I found out. He is Ed Kilduff, trained wetlands "expert." He won't reveal his real name or affiliations. Instead, said person hangs posters on community bulletin boards in Eastsound, and maybe on other islands in the San Juans. What are the connecting affiliations, once you start reading the blog, watching the youtube videos, and reading the posters accusing Friends of the San Juans and environmentalists in general, of attacking the very fiber of our community? Is Trojan Heron another deep- pocket or one of their (often unwitting) tools, seeing to it that the people are duped, misled and confused, and incited into an angry irrational froth? Or is Trojan Heron a concerned citizen just trying to do the right thing? Who knows? The blog, from what I've read, is divisive. In using spin and truth-bending, it is doing the very thing it accuses the accused of doing.
In connecting the dots for Trojan Heron's possible affiliations, they lead indirectly and directly to CAPR (with several chapters in Ca. and 12 in Wa), and , Resources Coalition, Olympic Stewardship Foundation, Kitsap Alliance of Property Owners, Freedom Foundation, Eagle Forum, Heritage Foundation, Freedom Works, Heartland Institute, American Crossroads, Koch Brothers, Bradley Foundation, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and many more private foundations and corporations and CEOs. Most of the big guns that could be affiliates, or influences on Trojan Heron, probably have some ties to, or have bought votes and membership in ALEC. (American Legislative Exchange Council).
Don't know what ALEC is? Learning about ALEC might be one of the most important things you can learn. The corporations and 1%ers belonging to ALEC are the true puppetmasters, and are buying votes (and legislators) and writing the laws the legislators pass; laws that attack the environment, deny climate change, dissolve public education funding and privatize schools, eliminate social programs, medicare, health care, unions, womens' rights, reproductive rights, civil rights, whistle-blowing rights,ability to assemble in peaceful protest, ad nauseum.
The goal of ALEC's puppetmasters? More land grab and exploitation of resources and Critical Areas for "free enterprise." For them. Meanwhile, tactics of front groups divert our attention while the chain saws rip and more gang-bangers develop and destroy our forests, oceans, and Critical Areas. Maximum development in throwaway UGAs prevails over stewardship and sustainable long-term planning to protect our Critical Areas.
If Trojan Heron cares about community as he states, wouldn't he be asking some profound questions about Critical Areas, and making some observations based on that caring, leading to heartfelt dialogue and sincere attempts to join with environmentalists in educating people to want to protect critical areas because it's good for their grandchildren to do so? Because intact critical areas are a wealth you can't buy? Because if we knew and understood what they are and what they do, and wanted to, we wouldn't need laws that no one obeys or enforces anyway? And yes, something does need to be done about repeat violators who know exactly what they're doing, and get a hand slap from the corrupt CD&P's Rene Beliveau, while poorer landowners are put through the wringer.
When the accusers twist and turn facts into arguments "proving" that environmentalists and CD&P (Shireene Hale specifically), County Council, Dept. of Ecology and any other group trying to protect Critical Areas, are the villains driving the wedge and inciting us against each other, how is that helping to bring our community together?
I have watched 30 years of many of the same old players (and some new ones) stalling, and stopping outright, any lasting or effective protections of our Critical Areas while certain land-grabbers trade their revolving-door chameleon-like LLCs and continue degrading wetlands and shoreline habitat with large scale for-profit developments.
Our hearts are sore at this destruction, whether we know it or not. We know deep down that we are destroying ourselves by destroying the earth, and the closer to home it is, the more it affects us - consciously or unconsciously. Not just our physical selves, but the very best in ourselves. The Earth's body is as ours. When we poison her waters, we poison our bodies and brains. We try to numb our heartbreak and outrage with misdirected anger or palliatives. But we have to face the truth of this heartbreak and mind-fuck if we are going to get on with creating a better, more just world for all.
No matter what Trojan Heron or his people say, using spin-doctoring front group tactics to incite the populace against environmentalists - a tactic used by "free enterprise" rapists, pillagers, and land-grabbers ever since humanity began - is a grave and unjust error. It's time to start de-constructing and exposing the myths and erroneous thinking on all sides, and come together, ready to listen to each other and work for the common good of generations to come who will inherit the earth, and who might like to have clean drinking water and forests and beneficial creatures and who might want a different world than the one we've created so far.
Sunday, May 6, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Eastsound Swale is Dying
Dear Citizens;
Eastsound Swale, our beloved wetland, is dying. The trees are drowning. We need the trees! They are our filters, our lungs.
The realtors, developers, planners, and county officials are probably relieved to have gotten away with the tree genocide and land grab glut, and have almost completed the destruction. How do they feel, selling the dream while in reality, trampling the land and its inhabitants, fouling our waters?
Spin doctors are spinning lies and fear tactics - tripe such as this> " you won't be able to have a garden or even dig a hole with the new CAO regulations." Lies are being propogated in epidemic fashion, a cancer polluting the minds of the gullible and uneducated. The liars are saying that Eastsound Swale is man made. Hogwash! Don't believe them. They're all about the money and profit. They'll do anything to sell us down the river including poison us all and cut all of our trees. After all, who can afford to live in Eastsound? Just us poor and middle class folk. We're in the way anyway. Eastsound Village Proper used to be a community - now it is a Business District. Nobody but a few people actually LIVE there.
The County and Planning Dept. have thrown Eastsound and its inhabitants (human and non human) under the bus. Our own Eastsound Planning and Review Committee (EPRC) has thrown us under the bus. What a selfish short-sighted lot are these few filthy rich and greedy spin doctors! Gangsters one and all. **
**a clarification: i'm not saying that EPRC or the County or CD&P are gangsters - or filthy rich and greedy. I am saying that there are a few who are, and they generate lies and spin, sometimes through a few individuals in well positioned places. What I'm also saying is that excessive wealth and greed are a bad combination which produce gangster mentality and control, since the bottom line is profit at all cost. What I do notice about the EPRC is that there is not even ONE conservationist or environmentalist on the EPRC - not for a long time. Those who have tried to join have either not been appointed, or have given up early when they realized what was going on within the EPRC. But I sort of digress.
Even the citizens of Orcas have thrown us under the bus. Any and all of them could have come to bat for the Critical Areas in Eastsound. Where are they when we need them? Do any of them put themselves in our shoes? Try to imagine how it'd feel if it were them in our predicament?
In the Growth Management Act, because Eastound was designated an "urban growth area," over 50% of the total population must live in Eastsound, by mandate. Our commissioners of the past sold us down the river and made us into an Urban Growth Area. Up all the way through 2011, we had a chance to get out of this - something our bureaucrats wanted us not to know - and we didn't. So we lost the chance for any flexibility in that.
Now there is a plan afoot to incorporate the Eastsound SubArea Plan (the one thing that supposedly protects Eastsound Swale, which the County continues to ignore anyway!) into the County Unified Development Codes. This effectively, once and for all, removes any power of protection from the citizenry. The most rapacious and greedy developers have the most holdings here in our UGA, and have built so many illegal and exploitative developments in the past 20+ years it's sickening.
Not ONCE did the County recognize or honor our SubArea Plan or the Conservancy Overlay District (16.55.250) when it really would have counted to protect the Swale, nor did they use the Conservancy Overlay District to safeguard trees in Eastsound Swale slated for demolition - wetland trees. Instead, they passed every single permit - legal or not!
The first offenders to radically change Eastsound Swale for the worse were the Outlook Inn owners. The Inn sits at the South end of the Swale creek. The inn expansion diverted the natural (NOT man made) creek, cut many trees to make parking lots and roads. Water was piped, diverted. What was built to supposedly handle their stormwater were two ugly scummy algae-covered, mosquito-infested eyesore "ponds." The "treated" stormwater then dumps into non-flushing Fishing Bay, likely poisoning it and any fish left in there. The airport destroyed the North end of the Swale (along with the Ditch). That took out a category 1 peat bog swamp; irreplaceable.
