NOTICE: This affects all of San Juan County. The best available science comments are being collected by Community Development and Planning. The county will decide what to use in order to write the Critical Areas Ordinance. They are taking public comment, suggestions, concerns ONLY until Friday, Feb. 4 cutoff date. Be sure your comments are in BEFORE Friday. Thanks!
Please submit all written/electronic comments to:
JaniceB@sanjuanco.com
There are CAO meetings Feb. 8 and 9 in Friday Harbor. See county website.
Thanks to WSU Beach Watchers, who posted a link to San Juan County's pages of Critical Areas Ordinance Best Available Science in their latest newsletter, or I never would have found Dr. Adamus's Habitat Analysis Map of 2009 in the wetlands section that raised some alarms, and generated a phone call to someone who knew that the planning department was taking comments on it. Does this mean they intend to use this map for "best available science?" Does this mean that the Conservancy Overlay district that now protects Eastsound Swale can be overturned? I hope not. You can find Beach Watchers here
Anyone who thinks that the Eastsound Swale, madrona forests, tree windbreaks, natural vegetation and wildlife habitat should be the CORE around which planning and development in the Eastsound UGA should be based, please make your comments to the planning department before Friday, Feb. 4th. It wouldn't hurt to also send written comments to the EPRC. The County Council and EPRC need to hear from scientists, conservationists, and environmentalists for a more balanced and equitable view of the big picture. Since all the islands are shown on the map, anyone on any other island who cares about habitats, please flood the planning department with your comments and read some of the myriad documents that may affect future planning in the San Juans.
On the habitat map, Eastsound Swale, supposedly protected in the Conservancy Overlay District, is colored in purple and dark purple. Its designation? "Low Value Habitat." I strongly disagree. I think it's essential habitat for the health of Eastsound's sensitive aquifers, ground water, and ultimately, Fishing Bay and President's Channel, and there IS science to back up the fact that functional wetlands and forests do much for the health of the land and ground water. If we let this map stand as the yardstick for the Critical Areas Ordinance, unplanned or poorly planned development is going to continue to trump good planning, especially in higher density and UGA areas where the only value assigned to land is dollar profit value. (and UGAs are particularly under-valued because saving habitat directly conflicts with developers' and speculative land buyers' profits.)
I don't want to see the Eastsound Swale, a category 2 regulated wetland, become the toxic waste dump of Orcas Island. If we leave the wetland as a "low value" habitat, a concrete stormwater treatment facility designed by an off-island engineer who knows nothing about the swale is exactly what we'll get. As well meaning as Public Works is, we need designers who know the terrain, what the Swale used to be like, and how we could move it in that direction again. We are at a crossroads. Once we go that direction, we can't go back, so make your opinions known. Please pass this on to anyone who might want to know. If you have facebook or twitter, please post something there and get your friends to commit to making comments before the deadline. Thanks.
With a little patience and these instructions, you can view the the map. I suggest you open the page in a new tab so you can follow these instructions and save time and energy.
Start with this page.
~Check the box that says "I agree to these terms." Click "proceed."You should be taken to a page with some links.Click on the bottom link which says
"Wetland BAS and Guidance."
~You will be taken to a page with tons of documents! Scroll down to "h" and look for "Habitat Analysis Map" (PDF). Open it and you can zoom in. You can also save a copy to your computer to email as an attachment to concerned people you know. Feel free to cut and paste this text or use your own words.
Please remember to get the word out quickly. Please make your email comments to the Planning Department and the county council before Friday, Feb. 4. Thanks very much!
