OSI looks to buy former Boy Scout camp on Lows Lake

Open Space Institute plans to preserve 1,500-acre property surrounded by Five Ponds Wilderness

By Mike Lynch

The Open Space Institute is under contract to buy a 1,500-acre former Boy Scout camp on Lows Lake and the Bog River in the northwestern Adirondacks. 

Once it purchases the property, the nonprofit plans to sell the former Sabattis Scout Reservation to the state for addition to the Adirondack Forest Preserve. 

Located in St. Lawrence County, Lows Lake is considered one of the premiere wilderness paddling and camping destinations in the park. It is surrounded by the 107,000-acre Five Ponds Wilderness.

OSI President Erik Kulleseid made the announcement Thursday night during a virtual town hall meeting hosted by his nonprofit organization. 

“That camp has been used informally for public access to a whole set of trails in that area, but it was always dependent on that camp being there and available and opening up for people, Kulleseid said.

He called Lows Lake “one of those pristine, absolutely incredible Adirondack lakes.” 

Purchase underway

OSI signed a one-year option agreement with the owners, Scouting America – Longhouse Council, on Feb. 4 for a purchase price of $2 million, OSI told the Explorer. The purchase would protect five miles of shoreline. It also includes several ponds. 

The nonprofit is working closely with the state Department of Environmental Conservation, according to OSI, and it plans to hold onto the land for a “short period of time” before selling it to the state for the Forest Preserve. OSI and DEC have been in talks about the property since last summer. 

While the property would be open to the public for recreation as Forest Preserve, OSI is still determining the amount of access it will allow under its ownership. 

New York State’s Open Space Conservation Plan identifies this area as part of the Bog River/Beaver River Headwater complex that contains “remote forestland and lakes” and smaller ponds and large wetlands that offer important aquatic habitat, in addition to lakes with scenic and recreational value. 

Lows Lake is accessible by paddlers from the Bog River and Lows Lower Dam parking area from the east. Less commonly, paddlers traverse through Lake Lila to Bog Pond on the way to Lows. 

Recently closed camp

Boy Scouts of America originally bought the property in the 1950s. The scout camp closed last summer. 

Edwin Theetge, CEO and Scout Executive of the Mattydale based Longhouse Council, told the Explorer last fall that declining interest in scouting among youngsters paired with a reluctance to “rough it” among adults have eroded the organization’s ability to break even on the camp. The Boy Scout camp offered few amenities: Groups cooked over campfires and had no access to electronic communication.

 “It’s one of the most pristine (Scout) camps up there,” he said. “It’s almost literally smack dab in the middle of the Adirondacks and it’s gorgeous with lakes and loons in the morning — but the future of scouting is not going to be camping” in rustic sites.

Last year 225 scouts camped at the site, 75 fewer than the council needed to cover the $250,000 cost to operate the summer camp over three months, Theetge told the Explorer. Overall, membership in the council fell from 3,400 to 1,775 over the past four years, partly due to fewer dads involved. The father-son tradition was a chief recruiting tool, he said.

Numerous Adirondack Boy Scout camps have sold or closed in recent years. In the Long Lake vicinity alone, the Sabattis Adventure Camp on Bear Pond sold several years ago as part of a sexual-abuse lawsuit settlement. The Cedarlands Scout Reservation in Long Lake sold for $3.35 million in 2023 to a Manhattan LLC.