Even today, dirty deals are being made by the same few players; LLC's are trading land back and forth, probably to avoid taxes and capital gains taxes. Then they develop the hell out of them and nobody is watching or if they are, they're too confused by the shell game. All of these exploited lands WERE the Swale, ARE still the Swale, no matter how unrecognizable or degraded. Local wetland "delineations" - hired out by charlatans who can pay enough to have anyone to say what they want them to say - never take into account the whole big picture of connectivity and interconnected wetlands How can something be declared "part of Eastsound Swale" in a wetland report and at the same time be downgraded and considered "not a part?" You tell me! So... the Swale gets chopped into little bitty pieces, then downgraded to "low value" wetlands and razed, raped, gutted, drained, filled, graded, plugged.
The Planners and Council are planning a whopping 6 years out - as if that is "long range planning" - while certain realtors and permittors who have conflicts- of-interest while "serving" on the planning commission and EPRC, continue to "sell the dream" and serve the town folks the Nightmare - and allow decimation of what few trees are left in town. They murder our songbirds, bats, frogs, salamanders, etc and destroy all their habitat. How many ways can you say "corrupt?"
Meanwhile, Eastsound gets colder and even more intensely windy, because there are no windbreak trees left. More get cut every day it seems. Stormwater rushes into the Swale at an alarming rate. Roads cut across it, damming the seasonal creek the First Nations used to use as a navigable waterway, and choking off its flow.
Eastsound Swale used to be a dark, dank, creepy, wild, mysterious, thick wooded area; it was huge, and wide and thick, and choked with willows, crabapples, alders, and old fruit trees from earlier farming days in the 1800s. The Swale was full of songbirds, muskrats, bats, and amphibians galore, including salamanders and newts. It was an oozing, croaking, stinking, singing place. It was cool and sheltering in summer, warm and protecting in winter. The creek was full in winter and then dried up a bit in summer. It always flowed. The trees filtered the water and allowed it to meander, not gush or pond. Now it is all a dead flood zone with a few trees here and there, all of them drowning. Invasives and noxious weeds have been introduced by chopping trees and degrading the buffer edges over and over and over again.
Stormwater from all the hills surrounding our Critical Aquifer basin rushes down in eroding rivulets, and dumps into the Swale, which was never meant to hold it all. Roads cut across it like handcuffs, like straitjackets, damming (damning) seasonal creek into permanent dead zone pools. Natural wetlands are never meant to be "stormwater treatment facilities." Stormwater is killing our Swale. Tree cutting is killing our Swale. Development is killing our Swale. Enchanted Forest Road is killing our Swale. Short sighted greed, stupidity, and corruption are killing our Swale. Apathy is killing our Swale.
Who will speak up for it before it is too late? Who will help plant trees to reforest it? Does anyone care anymore enough to get up off their behinds and DO something? If so, please get in touch - Let's do something! Let's put our heads and hearts together and stop the exploitative carnage. I have some ideas; I'll bet you have some, too. I've been gathering information for a long time. Some of it can help us legally. We have standing. I've also gathered some information on reforestation and restoration of wetlands. If the county won't do something, then it's up to the citizenry to take matters into its own hands. We need citizen watchdogs. I have a whole outline in place for a citizen watchdog group. I can't do this alone. Please come forward and help the trees. Help the beings who can't speak for themselves. Please.
Sincerely,
the Lorax
Who Will Speak
Eastsound Swale, our beloved wetland, is dying. The trees are drowning. We need the trees! They are our filters, our lungs.
The realtors, developers, planners, and county officials are probably relieved to have gotten away with the tree genocide and land grab glut, and have almost completed the destruction. How do they feel, selling the dream while in reality, trampling the land and its inhabitants, fouling our waters?
Spin doctors are spinning lies and fear tactics - tripe such as this> " you won't be able to have a garden or even dig a hole with the new CAO regulations." Lies are being propogated in epidemic fashion, a cancer polluting the minds of the gullible and uneducated. The liars are saying that Eastsound Swale is man made. Hogwash! Don't believe them. They're all about the money and profit. They'll do anything to sell us down the river including poison us all and cut all of our trees. After all, who can afford to live in Eastsound? Just us poor and middle class folk. We're in the way anyway. Eastsound Village Proper used to be a community - now it is a Business District. Nobody but a few people actually LIVE there.
The County and Planning Dept. have thrown Eastsound and its inhabitants (human and non human) under the bus. Our own Eastsound Planning and Review Committee (EPRC) has thrown us under the bus. What a selfish short-sighted lot are these few filthy rich and greedy spin doctors! Gangsters one and all. **
**a clarification: i'm not saying that EPRC or the County or CD&P are gangsters - or filthy rich and greedy. I am saying that there are a few who are, and they generate lies and spin, sometimes through a few individuals in well positioned places. What I'm also saying is that excessive wealth and greed are a bad combination which produce gangster mentality and control, since the bottom line is profit at all cost. What I do notice about the EPRC is that there is not even ONE conservationist or environmentalist on the EPRC - not for a long time. Those who have tried to join have either not been appointed, or have given up early when they realized what was going on within the EPRC. But I sort of digress.
Even the citizens of Orcas have thrown us under the bus. Any and all of them could have come to bat for the Critical Areas in Eastsound. Where are they when we need them? Do any of them put themselves in our shoes? Try to imagine how it'd feel if it were them in our predicament?
In the Growth Management Act, because Eastound was designated an "urban growth area," over 50% of the total population must live in Eastsound, by mandate. Our commissioners of the past sold us down the river and made us into an Urban Growth Area. Up all the way through 2011, we had a chance to get out of this - something our bureaucrats wanted us not to know - and we didn't. So we lost the chance for any flexibility in that.
Now there is a plan afoot to incorporate the Eastsound SubArea Plan (the one thing that supposedly protects Eastsound Swale, which the County continues to ignore anyway!) into the County Unified Development Codes. This effectively, once and for all, removes any power of protection from the citizenry. The most rapacious and greedy developers have the most holdings here in our UGA, and have built so many illegal and exploitative developments in the past 20+ years it's sickening.
Not ONCE did the County recognize or honor our SubArea Plan or the Conservancy Overlay District (16.55.250) when it really would have counted to protect the Swale, nor did they use the Conservancy Overlay District to safeguard trees in Eastsound Swale slated for demolition - wetland trees. Instead, they passed every single permit - legal or not!
The first offenders to radically change Eastsound Swale for the worse were the Outlook Inn owners. The Inn sits at the South end of the Swale creek. The inn expansion diverted the natural (NOT man made) creek, cut many trees to make parking lots and roads. Water was piped, diverted. What was built to supposedly handle their stormwater were two ugly scummy algae-covered, mosquito-infested eyesore "ponds." The "treated" stormwater then dumps into non-flushing Fishing Bay, likely poisoning it and any fish left in there. The airport destroyed the North end of the Swale (along with the Ditch). That took out a category 1 peat bog swamp; irreplaceable.
Even today, dirty deals are being made by the same few players; LLC's are trading land back and forth, probably to avoid taxes and capital gains taxes. Then they develop the hell out of them and nobody is watching or if they are, they're too confused by the shell game. All of these exploited lands WERE the Swale, ARE still the Swale, no matter how unrecognizable or degraded. Local wetland "delineations" - hired out by charlatans who can pay enough to have anyone to say what they want them to say - never take into account the whole big picture of connectivity and interconnected wetlands How can something be declared "part of Eastsound Swale" in a wetland report and at the same time be downgraded and considered "not a part?" You tell me! So... the Swale gets chopped into little bitty pieces, then downgraded to "low value" wetlands and razed, raped, gutted, drained, filled, graded, plugged.
