Conor Marshall
Hiking and camping at Baker Lake and Lake Kachess on the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest remind me of the intrinsic value of Washington’s forests. It can be easy to take our favorite public lands for granted or assume they will always be public. Until this year, I never imagined these places and other cherished national forest areas could so quickly become at risk of being sold off to developers.
As the 119th Congress gained momentum, the usual anti-conservation rhetoric was quickly backed by an unprecedented attempt to privatize public lands that belong to all Americans. Lawmakers sought to sell off federal land to raise revenue through the budget reconciliation process. This effort was motivated by the problematic premise that public lands are simply items on the nation’s balance sheet to be leveraged for financial gain.
As Mountaineers, we believe in the many benefits and values represented by conserved and accessible lands and waters, and we know that our public lands are more than parcels to be sold. These special places support our outdoor adventures and connect us to the natural world and to each other.
Public lands sell-offs through budget reconciliation
The initial sell-off proposal included half a million acres of public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Forest Service in Nevada and Utah. This proposal was met with opposition and eventually dropped before the final bill passed the House this spring. As the action shifted to the Senate, public lands sales were on the table again, and this time federal lands in Washington and ten other western states were thrown into the mix.
The first version of the Senate reconciliation bill mandated the sale of between 2.2 and 3.3 million acres of national forest and BLM lands for housing and associated infrastructure. (Wilderness, National Monuments, and other protective designations were thankfully off limits.) Hundreds of millions of multiple-use Forest Service and BLM lands, including Roadless Areas, were up for grabs with very few guardrails.
Mapping done by our partners at Outdoor Alliance showed a dynamic and valuable recreation footprint on these lands: 100,000 miles of trails, 3,405 miles of whitewater paddling, and more than 45,000 climbing routes and boulder problems.
The Mountaineers supports balanced use of public lands, and these sell-offs would have set a harmful precedent for how federal public lands are viewed and managed.
As the state of play for public lands sell-offs became clearer and Washington’s public lands entered the fray, it was game on for The Mountaineers and our partners. Nearly four million acres of Washington’s national forests and BLM areas were at risk of being sold, including areas around Washington Pass, Baker Lake, Lake Kachess, and The Mountaineers Meany Lodge. Recreation hotspots on the Olympic National Forest that are up for wilderness designation through the Wild Olympics Bill were also vulnerable to sale.
Baker Lake from a Mountaineers youth trip. Photo by Mountaineers staff.
Rejecting public lands sell-offs in Washington and across the country
Washington’s recreation community and the state’s congressional delegation have proven to be powerful catalysts for outdoor advocacy thanks to deep partnerships, policy expertise, and thousands of outdoor enthusiasts who speak up for the lands they cherish.
Washington’s congressional delegation and members of Congress across the country heard loud and clear from their constituents against the sale of public lands through reconciliation. For example, more than 3,000 action-takers generated 10,000 letters – the highest engagement I’ve seen on one of our calls to action during my time at The Mountaineers. Our collective advocacy helped spur several Washington members to timely and powerful action on this issue.
Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell made public statements against the proposal, and Representative Emily Randall from Washington’s 6th district – a new member who sits on the House Natural Resources Committee – came out early in opposition to the lands sales.
Notably, Representative Dan Newhouse from Washington’s 4th district joined four other western Republicans in pledging to vote “no” on the entire reconciliation bill if public lands sales were included – a move that helped make the sell-offs provision untenable and resulted in its removal from the final bill. Over the last couple years, The Mountaineers and Outdoor Alliance have engaged Representative Newhouse and his staff around the importance of outdoor recreation to the communities of Central Washington, including the Yakima River Valley. Many factors contributed to the rejection of public lands sales, but relationship and community building laid the groundwork for outdoor advocacy and the robust, bipartisan support for public lands we forged together.
Your advocacy gives me hope
The removal of public lands sales from the final budget bill is a big win to celebrate, as well as an individual victory in the wake of a crashing wave of harmful policies for public lands and the environment. The final bill included significant cuts to federal land manager staffing, rescinded previously allocated climate and public lands funding from the Inflation Reduction Act, and delivered new mandates to increase timber harvesting on national forests. These and other problematic provisions will likely challenge conservation efforts for years to come.
Broadscale attempts to sell off public lands will likely return to the halls of Congress at some point. In the meantime, we’ll continue to grow bipartisan support for the outdoors and defend public lands from emerging threats, like the administration’s planned rollback of the Roadless Rule.
Witnessing the groundswell of grassroots advocacy responses to the threat of public lands sales gives me hope that we can continue to build and refine the advocacy clout of the outdoor community. We helped build Outdoor Alliance Washington and strengthen the national coalition for this very reason: to set the stage for individual outdoor enthusiasts to raise their voices. Our community’s advocacy and impact inspire me and my colleagues to keep pushing to defend our public lands.
An Evening of Advocacy - Sep 18
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This article originally appeared in our fall 2025 issue of Mountaineer magazine. To view the original article in magazine form and read more stories from our publication, visit our magazine archive.
