Snowden Blog ยท Klickitat County, WA

A place with no
town government.

Snowden is an unincorporated community at 2,329 feet in Klickitat County, above White Salmon. No city hall, no mayor. The county and the neighbours are the government.

Places like this are badly served by the internet. There is no destination marketing here because there is nothing to sell, which is exactly why the few real sources are worth collecting: a community association, a county, and a Forest Service district. If you live up here or are thinking about buying land, those are the pages that actually decide things.

The reading list

Link-out only. There is not much, and what there is, is real.

The community itself

Unincorporated does not mean unorganised.

  1. Snowden Community

    Community association · Primary

    The community's own site. For a place this size, a working community association is the closest thing to local government there is.

  2. Klickitat County

    County government · Primary

    With no city, the county is the government: land use, roads, permits, assessment. If you are buying acreage up here, county code is the document that matters.

The land and the risk

Rural Klickitat is fire country on the dry side of the Cascades. That is the practical reality of living here.

  1. Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area

    US Forest Service · Primary

    Federal land below and around, plus current closures and fire restrictions, which matter more here than the calendar suggests.

  2. Mount Adams

    USGS · Science

    The mountain to the north, active and monitored.

  3. WSDOT

    Washington State DOT · Practical

    Getting down to the river and out to Hood River in winter is the whole question at this elevation.