The Planners and Council are planning a whopping 6 years out - as if that is "long range planning" - while certain realtors and permittors who have conflicts- of-interest while "serving" on the planning commission and EPRC, continue to "sell the dream" and serve the town folks the Nightmare - and allow decimation of what few trees are left in town. They murder our songbirds, bats, frogs, salamanders, etc and destroy all their habitat. How many ways can you say "corrupt?"
Meanwhile, Eastsound gets colder and even more intensely windy, because there are no windbreak trees left. More get cut every day it seems. Stormwater rushes into the Swale at an alarming rate. Roads cut across it, damming the seasonal creek the First Nations used to use as a navigable waterway, and choking off its flow.
Eastsound Swale used to be a dark, dank, creepy, wild, mysterious, thick wooded area; it was huge, and wide and thick, and choked with willows, crabapples, alders, and old fruit trees from earlier farming days in the 1800s. The Swale was full of songbirds, muskrats, bats, and amphibians galore, including salamanders and newts. It was an oozing, croaking, stinking, singing place. It was cool and sheltering in summer, warm and protecting in winter. The creek was full in winter and then dried up a bit in summer. It always flowed. The trees filtered the water and allowed it to meander, not gush or pond. Now it is all a dead flood zone with a few trees here and there, all of them drowning. Invasives and noxious weeds have been introduced by chopping trees and degrading the buffer edges over and over and over again.
Stormwater from all the hills surrounding our Critical Aquifer basin rushes down in eroding rivulets, and dumps into the Swale, which was never meant to hold it all. Roads cut across it like handcuffs, like straitjackets, damming (damning) seasonal creek into permanent dead zone pools. Natural wetlands are never meant to be "stormwater treatment facilities." Stormwater is killing our Swale. Tree cutting is killing our Swale. Development is killing our Swale. Enchanted Forest Road is killing our Swale. Short sighted greed, stupidity, and corruption are killing our Swale. Apathy is killing our Swale.
Who will speak up for it before it is too late? Who will help plant trees to reforest it? Does anyone care anymore enough to get up off their behinds and DO something? If so, please get in touch - Let's do something! Let's put our heads and hearts together and stop the exploitative carnage. I have some ideas; I'll bet you have some, too. I've been gathering information for a long time. Some of it can help us legally. We have standing. I've also gathered some information on reforestation and restoration of wetlands. If the county won't do something, then it's up to the citizenry to take matters into its own hands. We need citizen watchdogs. I have a whole outline in place for a citizen watchdog group. I can't do this alone. Please come forward and help the trees. Help the beings who can't speak for themselves. Please.
Sincerely,
the Lorax
Who Will Speak
Who will speak on behalf of trees
to stay saw’s bite, blade’s slash and sting?
Can the heart hold what the eye sees?
Home to eagles, quetzals, chickadees
chattering to down-fuzzed nestlings –
Who will speak on behalf of trees?
Gifts of plums and almonds, reddened leaves
melting into soil with winter’s wetting –
Can the heart hold what the eye sees?
Sheltering under lush green canopies –
do we thank the Amazon for rain it brings?
Who will speak on behalf of trees?
Frost-kissed leaf skeleton filagrees,
arboreal trilling, squawking, croaking, singing-
Can the heart hold what the eye sees?
Bare-boned stark windswept effigies,
spring blossomed crowns, bee- beckoning;
who will speak on behalf of trees?
Can the heart hold what the eye sees? 2011
Sunday, January 15, 2012
It sucks being a canary -- Skip if you can't handle anger and lengthy rants
I haven't written since August, because... what can I possibly say that isn't going to end up a rant or a wail? As I watch the Critical Areas in Eastsound be bulldozed, raped, logged, paved, destroyed - illegally and legally, with no repercussions for the violators, I can feel the pain of it in my own feminine body. It hurts more than I can say, and believe me, I've tried to express it more articulately than the hash I'm making of it right now. I can feel the earth's agony. Can't you? Maybe that sounds melodramatic but I no longer care how it sounds. It is so beautiful; all we've been given - and we throw it away. All we've been born into, been priviliged to have in our lives; don't our kids deserve at least as well? Don't they deserve to know the peace and beauty we have known? Don't they deserve our protection and stewardship of the lands we borrow from this Earth? Isn't the real wealth in our supporting lands, waters, and the community that comes together to honor and protect them?
I have wondered what my purpose is in writing these blogs. Who reads them? Who are they for? What do they really offer? Is it just mental masturbation, a journal written in the dark inside a crumbling coal mine as the oxygen runs out? How can I "just think positive," and then what - forget about it all and disassociate? Who even wants to know or ponder what we're doing to the planet, since pondering it hurts too much? Who is actually looking for being part of solutions, rather than just complaining, and who is willing to take the time to co-create them, implement them, and stand firm and hold steady against those who would destroy everything, and not give up or give in? Who in town (mostly moderate to low income people) even has the time or energy to do anything but survive and hope they can feed their kids from paycheck to paycheck?
I've wondered how to get people interested in sitting through arduously boring meetings that effect nothing, no matter how many times we tell the engineers and governmental officials that we don't want the trees cut, and have our offerings of other less hostile solutions for the land rejected in patronizing smiles. And what does "educating" people mean? It seems twofold. We have to be mindful of what is happening around us, and acknowledge the consequences of our thoughts, habits, and actions; ie our part in it. And if we then want to change those things to do least harm, we have to find ways to step outside the paradigm of this dysfunctional matrix and create something from the best of every one of us, and we have to want it really badly - so badly that we're willing to stop blaming our differences and learn to co-create and see them as a strength and an opportunity to have more creative ideas than if we were all alike. Easy to say, harder to do.
Then there's the whole white-male cultural rules: Men aren't supposed to be sad or feel the feminine inside them. (ie "no sissies."). Women aren't supposed to be angry ("bitches.") Everyone should just think positive and read a new self-help book, take more prozac, and go to a therapist or the latest motivational speaker or new age guru. Heh.
Even while understanding the historical moment we're in right now - the working class becoming a serf population, the hold the powerful few have on us all - I am frustrated by the lack of involvement locally. What will it take for Eastsound residents to be engaged with their own homeland? I am also disheartened that those outside of town with more acreage, time, and money - whose lands our sacrificial-lamb-the-Urban-Growth-Area, protect, turn away from our difficulties here. How can they look away? How can they not claim their connection with us and this land and these waters - in the heart, the hub, the most vulnerable geographic and geologic place in the island? In all the ferry islands, probably, due to our sea level location and narrow bridge of land which gets hammered by all the wind we get here, Eastsound is the most vulnerable.
Then there's the social ramifications: I am livid when someone moves to a place like Madrona Point and "loves" Madrona trees, then cuts down a bunch of them to build their "dream cottage" and complains about our dances at Oddfellows, the one joy many of us low-lifer blue collar workers have, while saws roar and trees fall around us. How can they call the cops on a fraternal organization that raises money for kids' scholarships and does all manner of good deeds for the community through rental of their hall for social events; here long before these new breeds who want closed gated communities for the rich with multiple homes, most not even willing to spend a winter here with just the locals? Who ARE these people?
Soon Eastsound area will feel the long-term effects of the latest onslaught by Public Works which dovetails nicely with their new excessively-monied grant program called "roadside hazard mitigation project."(more about that in another posting).
My frustration with Public Works is that they plan, engineer, seem sincere and probably are, but go about it backwards. First they apply and get the grant money. Then they spend some (plenty!) of that money planning and engineering. Then they have open houses, which are not really open houses, since they're "telling" us what they are going to do. It's frustrating to watch the engineers plan and then consistently run out of money for monitoring and maintenance; the very things that would make the new "constructions" work. The job goes to the lowest bidder; it has to by law. Never mind if they are skilled or ethically qualified to do the best job they can do. It's all about the dollars. There are too few Public Works "blue collar" crew to do the work of the white collar experts! Now, how is that?
