Welcome to SaveThePlateau.org, The Primary Source of Information Related to Saving Hammer Flat

WE WON! - THE PEOPLE WON! - THE WILDLIFE WON!

You may want to read that again. Here at STP world headquarters the news is still sinking in.

Details are still emerging* but, broadly, this is what happened.

From the outset, the proposed development on Hammer Flat was one of the riskier proposals in the valley. It was far out of town, the site was inhospitable, the soils were thin making utilities harder to place, and the list goes on.

Then there was the matter of the entrance road. For most developments, entry and exit is a no-brainer. Not so in this case. The Cliffs went into the approval process without an agreement to use state land for their entrance road. It was a right the development never achieved and it proved to be a handicap from which it never recovered. Over the past few months the main questions revolved around the form the death throes would take, and the degree to would it be possible to protect the property for wildlife.

Cutting to the chase, a coalition of Boise City, Foothills Conservation Advisory Committee members, and Idaho Department of Fish and Game, using a combination of Foothills Levy funds and federal funds, came to the rescue and picked up the property for about 30 cents on the dollar. Hammer Flat is now public property. It will be managed by Idaho Department of Fish and Game in conjunction with the Boise River Wildlife Management Area.

Make no mistake, this is a great event for the people of Boise, the Treasure Valley, and Idaho. Bragging about quality of life is one thing. Taking the steps necessary to protect quality of life is a harder, rarer, task. Mayor Bieter, the City Council, and Fish and Game, deserve all the credit in the world.

This is also a great moment for community activism. To the thousands of people who came to meetings, wrote letters, testified, offered advice and assistance, and helped in a thousand ways, please, give yourself a big, big pat on the back. It is support like yours that gives people like the Mayor, and other public officials, the extra dose of encouragement it takes to keep doing the right thing.

We didn't win it by ourselves. Not by a long shot. The anchor to which the struggle for Hammer Flat was tied was laid years ago, make that decades ago, by all the people who fought for the Foothills Policy Plan and the Foothills Levy.

We waged a good clean campaign against staggering odds. We lost many of the battles but we won a couple of critical ones. Exposing and pressing the entry road issue was HUGE! And, by keeping the process alive, we helped make it possible for Boise City, the Foothills Committee, and the State to make this final critical purchase. We were on the right side of history and it feels mighty good. Congratulations, and thank you, to everyone who helped make this possible!

Sincerely,

Anthony Jones
SaveThePlateau.org

Special Note

Folding Hammer Flat into the larger Boise River Wildlife Management Area is a great and wonderful thing. At the same time, it is important to remember that the WMA is a refuge, not a recreation area.  The primary function is to provide habitat for animals.   Assuming the Hammer Flat portion is managed in the same manner as is the current WMA, access will be restricted from about mid November through about mid April when wildlife are most susceptible to stress from cold and lack of forage.

Let’s do our part to make the Hammer Flat addition as successful as possible at protecting wildlife by keeping human impact as light as possible.  Let’s respect Fish and Game’s seasonal closures of the area.  We will have plenty of time to tour the area later in the year.

* This post was authored in anticipation of the formal announcement by Boise City, Fish and Game, and others. As such, it is as accurate as it could be given the secrecy surrounding the final negotiations. Revisions will be forthcoming as details emerge.

Contact - SaveThePlateau.org

PREFACE

In the foothills on the east side of Boise, Idaho, sandwiched between the Black Cliffs on the west and the Boise River Wildlife Management Area on the east, (see map below) there is a 700 acre plateau known as Hammer Flat. This plateau provides critical habitat for deer, elk, antelope, eagle, and hundreds of other specie of wildlife. With the imminent restarting of the Harris Ranch subdivision to the west, this plateau forms a substantial portion of the last remaining viable harsh winter habitat for about one third of the 12,000 - 14,000 deer in the Boise Front, the largest mule deer herd in Idaho.

Save the Plateau's mission is to promote and coordinate activities designed to maintain and preserve the Hammer Flat Plateau as a viable habitat for deer, elk, eagles, and the variety of other species that inhabit this area in such abundance and rely on it for their winter survival.

Sincerely,
SaveThePlateau.org
J p-d, Armstrong, M pechennino, R cook, D gunderson, B wall