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Community Profile - Enumclaw: A Bit of the Country Close to the City |
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Written On: July/August 2005 |
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Written By: by Paul Schlienz |
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Enumclaw is near the bright lights of Seattle and Tacoma. Nevertheless, this town on the edge of the Cascades seems far removed from city life.
Best known as the home of the King County Fair, Enumclaw has pioneer roots that go back to the 1870s. Since then this town, located on a plateau north of the White River, has grown steadily. Currently, Enumclaw boasts a population of around 11,000.
Despite this growth, Enumclaw has retained a rural, small town atmosphere in contrast to nearby communities like Bonney Lake, Auburn and Black Diamond, all of which have sprawling tract house development and typical suburban commercial strips. Enumclaw’s downtown area—still a vital commercial center of importance—would likely be recognizable to someone who knew the town 60 years ago. Beyond the town’s built up core are thickly forested Cascade foothills and spacious farms that nurture a thriving thoroughbred horse breeding industry. Urban sprawl is nowhere to be seen on this plateau, which offers some of the state’s best views of Mount Rainier.
"Enumclaw is different," observed Mark Topping, president of the Enumclaw Chamber of Commerce. "It provides the benefits of country living and a rural environment, but you don’t have to sacrifice big city opportunities as a result of it."
Welcoming Growth, Preserving Character
Enumclaw’s municipal government, while welcoming growth, is determined to preserve the town’s unique character. Lack of capacity at the city’s wastewater treatment plant has curtailed the construction of new residences within the City of Enumclaw, although the surrounding unincorporated area has seen new residential development. In 2007-2008, an upgrade to the plant will be complete, allowing for residential development within the town for the first time since the mid 1990s. Following the upgrade, the city is planning on adding residential capacity for approximately 6,000 new people by 2020. Don’t, however, expect radical changes to Enumclaw’s homey atmosphere.
Significant portions of the unincorporated rural land surrounding Enumclaw will remain rural. Under King County’s farmlands preservation program, much land on the plateau has been purchased by the county. Effectively, this land is no longer developable.
"We don’t see Enumclaw becoming a strip mall and big-box location," Mark Bauer, Enumclaw’s city administrator, said. "The community’s business center will remain our downtown, and we’ll maintain our small town, rural integrity over the long term. While we will have to take our share of growth, we believe in a very well thought out plan."
While Enumclaw is still primarily a bedroom community for people who work in other parts of the Seattle-Tacoma area, this is changing. Light manufacturing and car dealerships are among the recent additions to Enumclaw’s growing business community. Although Weyerhaeuser shut down operations in Enumclaw, the mill has reopened under different ownership, and the town’s timber industry heritage lives on.
After the school district, Enumclaw’s largest employer is Mutual of Enumclaw, an insurance company that has been writing policies since 1898. With 245 employees and a headquarters that is the downtown’s largest building, Mutual of Enumclaw now writes approximately 2.2 percent of all the policies in Washington.
Mutual of Enumclaw’s President Gerald Schmidt gives the City of Enumclaw high marks for providing a positive business climate. "Enumclaw is a terrific place for business," Schmidt said. "Mutual of Enumclaw, as an organization, has certainly appreciated the community’s receptiveness to us as we’ve grown our business adjacent to the downtown. We enjoy the partnership between ourselves and the community."
Tourism Potential
Plans are already well under way to capitalize on Enumclaw’s enviable location 45 minutes from the Crystal Mountain ski resort and 35 minutes from the Sunrise entrance to Mount Rainier National Park. With many tourists passing through Enumclaw on their way to these destinations, the city is developing strategies to encourage lodging for visitors who could then use Enumclaw as a base for exploring the Cascades.
At the center of Enumclaw’s hopes to establish itself as a tourism center is the planned development of a multi-agency welcome center for Mount Rainier National Park and the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. The center will be staffed in partnership with the National Park Service, the National Forest Service and the chamber of commerce and will provide a direct link to the park with a shuttle bus system.
Ultimately, the welcome center will cost approximately $6 million, half of which has already been secured.
Still, Enumclaw’s biggest draw remains the King County Fair, held each July at a fairground on the eastern edge of town. Approximately 500,000 people visit Enumclaw for the fair each year.
The fair, which dates back to 1863, is another link to Enumclaw’s past that has survived to the present day. Unlike some county and state fairs, which rely more on big name entertainment to attract visitors, the King County Fair is one where tradition reigns. Local country performers, animals, a rodeo, carnival rides, games, 4-H, Future Farmers of America and Grange exhibits can all be found at the King County Fair, which is remarkably similar in character to what it was 50 years ago.
The King County Fairgrounds, featuring a number of historic buildings from Seattle’s 1962 World Fair, is another community resource with great potential for the future.
As the heart of one of the country’s most important thoroughbred horse breeding regions in the country, Enumclaw is seriously considering using the fairgrounds for major equestrian events, which would allow the town to emphasize its strong equestrian heritage as another draw for visitors. In addition, Enumclaw is contemplating other ways to tie itself to its unique horse-breeding industry, including the possibility of developing street signs based on an equestrian theme.
With all the changes contemplated for Enumclaw, however, it is remarkable that the town a visitor will encounter 20 years from now will likely be very similar to what one sees today. A thriving, traditional downtown of storefronts, shops and restaurants surrounded by leafy, peaceful neighborhoods full of sturdy, early 20th century homes, and farms and mountains just beyond the city limits—this is the once and future Enumclaw.
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