And very soon Mount Baker Road, home of some longtime island families and friends, home to my own new garden (which will be 10 degrees colder when those trees are lost), and many other life-forms that can't speak up at "public" meetings and who depend on tree cover, will be irrevocably compromised in terrain where there are precious few trees left, and any new trees will have a terrible time growing, due to the almost continual buffeting winds and our new rabbit problem - people releasing domestic rabbits into "the wild" (illegal and destructive beyond belief).
In the vicinity of my new garden, built last spring/summer I have already seen cedar waxwings, anna's and rufous hummingbirds, goldfinches, western tanagers, garter snakes, tree frogs, all kinds and sizes of hawks, eagles, ospreys, pileated and downy woodpeckers, and much much more. I have heard several kinds of owls at night. Where will these creatures live without their homeland trees? What will hold stormwater and polluted road runoff from flooding in the lowlands, if not tree roots?
The Mount Baker Road Widening Project is at best, unnecessary. At worst, it's a long-term tragedy that will do immeasurable harm. Why is this being done? Supposedly, for safety and visibility on "dangerous" Mount Baker Road, which runs through a large category 1 and 2 wetland. Having lived here for 30 years, I can tell you that Mount Baker Road was a lot safer before Public Works's last project, the "truck bypass route" which many trucks don't use anyway. They made two promontory-type corners and don't have the manpower to maintain them so the visibility is terrible. There have been more serious accidents and fatalities, not less. The so-called trail is in a wetland and underwater most of the year; some parts all year long so people have to walk out in the shoulder-less roadway. Couldn't they have fixed the trail with a berm and flow pipes for a whole lot less money and carnage?
How does making this road into a highway where people can now do 70mph instead of 50, safer? Public Works refuses to acknowledge the part that excessive speeding, alcohol and drug impairment, and inappropriate cell phone use are the top contributors to accidents and fatalities. Their solution? Get state and EPA grants and keep the engineers employed and happy. SO... for the benefit of the few, the many must suffer. Same old tired song and I'm sick of hearing this discordant music. I'm mad and sad as hell.
Most of the trees on the North side of Mount Baker Road from Terrill Beach Road to Buck Park will be cut. The rest may not stand, depending on the treatment of the land by heavy equipment. The smaller trees protect the larger ones, as we can see by the sad example of the Mount Property Constructed Wetland Project, where the tall pines are drowning and being pushed over by the strong winds that prevail in Eastsound.
What do we stand to lose with each mature or maturing tree cut? How much water filtration do we lose? How many bird's nests? Tree frogs? Salamanders? Raptors? Bats? Beneficial insects? How much shade and shelter and windbreak do we lose? How much life does one tree support? Who speaks for that life, for all those lives? Are any planners and engineers asking these questions and will they take time from their desks and go out in the field, as gardeners do, and observe the life around them, over seasons? Over years?
What can you really say? How much broken-heartedness can a person take? How can that be used to make the world a better place; not by force but by gentleness? How can one turn fierce anger into an ally that will stand up and say "NO MORE CARNAGE?" I am now so cynical that I can understand why people just give up and decide to be selfish and "me" oriented. Bah. May as well just do art and garden and try to enjoy the few years or days we have left. But thoughts haunt: who will speak for the trees? For the next seven generations of humankind? For our great nieces or children or grandchildren?
If this blog had followers in numbers like facebook pages, then maybe some people would offer up solutions, ideas, prayers - because we need every one of us to stop going in this planet-destroying direction we are heading. Meanwhile, I hope we all take seconds and moments, as often as we can, make it our meditation and mindfulness practice to appreciate and give thanks for what is here and give that forth to the land, the waters, and their marvelous resident and migratory creatures. This earth needs to feel our love and thanks, now more than ever.
I have wondered what my purpose is in writing these blogs. Who reads them? Who are they for? What do they really offer? Is it just mental masturbation, a journal written in the dark inside a crumbling coal mine as the oxygen runs out? How can I "just think positive," and then what - forget about it all and disassociate? Who even wants to know or ponder what we're doing to the planet, since pondering it hurts too much? Who is actually looking for being part of solutions, rather than just complaining, and who is willing to take the time to co-create them, implement them, and stand firm and hold steady against those who would destroy everything, and not give up or give in? Who in town (mostly moderate to low income people) even has the time or energy to do anything but survive and hope they can feed their kids from paycheck to paycheck?
I've wondered how to get people interested in sitting through arduously boring meetings that effect nothing, no matter how many times we tell the engineers and governmental officials that we don't want the trees cut, and have our offerings of other less hostile solutions for the land rejected in patronizing smiles. And what does "educating" people mean? It seems twofold. We have to be mindful of what is happening around us, and acknowledge the consequences of our thoughts, habits, and actions; ie our part in it. And if we then want to change those things to do least harm, we have to find ways to step outside the paradigm of this dysfunctional matrix and create something from the best of every one of us, and we have to want it really badly - so badly that we're willing to stop blaming our differences and learn to co-create and see them as a strength and an opportunity to have more creative ideas than if we were all alike. Easy to say, harder to do.
Then there's the whole white-male cultural rules: Men aren't supposed to be sad or feel the feminine inside them. (ie "no sissies."). Women aren't supposed to be angry ("bitches.") Everyone should just think positive and read a new self-help book, take more prozac, and go to a therapist or the latest motivational speaker or new age guru. Heh.
Even while understanding the historical moment we're in right now - the working class becoming a serf population, the hold the powerful few have on us all - I am frustrated by the lack of involvement locally. What will it take for Eastsound residents to be engaged with their own homeland? I am also disheartened that those outside of town with more acreage, time, and money - whose lands our sacrificial-lamb-the-Urban-Growth-Area, protect, turn away from our difficulties here. How can they look away? How can they not claim their connection with us and this land and these waters - in the heart, the hub, the most vulnerable geographic and geologic place in the island? In all the ferry islands, probably, due to our sea level location and narrow bridge of land which gets hammered by all the wind we get here, Eastsound is the most vulnerable.
Then there's the social ramifications: I am livid when someone moves to a place like Madrona Point and "loves" Madrona trees, then cuts down a bunch of them to build their "dream cottage" and complains about our dances at Oddfellows, the one joy many of us low-lifer blue collar workers have, while saws roar and trees fall around us. How can they call the cops on a fraternal organization that raises money for kids' scholarships and does all manner of good deeds for the community through rental of their hall for social events; here long before these new breeds who want closed gated communities for the rich with multiple homes, most not even willing to spend a winter here with just the locals? Who ARE these people?
Soon Eastsound area will feel the long-term effects of the latest onslaught by Public Works which dovetails nicely with their new excessively-monied grant program called "roadside hazard mitigation project."(more about that in another posting).
My frustration with Public Works is that they plan, engineer, seem sincere and probably are, but go about it backwards. First they apply and get the grant money. Then they spend some (plenty!) of that money planning and engineering. Then they have open houses, which are not really open houses, since they're "telling" us what they are going to do. It's frustrating to watch the engineers plan and then consistently run out of money for monitoring and maintenance; the very things that would make the new "constructions" work. The job goes to the lowest bidder; it has to by law. Never mind if they are skilled or ethically qualified to do the best job they can do. It's all about the dollars. There are too few Public Works "blue collar" crew to do the work of the white collar experts! Now, how is that?
And very soon Mount Baker Road, home of some longtime island families and friends, home to my own new garden (which will be 10 degrees colder when those trees are lost), and many other life-forms that can't speak up at "public" meetings and who depend on tree cover, will be irrevocably compromised in terrain where there are precious few trees left, and any new trees will have a terrible time growing, due to the almost continual buffeting winds and our new rabbit problem - people releasing domestic rabbits into "the wild" (illegal and destructive beyond belief).
