Local officials hope the steady wind that blows up and over the Willapa Hills of West Lewis County will drive employment, property taxes and the local economy in an upward trajectory.

    As proposed, the recently announced Coyote Crest Wind Park project in the hills above West Lewis County stands to create a boom in local employment and a new source of energy for the Interstate 5 corridor.

    Depending on how well it functions, the project could also be the beginning of a larger movement toward wind-created energy in Washington, specifically in Lewis County.

    EverPower Wind, the New York company behind the proposal, has been monitoring nine other hilltops and mountain crests throughout the Northwest including Windy Point near Cinebar and several locations south of Pe Ell, according Dave McClain, the company’s vice president and general manager of Northwest Operations.

    With the Coyote Crest project four miles north of Doty acting as a pilot project, McClain said there is potential for expansion in the future.

    “That’s the plan,” he said.

    First, though, the company must shepherd through its first project in the coastal hills of the Pacific Northwest, which calls for up to 50 wind turbines on a 3,755-acre hillcrest owned by Weyerhaeuser. The 120-megawatt wind park will function even as the forest remains in working order, officials said Thursday.

Financial Benefits

    According to a study paid for by the Lewis County Economic Development Council in 2008, the construction phase of such a project could require up to 150 workers with a total payroll of $10.2 million.

    The study estimated the local economic benefit of the construction phase alone as $16 million.

    Once it’s built, up to 23 workers will be hired to provide around-the-clock maintenance and operations tasks that would pay an annual salary of close to $65,000, according to the study.

    Lewis County Economic Development Council Director Dick Larman put the impact of the project for West Lewis County into simple terms at a press conference Thursday.

    He said it would be for West Lewis County what Cardinal Glass was for Winlock, referencing the arrival of large tax base and employer in the rural Lewis County community.

    Larman has said that the $230 million project could bring an estimated $2 million in new annual property taxes to be dispersed among local schools, fire districts and county government.

    Chehalis attorney J. Vander Stoep, who is representing EverPower, said that would represent a 3 percent overall increase in property tax returns for the county.

    EverPower has completed two years of detailed environmental and engineering design studies and the company plans to apply for land use permits from Lewis County later this month.

    McClain said he hopes to have the project online and generating electricity by 2012.

    “We know the resource is there, and it is a robust resource,” McClain said.

    Eric Schwartz: (360) 807-8245