Washington forest parcel saved by a unique effort

Amanda Zhou, The Seattle Times on May 26, 2026

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SEATTLE — Advocates with the Elwha Legacy Forests Coalition have raised $32,000 to prevent the logging of 2 acres west of Port Angeles.

The deal, which took place without input from the Department of Natural Resources, which owns the land, appears to be the first of its kind. Public donations have effectively saved trees, that had already been sold, from being logged.

For decades, DNR has used timber sales on state lands to raise money for cities and towns. The recently saved parcel was originally to be cut down by Webster Logging as part of a 2024 sale. The money raised from around 325 donors in four days makes the logging company and the state whole while leaving the forest intact, said Elizabeth Dunne, an attorney with the Earth Law Center, who helped broker the deal.

It felt like such a unique and win-win opportunity to be able to work with the logging company to recognize that these forests aren't interchangeable," she said.

The 2 acres are part of a larger sale called “Doc Holliday” that has attracted criticism from environmental advocates, tribal members and community members who argue that the forest, which has trees over 100 years old, is worth more standing than in timber sales.

In recent years, environmentalists have argued that in the face of a climate and biodiversity crisis, the state should find new ways of raising funds beside relying on logging decades-old, diverse and structurally complex forests. Members of the Legacy Forest Defense Coalition have litigated and protested the sale of these forests, injecting uncertainty into the state’s timber and milling businesses and some communities.

While these so-called legacy forests are too young to be protected under the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan, these forests are considered the old-growth of tomorrow. Typically, these stands were logged nearly a century ago and have grown back naturally as complex forests. Advocates point out these forests play an important role as carbon sinks, habitat for endangered species and regulators of streams and rivers during drought.

The Doc Holliday sale in particular, which includes the recently saved land and five other noncontiguous units, has garnered criticism from environmental advocates. These parcels were put up for sale, among others, in the final months of former Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz's tenure, DNR spokesperson Michael Kelly said.

The controversy over Washington's older forests has captured such attention that Dave Upthegrove, the current commissioner of public lands and head of DNR, was elected in 2024 on a platform of conserving legacy forests.

Dunne, with the Earth Law Center, supports keeping these trees standing.

"There's less than 3% of these legacy forest lands, these structural complex forests left on DNR-managed land. It feels like in this time we're in … that it doesn't make sense to continue to log these forestlands," she said.

While DNR has a work group dedicated to exploring formal conservation easements on lands that would otherwise be used for timber sales, the department has declined to revisit sales like Doc Holliday that had already been awarded to a logging company before Upthegrove’s tenure, Kelly said.

"The best thing to do was look forward and work toward a different forest policy," he said.

After an eight-month pause on timber sales of complex forests, the agency is also developing a map using both data models and ground surveys of which state-owned timberlands have forests that might be considered a legacy forest, Kelly said.

DNR only became aware of the arrangement between the Elwha Legacy Forests Coalition and the logging company through reading about the deal in the Washington State Standard, he said. Though unlikely, without a formal conservation designation, the timber in the 2-acre parcel could theoretically be put back up for sale, Kelly said.

Webster Logging did not respond to a request for comment.

The Elwha Legacy Forests Coalition also has its eye on preserving a larger unit of the Doc Holliday sale that has not yet been logged. The unit, which is valued around $1 million, could be cut down in July and the coalition has proposed swapping the sale for another parcel, Dunne said.

"It's unique coastal Sitka spruce forest and also just really diverse, a lot of old trees and a lot of animal life and wildlife in there, she said.

Kelly said that because the sale has already been approved by the agency's Board of Natural Resources, DNR will not reopen the negotiations and expects the contract to be fulfilled.

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