In the vicinity of my new garden, built last spring/summer I have already seen cedar waxwings, anna's and rufous hummingbirds, goldfinches, western tanagers, garter snakes, tree frogs, all kinds and sizes of hawks, eagles, ospreys, pileated and downy woodpeckers, and much much more. I have heard several kinds of owls at night. Where will these creatures live without their homeland trees? What will hold stormwater and polluted road runoff from flooding in the lowlands, if not tree roots?
The Mount Baker Road Widening Project is at best, unnecessary. At worst, it's a long-term tragedy that will do immeasurable harm. Why is this being done? Supposedly, for safety and visibility on "dangerous" Mount Baker Road, which runs through a large category 1 and 2 wetland. Having lived here for 30 years, I can tell you that Mount Baker Road was a lot safer before Public Works's last project, the "truck bypass route" which many trucks don't use anyway. They made two promontory-type corners and don't have the manpower to maintain them so the visibility is terrible. There have been more serious accidents and fatalities, not less. The so-called trail is in a wetland and underwater most of the year; some parts all year long so people have to walk out in the shoulder-less roadway. Couldn't they have fixed the trail with a berm and flow pipes for a whole lot less money and carnage?
How does making this road into a highway where people can now do 70mph instead of 50, safer? Public Works refuses to acknowledge the part that excessive speeding, alcohol and drug impairment, and inappropriate cell phone use are the top contributors to accidents and fatalities. Their solution? Get state and EPA grants and keep the engineers employed and happy. SO... for the benefit of the few, the many must suffer. Same old tired song and I'm sick of hearing this discordant music. I'm mad and sad as hell.
Most of the trees on the North side of Mount Baker Road from Terrill Beach Road to Buck Park will be cut. The rest may not stand, depending on the treatment of the land by heavy equipment. The smaller trees protect the larger ones, as we can see by the sad example of the Mount Property Constructed Wetland Project, where the tall pines are drowning and being pushed over by the strong winds that prevail in Eastsound.
What do we stand to lose with each mature or maturing tree cut? How much water filtration do we lose? How many bird's nests? Tree frogs? Salamanders? Raptors? Bats? Beneficial insects? How much shade and shelter and windbreak do we lose? How much life does one tree support? Who speaks for that life, for all those lives? Are any planners and engineers asking these questions and will they take time from their desks and go out in the field, as gardeners do, and observe the life around them, over seasons? Over years?
What can you really say? How much broken-heartedness can a person take? How can that be used to make the world a better place; not by force but by gentleness? How can one turn fierce anger into an ally that will stand up and say "NO MORE CARNAGE?" I am now so cynical that I can understand why people just give up and decide to be selfish and "me" oriented. Bah. May as well just do art and garden and try to enjoy the few years or days we have left. But thoughts haunt: who will speak for the trees? For the next seven generations of humankind? For our great nieces or children or grandchildren?
If this blog had followers in numbers like facebook pages, then maybe some people would offer up solutions, ideas, prayers - because we need every one of us to stop going in this planet-destroying direction we are heading. Meanwhile, I hope we all take seconds and moments, as often as we can, make it our meditation and mindfulness practice to appreciate and give thanks for what is here and give that forth to the land, the waters, and their marvelous resident and migratory creatures. This earth needs to feel our love and thanks, now more than ever.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Questions handed in to Public Works on Feb. 15, 2011 re: Mount Property Stormwater Facility
Here are a bunch of questions written to PW on February 15, 2011 and handed in at a Stormwater Aesthetics meeting to their representative engineer, Shannon Wilbur.
How many of these questions were addressed by Public Works? It would be good to compile follow-through documentation on this.
“Thousand Questions” re: Mount Property Stormwater Treatment Facility
1) If, according to BAS, wetlands shouldn’t be used for stormwater treatment facilities if there’s any chance of negatively impacting groundwater in sensitive aquifers, how does this plan prevent groundwater or potable water pollution?
2) If this wetland, as-is, can handle normal seasonal runoff (and we’ve had one of the wettest winters on record), isn’t there a way to divert stormwater runoff someplace near the wetlland (ie into a culvert or a pond off-site) that could be slowly absorbed back into the ground rather than into Fishing Bay, and leave the wetland as-is except for canary grass removal and a little gentle grading and splitting of flow? (Michael B’s idea from what he observed while walking the wetland several times.)
3) Regarding future piping from Fern Street and any other piping to this facility being planned: everything I’ve read so far says that stormwater should be diverted away from wetlands, not into them. Would you please point me to science that shares the opposite view?
4) When planning this stormwater treatment facility, how much was future buildout considered? If this connects to future projects, have those been mapped out? What are the piping and other treatment facilities that will tie into this? How can we see those in connection and relation to this first step?
5) How will this facility affect abutting wetlands? What will happen to them as they get filled and more impervious surfaces put into them, more alluvial soils displaced, and more chopping up of the Eastsound Swale into smaller and smaller separated pieces?
6) Is anything at all being done to protect the rest of Eastsound Swale from having to take stormwater and thus we’d lose more tree habitat? (Most of the willows were unfortunately already cut down along lovers land and Enchanted Forest Road.)
7) Since science seems to point to natural functioning wetlands being always preferable over engineered wetlands, I’m wondering how we got to this plan. Is it just that we had no other choice, based on science and geography?
8) Mindy seemed to think that Amanda drew up an alternate plan that was less radical than this one and more natural than engineered. Is that plan available for public perusal?
9) Wetlands, even drained and filled, can be restored if the alluvial soils are left intact. (EPA). What will happen to the alluvial soil? If removed, why, and why not returned to the site? There are some grants for restoration. Should we explore that angle for the rest of the impacted parts of the Swale?
10) Many of the BAS documents on stormwater and wetlands that I read said that detention and retention ponds are being over-used and that the latest BAS studies show that they are doing more harm to wetlands than good, and that ponds can ruin a wetland's function within 20 years due to various factors. Was this considered in the engineering? If there is science disproving this, please point me to those documents, because I’m not finding them.
11) Not one engineered wetland I’ve seen (in the many docs I studied) showed an engineered wetland planted with trees. They all seem to be grassland and marshland. Why is it that these are chosen over tree filtration systems. Can’t trees be planted that would thrive in wet conditions and grow, like the island willows we once had everywhere and have all been destroyed for development? If trees keep wetland life warmer in winter and cooler in summer due to shading and protection, this destroys the ecological balance of that area.
12) I read in the scientific documents that if a potential site’s climate is dry in summer for more than two months, (as the San Juans are), a pond system wetland is not a good pick because the ponds should not be allowed to dry out and the chance of pollutant spread was greater if heavy rains followed a dry summer. Was this considered? How will that be handled? What will be done to provide shade and organic refuse for the ponds, since tree cover will no longer shade the water?
13) making new “edges” (from cutting down trees and excavation) encourages noxious weed proliferation near and into the wetlands (i.e. hawthorn trees replace more desirable willows, blackberries replace nootka rose). Herbaceous perennials and annuals are taken over by invasive plants such as canary reed grass. How will the existing reed canary grass problem be addressed? Blackberry? Edge buffers for the new edges created? Have you considered the rabbit problem in Eastsound?
14) My readings of wetland science suggest that sun, although it can be good for “cleaning” ponds (although I doubt it gets hot enough here), changes the temperature, and that many fish and amphibians are negatively impacted (fatally) by temperature changes of even a few degrees. We lost most of our salamander and frog population due to Enchanted Forest Road being put on top of the swale right over their breeding grounds. What is being done by the County and Public Works to protect the rest of what’s left, and are you working with the Army Corps of Engineers, state DOE, fish and wildlife, and the EPA to protect these critical areas aquifers?
