Campaigners for Save Guemes Mountain are saying, “We did it!”

The fundraisers are celebrating after raising $2.2 million to purchase 70 acres on top of Guemes Mountain and permanently protect them.

The current zoning would have allowed up to seven homes or an estate at the summit of the mountain.

Those developments would have been highly visible from elsewhere on Guemes Island, from Anacortes, and Samish Island. The 360-degree view from the summit would have become inaccessible.

“The Co-Chairs each did the work of ten people and deserve an enormous amount of credit for the success of this campaign,” executive director of the San Juan Preservation Trust Tim Seifert said.

The Co-Chairs of the steering committee were Guemes residents Paul Beaudet, Karen Everett, Joost Businger, and Marianne Kooiman.

The conservation project began in October 2007 when Skagit Land Trust and the San Juan Preservation Trust were approached by Guemes residents concerned about the mountaintop being sold and developed. The two land trusts partnered to secure the 70 acre property on Guemes Island.

“In the last few months, we were given the wonderful gift of a $200,000 matching grant from the Northwest Wildlife Conservation Initiative that really gave our fundraising efforts a huge boost, helping us get to the finish line,” executive director of Skagit Land Trust Molly Doran said.

The Northwest Wildlife Conservation Initiative is a program of The Nature Conservancy and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation that helps to conserve wildlife habitat identified in State Wildlife Action Plans. Because of the property’s location at the heart of 500 acres of previously protected private and public land, the mountaintop will serve as the link connecting conservation land stretching from marine shoreline to the summit and down forested slopes to an inland valley of wetland and farms.

In addition to working on the campaign, Businger donated a small property on the mountain top that he had strategically purchased from a telecommunications company years ago.

“This campaign succeeded due to the professionalism, dedication, and work of the steering committee and over 550 community members who gave so generously” said Brian Windrope of the San Juan Preservation Trust. “It was amazing to witness the level of dedication to saving the mountain.”

For more information on access or make a donation to the stewardship fund go to www.saveguemesmountain.org.