Friends of Fox Creek

The mission of Friends of Fox Creek is to restore and enhance Fox Creek for the benefit of education, recreation, wildlife habitat, and flood protection.
Monthly meetings are held usually at 6:30 pm at the Cornerstone Restaurant on the second or third Thursday of the month.
FFC is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charitable organization. Contributions are tax-deductible.
The annual membership fee is $10.

What is this group all about?

Since Earth Day 1990 many Rainier citizens have been cleaning up Fox Creek in downtown Rainier and building trails along it for people to enjoy and for local students to use for science studies. They want to create also a greenway along the stream that will pass through the school ground and link up with the city park.

Who has been spearheading this greenway idea?

The people who have been working on the trails and cleaning up the creek formed a community action group called Friends of Fox Creek, which includes property owners on the creek, parents and teachers of Rainier students, other interested citizens, and representatives from appropriate local, state and federal agencies. They have been meeting monthly since November 1991 to plan and coordinate efforts by volunteers and by the landowners (including the city and the school district) to make progress toward a greenway along the creek.

What is the goal of Friends of Fox Creek?

The group seeks to “daylight” Fox Creek from the school ground to the Columbia River to provide easy access for learning and for enjoyment, to make it easier for salmon and other wildlife to use the stream corridor, and to improve flood protection.

How do they hope to achieve this?

Friends of Fox Creek will continue to involve all the interested parties and the general community in meetings to discuss plans, reach agreements and make commitments. It will also seek donations and grants to help fund the different parts of the project (FFC received a grant of $42,600 of lottery money from the Governor’s Watershed Enhancement Board to help fund the stream restoration at Rainier Elementary School). The group has enjoyed broad support in the community and encourages everyone to contribute their suggestions. Membership is open to anyone for a $10 fee. FFC has federal tax-exempt status.

Will the city benefit?

Yes. The city will have an attractive greenway (as called for in the waterfront master plan) and a healthy stream that everyone can enjoy. In addition, there will continue to be many opportunities for townsfolk of all ages to participate in improving the greenway as volunteers. Boy Scout troops 332 and 347 have regular trail building projects on Fox Creek and two Eagle projects have focused on the Fox Creek Trail.

Will the school district benefit?

Yes. The school district will have a first-rate outdoor learning facility just a few minutes away from Rainier Alternative School and Rainier Middle School. The district correctly chose to open the stream for educational use instead of spending about the same amount of money to build a bigger culvert to replace the crumbling, inadequate one.

Will the region benefit?

Yes. The region gains another community committed to caring for its streams and watershed; the Columbia River regains another healthy stream suitable for salmon spawning and rearing. The lower Columbia area will be especially proud of the attractiveness of Rainier’s “natural” stream gracing its downtown section. Fox Creek may become a model for other Northwest communities who wish to restore their urban streams.

What progress has FFC made toward its goal?

Excavation of the school ground section was completed in the summer of 1996. A trail was roughed out in summer 2001 by the Oregon Youth Conservation Corps; a footbridge for that trail is in the planning stages; planting of native vegetation at the site has proceeded fitfully but FFC is making a major effort in 2003. The next section that was constructed (2001) was the beach section, where the 550-foot culvert through the city park was removed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in partnership with the City of Rainier and the Department of State Lands. FFC raised over $5,000 for this project and has offered at least that much in volunteer services. As for the remaining culverted stretch of the creek, the block south of US 30, the city has so far declined to consider daylighting it. FFC was selected to receive the 2001 Earth Team Volunteer Group Award for the West Region of the United States by the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

What can I do to help?

You can help in any of these ways: 1) become a member of FFC; 2) offer to serve on the FFC board of directors or a committee to lend your ideas and energy; 3) volunteer on the annual Earth Day project in April or a planting day in the fall; 4) make a donation to FFC.