Add Your Name! Save Vinegar Flats Farmland.
In 2019, the Hearing Examiner for the City of Spokane issued a decision and conditionally approved a developer’s application to build a 94-unit gated community on what is currently farmland in Vinegar Flats. The development project is known as "Deep Pine Overlook."
- The 48 acres are part of the City of Spokane’s only “Residential Agricultural” planning zone and has been farmed for over 100 years. Most of the land where the houses would be built is classified by the USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Service as "prime farmland."
- There are only 152 acres of "Residential Agricultural" land in the City. This parcel accounts for 32% of that non-renewable resource.
- This parcel is in an area prone to flooding, even catastrophic flooding, which brings into question whether it’s an appropriate place for a dense housing development or better preserved as open space.
- Neighbors in the area are very concerned that traffic would worsen on a stretch of State Route 195 already notoriously hazardous with a new housing development of this size.
- There is great concern about increased pollution of Hangman Creek that runs adjacent to the property. It's already one of the state's most polluted waterways.
We Can Do Better!
The Spokane Farmland Preservation Working Group favors public purchase of the property and its use be dedicated to:
- Growing food for local consumption, using regenerative methods and permaculture principals;
- Providing free access to the public through the property to High Drive Bluff Park;
- The establishment of a community education center for learning small-scale farming skills, urban agriculture and other agrarian arts.
Add your name!
Help save this farmland! You can sign on to the open letter from the Spokane Farmland Preservation Working Group to Spokane officials. The group is asking for open, transparent negotiations NOW to finally have this Vinegar Flats farm permanently protected by being purchased through the Conservation Futures program. Follow the link to read read the letter. There's a button at the bottom for signing on.