The Snoqualmie Tribe announced it has fully paid off its debt for the purchase of the Salish Lodge, at its July 10 Special General Council meeting.

The Muckleshoot Tribe agreed to transfer ownership of the 45 acre property to the Snoqualmie Tribe for $125 million in November 2019. The Muckleshoot Tribe had owned the lodge since 2007.

According to the Tribe’s website, Snoqualmie Falls and the surrounding area is the most important and sacred site to the Snoqualmie Tribe and is central to its history, spiritual practice and identity.

In 2015 the Tribe launched the Save Snoqualmie Falls campaign in response to the proposed construction — by the City of Snoqualmie — of the Tokul Roundabout and its implications on future development near the falls, the Valley Record previously reported. The Tribe called the planned development irresponsible and unjust, on grounds that it disrupted an ancestral burial site and degraded the environmental health of the area.

In October 2018, the City of Snoqualmie approved plans for construction of 210 new homes, a 182 room hotel and convention center on the property, but the Tribe’s purchase of the lodge prevented the city from following through on those plans.

A spokesperson for the Tribe did not return comment for this story.