15) Who will maintain the wetland facility after major soil disturbance? Who will regularly maintain and weed-out the inevitable thistle, teasel, and other noxious weeds that follow? Based on the county’s maintenance of other projects due to personnel shortages, I do not feel hopeful that this facility will be properly maintained and monitored.
16) What will major tree removal do to songbird, bat, and amphibian insect catchers in terms of foraging, mating, and breeding sites, which we’re already losing fast or have lost within the UGA? Can we afford to lose any more of their habitat?
17) Since all that I have read says that tree roots have great filtering capabilities, especially conifers, are there any examples of “treed” natural wetlands used as stormwater treatment facilities? If so, would you direct me to links or documents?
18) What can possibly replace trees, aesthetically, for the kind of height and natural backdrop that we’re used to seeing behind the band shell? The band shell was built to be part of an environment which included trees for backdrop. Loss of trees will destroy the scale and scope of the design. Can we plant pines or some other type of small or narrow conifers along the Eastern edge of the wetland to shield our view and help keep late afternoon sun out of our eyes when viewing concerts? (the trees did this for us late afternoon and early evening)
19) What will be done to keep people from walking all over the wetland area if the wetland dries up in summer, which seems probable?
20) What will keep the ponds from becoming mosquito breeding grounds and who will maintain weeds around them? Will the ponds contain aquatic plants?
21) If soil is being excavated out two feet deep or more, aren’t we infiltrating the groundwater and aquifer supply?
22) What is the life (in years) of this kind of facility before it needs to be “re-engineered?”
23) Is a 60 foot long, ten foot wide concrete ramp really necessary to clean the north pond? Can the pond be moved East to mitigate that, or can some temporary metal mesh type material be used to roll out and put down atop a much more minimal concrete structure (perhaps even mostly underwater) when the excavator or backhoe needs to clean the pond, and then rolled back up?
24) How often will the pond need to be cleaned?
25) Has anyone heard of an exciting new thing in possible pollutant cleaning of wetlands – mycology? There has been good success with mycology in forest restoration. Results have been promising in studying mushrooms’ ability to absorb and “eat” pollutants and when tested, the mushrooms are shown to be “clean.” Can we explore this as a potential treatment for pollutants? See Paul Stamets How Mushrooms Can Save the World. Mr. Stamets is a highly sought expert on this subject and how mycology is helping stormwater pollutant absorption.
26) What will be done about the potential litter problem that, so far, is kept to a minimum by tree and shrub buffers and mostly impenetrable wetlands, but is a problem in existing trails? Who will regularly clean up the litter?
27) Is it possible that rather than put the east-west trail right next to the pond, it can go more on the perimeter of the wetland and thus have less foot traffic disturbance of the wetland?
28) How do rain gardens tie in with this facility plan and stormwater in general? How will you give the public incentive to utilize them?
29) What is being planned in terms of culverts and aprons in Eastsound?
30) I would hope that any tree removal/upheaval NOT be done in nesting season and until fledglings have flown.
31) Why was this project chosen here, when the bulk of pollutants are running down Main Street in the ditches and directly polluting Fishing Bay through stormwater outflow pipes?
32) What is being done to consider futurity, 20 years out? 50 years out? How does this project help with that? How many more functioning wetlands will be destroyed to make engineered stormwater treatment facilities, which are not suggested for existing functioning wetlands, according to state and federal laws and the Clean Water Act?
Kim’s Input- Went to the constructed wetland plan workshop today
I would like to know more re:>
~ toxics testing and sediment dredge schedule
~out flow pipe monitoring plan- scouring
~buffering the existing true adjacent wetland and
~risks involved in damage to this preexisting adjacent healthy wetland by altering upstream w/ constructed wetlands
~and when i look closely i question if this small tx site is able to handle the volume present, much less the increase load that comes w/ future development, plus increased impervious surface = what mechanisms are in place to handle overflow?
~I would like public to be aware of the presence of the creatures in the bay where this water is being pumped out.
~ Please go to the beach watchers website and republish photos and information from our data on surfactants
Some documents I requested may be able to answer the drainage and runoff questions interspersed throughout.
Thanks for considering these questions, thoughts, ideas, and concerns. Please understand that Eastsound is home to many of us, and we love and want to protect it. I remember the Swale when it was far more diverse in functionality, vegetation and wildlife, and don’t want to keep losing it piecemeal until it’s so destroyed it can be reclassified to “unregulated” and finished off by rampant and poorly planned development.
Sincerely, Sadie Bailey – Eastsound resident
How many of these questions were addressed by Public Works? It would be good to compile follow-through documentation on this.
“Thousand Questions” re: Mount Property Stormwater Treatment Facility
1) If, according to BAS, wetlands shouldn’t be used for stormwater treatment facilities if there’s any chance of negatively impacting groundwater in sensitive aquifers, how does this plan prevent groundwater or potable water pollution?
2) If this wetland, as-is, can handle normal seasonal runoff (and we’ve had one of the wettest winters on record), isn’t there a way to divert stormwater runoff someplace near the wetlland (ie into a culvert or a pond off-site) that could be slowly absorbed back into the ground rather than into Fishing Bay, and leave the wetland as-is except for canary grass removal and a little gentle grading and splitting of flow? (Michael B’s idea from what he observed while walking the wetland several times.)
3) Regarding future piping from Fern Street and any other piping to this facility being planned: everything I’ve read so far says that stormwater should be diverted away from wetlands, not into them. Would you please point me to science that shares the opposite view?
4) When planning this stormwater treatment facility, how much was future buildout considered? If this connects to future projects, have those been mapped out? What are the piping and other treatment facilities that will tie into this? How can we see those in connection and relation to this first step?
5) How will this facility affect abutting wetlands? What will happen to them as they get filled and more impervious surfaces put into them, more alluvial soils displaced, and more chopping up of the Eastsound Swale into smaller and smaller separated pieces?
6) Is anything at all being done to protect the rest of Eastsound Swale from having to take stormwater and thus we’d lose more tree habitat? (Most of the willows were unfortunately already cut down along lovers land and Enchanted Forest Road.)
7) Since science seems to point to natural functioning wetlands being always preferable over engineered wetlands, I’m wondering how we got to this plan. Is it just that we had no other choice, based on science and geography?
8) Mindy seemed to think that Amanda drew up an alternate plan that was less radical than this one and more natural than engineered. Is that plan available for public perusal?
9) Wetlands, even drained and filled, can be restored if the alluvial soils are left intact. (EPA). What will happen to the alluvial soil? If removed, why, and why not returned to the site? There are some grants for restoration. Should we explore that angle for the rest of the impacted parts of the Swale?
10) Many of the BAS documents on stormwater and wetlands that I read said that detention and retention ponds are being over-used and that the latest BAS studies show that they are doing more harm to wetlands than good, and that ponds can ruin a wetland's function within 20 years due to various factors. Was this considered in the engineering? If there is science disproving this, please point me to those documents, because I’m not finding them.
11) Not one engineered wetland I’ve seen (in the many docs I studied) showed an engineered wetland planted with trees. They all seem to be grassland and marshland. Why is it that these are chosen over tree filtration systems. Can’t trees be planted that would thrive in wet conditions and grow, like the island willows we once had everywhere and have all been destroyed for development? If trees keep wetland life warmer in winter and cooler in summer due to shading and protection, this destroys the ecological balance of that area.
12) I read in the scientific documents that if a potential site’s climate is dry in summer for more than two months, (as the San Juans are), a pond system wetland is not a good pick because the ponds should not be allowed to dry out and the chance of pollutant spread was greater if heavy rains followed a dry summer. Was this considered? How will that be handled? What will be done to provide shade and organic refuse for the ponds, since tree cover will no longer shade the water?
