Hikers, neighbors worry about gunfire on this Boise-area public land. That may change
For years, hikers, equestrians and target shooters have tried to coexist on 2,200 acres of Eagle-annexed Bureau of Land Management land, located north of Beacon Light Road.
BLM allows recreational shooting on its land, but the city of Eagle does not allow firearms to be discharged in city limits. Since the BLM land is in city limits, shooting there is illegal. However, Eagle police don’t enforce the prohibition there.
With future development proposed to the north, south and southeast of the BLM land, Eagle needs a solution.
In 2008, the city annexed the M3 property, now known as Spring Valley, for a proposed planned community of more than 7,000 houses. The Dallas Police and Fire Pension System, the company that bought the land in 2005, ran into problems with its investments. Some of the company’s investments were worth far less than the fund had reported. The property was never developed.
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The city also annexed 2,200 acres of BLM land sandwiched between the former city limits and the Spring Valley site to the north. The area, about a mile north of Beacon Light Road, between Highway 16 and Willow Creek Road, has been popular for recreation.
Equestrians and hikers on the land worry about bullets from target shooters, and the city worries about having target shooters so close to subdivisions in the future. To solve these problems, the Eagle City Council created a committee last August to create a concept plan and map for the land.
“Firearms have become the major issue,” said Charlie Baun, an Eagle council member who was part of the Bureau of Land Management Work Group, during a committee meeting in February. “Technically it is against the law to be shooting up there. It is a city ordinance, and BLM doesn’t need to enforce it, and we don’t have the resources to enforce it.”
Baun said the work group proposed that the City Council add exemptions to the ordinance for BLM land users but still needed to come up with a solution to having shooting so close to future development.
In April, the work group, with council approval, contracted with Range Design Services, an Eagle company, an Eagle company that designs small firearms ranges, to conduct a feasibility study to determine where a shooting range would be located. The potential sites are the eastern portion of the BLM land. and Baun said the group has been working with the Spring Valley developers to potentially put a shooting range in that area, outside the BLM.
The Spring Valley Ranch land now has new owners, who are meeting with the Eagle City Council about their plans to develop the area.
The shooting range would be designed by Range Design Services. During a city council meeting to discuss the range, Baun said its shooting distance would be up to 1,200 yards.
“(The shooting range)... addresses the safety issues around shooting,” Baun told the council. “All of the BLM land would be no shooting, with shooting dedicated in this area to avoid bullet flyovers.
“A lot of these user conflicts, if we can hit them now before they get out of hand, will help out,” Baun said.
After months of meetings with mountain biking groups, equestrian groups and other user groups, including target shooters and Range Design Services, the committee of seven is prepared to present a concept plan to the City Council. The plan is available online on the Eagle city’s website. There you can give feedback through an online form.
The committee will present the plan and map to the council at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 27, at Eagle City Hall.
