Douglas: Forest Service secretly dropped Dreyfus plans

Friday, May 8, 1998 | 10:55 a.m.

"They back-doored us, County Commissioner Don Miner said Thursday. "They totally went around us on this after they said they would work with us."

Miner and other commissioners grilled U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Linda Massey, saying the agency had promised to cooperate on plans to rent the buildings at Zephyr Cove for weddings and other events.

Massey said she would convey the commissioners' concerns to her colleagues, but the decision on Dreyfus may be final.

A private agency, the Olympic Group, arranged a 1997 land swap that gave the Forest Service the estate's 40 pristine, lakefront acres. Olympic kept the rights to a main house, caretaker's house, garage and other buildings on the land and later sold them to the Park Cattle Co., which has extensive holdings in Douglas County.

Douglas County officials supported that move because they wanted Park to rent the buildings out for weddings, conferences and other uses that would increase tourism and bring in tax revenue.

But in a March 24 letter, Philip Bayles, director of land and minerals for the Forest Service, said the agency isn't interested in having a concessionaire run the buildings.

"There is no demonstrated need for use of the land other than free and unencumbered use of the property by the public," Bayles said.

In an April 27 letter to Commissioner Miner, Park lawyer Gordon DePaoli said the Forest Service could have taken the building rights, but actually reviewed and approved plans to offer them to Park.

DePaoli says it was only after Park officials acquired the rights, applied for a special use permit and made plans to bring the buildings up to code for the public that they learned the agency didn't want the buildings rented out.

The property is adjacent to the Zephyr Cove Park and is separate from the old Whittell mansion to the north, which also is part of the Dreyfus estate.