Kukutali Preserve

Today, Kukutali Preserve protects Kiket and Flagstaff Islands and part of Fidalgo Island within Deception Pass State Park. Though called islands, Kiket and Flagstaff Islands form one peninsula attached to the western shoreline of Fidalgo Island by narrow strips of sand.

Long before Deception Pass State Park and the arrival of Europeans in what is now Washington State, Indigenous people gathered shellfish and fished along Kiket and Flagstaff Islands. In 1855, the Treaty of Point Elliot guaranteed ancestors of the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community’s full ownership of the peninsula. But both governmental and private entities disregarded the Tribe’s rights.

In the 1970s, Flagstaff Island nearly became a nuclear power plant. In the 1980s, a private landowner barred the Tribe’s access to the peninsula’s beaches, which the Tribe still owned and had the right to access.

In 2010, Trust for Public Land purchased the peninsula and conveyed the land to the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community and Washington State Parks. The land became Kukutali Preserve, restoring access to the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community as the first park in the United States jointly owned and managed by a tribe and a state government.

Now protected forever, Kukutali Preserve benefits the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, visitors from across the state, and local wildlife. Importantly, joint ownership guarantees the Tribe’s treaty rights to own and steward the peninsula’s tidelands. Hikers can enjoy 2 miles of trails on Kiket Island and fragile habitats are protected as wildlife sanctuaries for endangered and threatened species, including Chinook salmon.