7.9 million. The county has $4.6 million in Oregon Parks and Recreation Department grant funding in hand.

It would pay the remainder with a low-interest loan from a philanthropic organization. Backers of the proposal vow that the loan will be secured by timber on the property and not by the county’s general fund.

Mount Emily has been open and available for public use for decades, indeed for as long as anyone around here can remember. But several years ago, it became apparent that the land was at risk for being sold, subdivided, developed as residential property and closed off.

The coalition came together and enlisted the help of Union County to try to prevent that. Since then, the coalition has staged a massive public outreach effort, doing its all to convince the public that saving Mount Emily for public access is the right thing to do.

Certainly, not everyone sees it that way. Opponents have been vocal, predicting that the project will become not only a burden on the taxpayer, but also a management nightmare.

Backers can only repeat what they’ve said at public meetings and forums and in a plethora of written material: the general fund is not at risk, a management plan will govern use and a broad-based committee, representing recreation, natural resource and environmental and wildlife interests, will be appointed to advise the board of commissioners on future policy and conflict resolution.

For all the negative arguments we hear on the Mount Emily project, a single positive one trumps them. If the advisory vote passes, the mountain, with its diverse recreational opportunities, its bounty of timber, its wildlife and its scenic beauty, remains opens to us all. If it fails, fences and locked gates keep us out forever.

Vote yes.