13) making new “edges” (from cutting down trees and excavation) encourages noxious weed proliferation near and into the wetlands (i.e. hawthorn trees replace more desirable willows, blackberries replace nootka rose). Herbaceous perennials and annuals are taken over by invasive plants such as canary reed grass. How will the existing reed canary grass problem be addressed? Blackberry? Edge buffers for the new edges created? Have you considered the rabbit problem in Eastsound?
14) My readings of wetland science suggest that sun, although it can be good for “cleaning” ponds (although I doubt it gets hot enough here), changes the temperature, and that many fish and amphibians are negatively impacted (fatally) by temperature changes of even a few degrees. We lost most of our salamander and frog population due to Enchanted Forest Road being put on top of the swale right over their breeding grounds. What is being done by the County and Public Works to protect the rest of what’s left, and are you working with the Army Corps of Engineers, state DOE, fish and wildlife, and the EPA to protect these critical areas aquifers?
15) Who will maintain the wetland facility after major soil disturbance? Who will regularly maintain and weed-out the inevitable thistle, teasel, and other noxious weeds that follow? Based on the county’s maintenance of other projects due to personnel shortages, I do not feel hopeful that this facility will be properly maintained and monitored.
16) What will major tree removal do to songbird, bat, and amphibian insect catchers in terms of foraging, mating, and breeding sites, which we’re already losing fast or have lost within the UGA? Can we afford to lose any more of their habitat?
17) Since all that I have read says that tree roots have great filtering capabilities, especially conifers, are there any examples of “treed” natural wetlands used as stormwater treatment facilities? If so, would you direct me to links or documents?
18) What can possibly replace trees, aesthetically, for the kind of height and natural backdrop that we’re used to seeing behind the band shell? The band shell was built to be part of an environment which included trees for backdrop. Loss of trees will destroy the scale and scope of the design. Can we plant pines or some other type of small or narrow conifers along the Eastern edge of the wetland to shield our view and help keep late afternoon sun out of our eyes when viewing concerts? (the trees did this for us late afternoon and early evening)
19) What will be done to keep people from walking all over the wetland area if the wetland dries up in summer, which seems probable?
20) What will keep the ponds from becoming mosquito breeding grounds and who will maintain weeds around them? Will the ponds contain aquatic plants?
21) If soil is being excavated out two feet deep or more, aren’t we infiltrating the groundwater and aquifer supply?
22) What is the life (in years) of this kind of facility before it needs to be “re-engineered?”
23) Is a 60 foot long, ten foot wide concrete ramp really necessary to clean the north pond? Can the pond be moved East to mitigate that, or can some temporary metal mesh type material be used to roll out and put down atop a much more minimal concrete structure (perhaps even mostly underwater) when the excavator or backhoe needs to clean the pond, and then rolled back up?
24) How often will the pond need to be cleaned?
25) Has anyone heard of an exciting new thing in possible pollutant cleaning of wetlands – mycology? There has been good success with mycology in forest restoration. Results have been promising in studying mushrooms’ ability to absorb and “eat” pollutants and when tested, the mushrooms are shown to be “clean.” Can we explore this as a potential treatment for pollutants? See Paul Stamets How Mushrooms Can Save the World. Mr. Stamets is a highly sought expert on this subject and how mycology is helping stormwater pollutant absorption.
26) What will be done about the potential litter problem that, so far, is kept to a minimum by tree and shrub buffers and mostly impenetrable wetlands, but is a problem in existing trails? Who will regularly clean up the litter?
27) Is it possible that rather than put the east-west trail right next to the pond, it can go more on the perimeter of the wetland and thus have less foot traffic disturbance of the wetland?
28) How do rain gardens tie in with this facility plan and stormwater in general? How will you give the public incentive to utilize them?
29) What is being planned in terms of culverts and aprons in Eastsound?
30) I would hope that any tree removal/upheaval NOT be done in nesting season and until fledglings have flown.
31) Why was this project chosen here, when the bulk of pollutants are running down Main Street in the ditches and directly polluting Fishing Bay through stormwater outflow pipes?
32) What is being done to consider futurity, 20 years out? 50 years out? How does this project help with that? How many more functioning wetlands will be destroyed to make engineered stormwater treatment facilities, which are not suggested for existing functioning wetlands, according to state and federal laws and the Clean Water Act?
Kim’s Input- Went to the constructed wetland plan workshop today
I would like to know more re:>
~ toxics testing and sediment dredge schedule
~out flow pipe monitoring plan- scouring
~buffering the existing true adjacent wetland and
~risks involved in damage to this preexisting adjacent healthy wetland by altering upstream w/ constructed wetlands
~and when i look closely i question if this small tx site is able to handle the volume present, much less the increase load that comes w/ future development, plus increased impervious surface = what mechanisms are in place to handle overflow?
~I would like public to be aware of the presence of the creatures in the bay where this water is being pumped out.
~ Please go to the beach watchers website and republish photos and information from our data on surfactants
Some documents I requested may be able to answer the drainage and runoff questions interspersed throughout.
Thanks for considering these questions, thoughts, ideas, and concerns. Please understand that Eastsound is home to many of us, and we love and want to protect it. I remember the Swale when it was far more diverse in functionality, vegetation and wildlife, and don’t want to keep losing it piecemeal until it’s so destroyed it can be reclassified to “unregulated” and finished off by rampant and poorly planned development.
Sincerely, Sadie Bailey – Eastsound resident
Mount Property Stormwater Treatment Facility - and some thoughts after the final Public Works "Open House"
First of all, my deepest apologies to all of the non-human the inhabitants of the mixed-forest Ecosystem dwelling on the Mount Property; tree beings, plant beings, birds, frogs, salamanders, bats, bees, and other creatures - for not following through and insisting that public Works give us a much better publicized open house after Mid- July. I dropped the ball. Secondly, equally heartfelt apologies to the Citizens who don't yet know what will hit them, especially the citizens of the UGA and the people who worked hard at the Stormwater Facility Aesthetics meetings. No excuses will cut it, but burnout and exhaustion and a broken heart all contributed to the ball drop. This was NOT the time to drop the ball! I feel I let you all down. I let myself down, and the few people who wanted to stop this project or stall it until sanity prevailed. I wish I could have done more for you all instead of retreating. I had to walk away. I wish I didn't have to, could have managed it. This is a set of questions I drafted in June, and apparently never sent to the Aesthetics Committee for feedback and brainstorming. I want it here for posterity.
***********************
email from June 17, 2011
Hello.
I want to thank everyone on the Aesthetics Committee and concerned citizens for their input on the Mount Property Stormwater Facility. I apologize for not contacting Shannon about another open house. I left the ball in her court with the last email I sent her, which was unwise. Frankly, I dropped the ball. If that open house was going to happen, I should have kept at her to do it. I didn't. Had to walk away. I'm sorry, and feel that I let us all down. Still having a very hard time with this project's immanence, and still feel upset that they're going through with this plan. But if not for you people, it would have been worse - so thank you for your time, efforts, and energy. It was a pleasure to watch you all work together and brainstorm your good ideas and intelligent questions and concerns and make the best of a less than ideal situation.
For what it's worth, I'd still like to hear your input on the process if you feel like taking the time; especially any questions you have that are still unresolved, any new questions or concerns. Below is the original draft of concerns to present to your perusal, the public, and PW before the open house that never followed. Thanks again.
Sadie
***********************
Written June 17
Public Works has made some concessions, thanks to good input from Michael and Fred. But from what Shannon said yesterday, I have questions and maybe some of you do too. I would like to compile a list of questions we already asked, questions still to ask, and any answers you got and how satisfied or concerned you are with the answers you got.
The biggies that stand out for me are maintenance and monitoring,. PW consistently seems to run out of money when a big project is done, and they don't seem to factor-in operational, maintenance, suppliy, or monitoring costs. A look at their projects would point to the fact that there might be little to no maintenance and a bigger load on the workers, and this is a concern.
