The Safe Passage 97 Project
Securing a Movement Corridor Across the Okanogan Valley to Provide Safe Passage to Wildlife
In the early 2010s, the Safe Passage 97 project was reaching out to landowners along Highway 97 for the purpose of identifying locations for the first of several planned wildlife underpasses to allow deer and other animals to safely navigate the highway. They had a particular set of criteria in mind: the site must lie within an established movement corridor for deer and other migratory species; the land on either side of the highway must be protected from future development, affording animals clear access from either direction; and the ground must dip down on either side of the highway to support tunneling beneath the roadway. Among the only people whose land met these criteria to respond to the partners’ inquiry were Michelle and AJ Engebretson.
The 95-acre property Michelle and AJ have lived on since moving to the area in 2003 lies south of Tonasket, near the Crumbacher development. The couple loves to observe the wildlife that lives on and moves through their land, from deer, bear, and moose to the signs left by a cougar, never actually sighted in over 20 years. AJ tracks the arrival dates of migratory songbird species each year in a worn notebook. Michelle keeps a watchful eye out for weeds as she rambles over the property and vigilantly maintains a fire-safe perimeter around the house.
Behind their sloping stretch of sagebrush and Ponderosa pine, land owned by the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation extends all the way to the Okanogan River. Anchoring the future passage to the west of the highway is the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Carter Mountain Unit. The perfect site. In 2017, OLT completed a conservation easement protecting the property from future subdivision and further development beyond AJ and Michelle’s existing home and outbuildings. A bubbler was installed on a small spring in the valley below the highway to draw wildlife from the surrounding hillsides to the future safe crossing site.
Lasting Significance
The Engebretson easement continues to safeguard thriving native shrubsteppe habitat and hold open a corridor for wildlife toward what will one day be one of the first two wildlife crossing structures in Okanogan County.
It demonstrates how the right people, at the right place and the right time, can play a pivotal role in maintaining the health of our whole interconnected landscape. It is a testament to the fact that what is good for wildlife and what is good for people can be one and the same.
Economic Impact
Over 350 deer are killed in collisions with vehicles every year on the stretch of Highway 97 between Riverside and Tonasket, at an estimated cost of two million dollars each year in vehicle repairs, hospital bills, and other expenses. The benefits in safety and well-being to humans and wildlife alike from the safe passage project are difficult to measure.
Landscape and Habitat
The easement protects a pivotal point within a movement corridor running from the Kettle River Range to the North Cascades via the Tunk and Chewiliken Valleys and on through the Sinlakekin Wildlife Refuge. The conservation easement restricts future subdivision on this land and keeps native plant communities intact for wildlife and humans to enjoy.
Looking to the Future
As of 2025, several grant cycles have passed without success, and funding for the first few underpasses along 97, including the one adjacent to AJ and Michelle’s land, is still being actively sought. AJ and Michelle, who have been committed to the project since first hearing about it, are frustrated but philosophical. “We’ve been here since the beginning,” AJ says. “It just takes time.”