What will happen to the standing trees without tree support in an extreme wind tunnel, and the visual shock of no taller greenery in places where people are used to seeing it? Is the public at all prepared for what they're going to see, including all the old and new commercial construction which will now be visible?
How are affected neighbors feeling, and what suggestions do they have to minimize any negative visual impacts? How will these be satisfied? What has been promised?
Shannon addressed the question of hawthorn seedlings; she said that PW would pull them at the "annual maintenance." Does this mean that they actually think they can weed only once per year? Yikes; terrifying thought.What about the reed canary grass, holly, blackberry, and other weed seedlings that birds and wind will bring in? did anyone find out how often PW plans to weed? Water?
Did anyone talk with mindy? Do you think she is going to bid on the planting job or was she present to write another article for Bullwings? Has anyone contacted Ted T about bidding on the plantings or his thoughts on this project or alternatives he would propose? (Moot questions, since Robin K got the bid; but I'd still like to know Ted's take on things.)
What kind of job do you think Orcas Ex will do on the bulldoze/grade/etc? Sensitive? Not?
Monitoring.... Did anyone hear (and get in writing) what they were planning to do for testing and monitoring? This is hugely important, since this is the whole reason the facility is being engineered. What are the actual plans for monitoring? How will they be implemented? By whom? How often? For what will they test? How much will it cost, now and in the long term? Are there written plans and figures for the public to see?
Why do they have to move the berm further south and thus sacrifice the native crabapples and young scoulers willows on the SW corner? Shannon said it was because they had to make the basin bigger to make up for the shallower settling ponds. Can't that be done instead with gentle meandering grading and mounding? Thoughts?
People who attended the open house; would you please weigh in on what questions you asked and what responses you got? I still think this is important to get documented for including in the public records on this project.
Does anyone know if a representative from the Tribes will be present to be sure that no middens are disturbed? Who would contact Tribal officials - PW? Can we follow through to see if this was done?
Although i am pleased that Michael's and Fred's input at least had some better effect, i still feel that more can be done to minimize the impact without compromising the function of the constructed wetland; and far more cheaply, leaving more money for monitoring and operations. Is this reasoning off base? Anyone else feeling this way too? Ideas?
I missed the bid walk-through at the end of June. Did anyone tag along and see where the trees had been marked more clearly regarding what stays and goes? I asked that they mark the trees and delineation of the existing wetland still staying.
What do you think of PW's answer about the discrepancy between the Polaris map and what the wetland expert said is the existing wetland? I attribute that discrepancy to more degradation of the Swale, thus making it appear to be a less sensitive or important wetland. But all this and more was all once a part of Eastsound Swale. Where does degradation factor in? What will happen to the alluvial soil being removed from this site? It is supposed to be put back, and if tarped, probably could. It's important to save the alluvial soil so the wetland can recover if this plan doesn't work out, and I am skeptical that it will work out, from all the science I have read on emergent wetland stormwater treatment facilities.
Anyone want to document a "maturity count" of trees bigger than 12" diameter at chest height? That would be good to do, unless PW already did that and it's obtainable. If so, would someone please direct me to that link or whom to ask for the documents on that?
If Shannon agrees to another open house, late July, this would be helpful. We can then present accurately to the public what's been answered and what still has holes. That date is fast approaching. (MOOT - too bad. The public should have been more involved in this process)
Who got to see the final planting list? Any red flags there? Has anyone seen copies of this on PW website or in the library, as promised?
all the best,
Sadie
***********************
email from June 17, 2011
Hello.
I want to thank everyone on the Aesthetics Committee and concerned citizens for their input on the Mount Property Stormwater Facility. I apologize for not contacting Shannon about another open house. I left the ball in her court with the last email I sent her, which was unwise. Frankly, I dropped the ball. If that open house was going to happen, I should have kept at her to do it. I didn't. Had to walk away. I'm sorry, and feel that I let us all down. Still having a very hard time with this project's immanence, and still feel upset that they're going through with this plan. But if not for you people, it would have been worse - so thank you for your time, efforts, and energy. It was a pleasure to watch you all work together and brainstorm your good ideas and intelligent questions and concerns and make the best of a less than ideal situation.
For what it's worth, I'd still like to hear your input on the process if you feel like taking the time; especially any questions you have that are still unresolved, any new questions or concerns. Below is the original draft of concerns to present to your perusal, the public, and PW before the open house that never followed. Thanks again.
Sadie
***********************
Written June 17
Public Works has made some concessions, thanks to good input from Michael and Fred. But from what Shannon said yesterday, I have questions and maybe some of you do too. I would like to compile a list of questions we already asked, questions still to ask, and any answers you got and how satisfied or concerned you are with the answers you got.
The biggies that stand out for me are maintenance and monitoring,. PW consistently seems to run out of money when a big project is done, and they don't seem to factor-in operational, maintenance, suppliy, or monitoring costs. A look at their projects would point to the fact that there might be little to no maintenance and a bigger load on the workers, and this is a concern.
What will happen to the standing trees without tree support in an extreme wind tunnel, and the visual shock of no taller greenery in places where people are used to seeing it? Is the public at all prepared for what they're going to see, including all the old and new commercial construction which will now be visible?
How are affected neighbors feeling, and what suggestions do they have to minimize any negative visual impacts? How will these be satisfied? What has been promised?
Shannon addressed the question of hawthorn seedlings; she said that PW would pull them at the "annual maintenance." Does this mean that they actually think they can weed only once per year? Yikes; terrifying thought.What about the reed canary grass, holly, blackberry, and other weed seedlings that birds and wind will bring in? did anyone find out how often PW plans to weed? Water?
Did anyone talk with mindy? Do you think she is going to bid on the planting job or was she present to write another article for Bullwings? Has anyone contacted Ted T about bidding on the plantings or his thoughts on this project or alternatives he would propose? (Moot questions, since Robin K got the bid; but I'd still like to know Ted's take on things.)
What kind of job do you think Orcas Ex will do on the bulldoze/grade/etc? Sensitive? Not?
Monitoring.... Did anyone hear (and get in writing) what they were planning to do for testing and monitoring? This is hugely important, since this is the whole reason the facility is being engineered. What are the actual plans for monitoring? How will they be implemented? By whom? How often? For what will they test? How much will it cost, now and in the long term? Are there written plans and figures for the public to see?
Why do they have to move the berm further south and thus sacrifice the native crabapples and young scoulers willows on the SW corner? Shannon said it was because they had to make the basin bigger to make up for the shallower settling ponds. Can't that be done instead with gentle meandering grading and mounding? Thoughts?
People who attended the open house; would you please weigh in on what questions you asked and what responses you got? I still think this is important to get documented for including in the public records on this project.
Does anyone know if a representative from the Tribes will be present to be sure that no middens are disturbed? Who would contact Tribal officials - PW? Can we follow through to see if this was done?
Although i am pleased that Michael's and Fred's input at least had some better effect, i still feel that more can be done to minimize the impact without compromising the function of the constructed wetland; and far more cheaply, leaving more money for monitoring and operations. Is this reasoning off base? Anyone else feeling this way too? Ideas?
I missed the bid walk-through at the end of June. Did anyone tag along and see where the trees had been marked more clearly regarding what stays and goes? I asked that they mark the trees and delineation of the existing wetland still staying.
What do you think of PW's answer about the discrepancy between the Polaris map and what the wetland expert said is the existing wetland? I attribute that discrepancy to more degradation of the Swale, thus making it appear to be a less sensitive or important wetland. But all this and more was all once a part of Eastsound Swale. Where does degradation factor in? What will happen to the alluvial soil being removed from this site? It is supposed to be put back, and if tarped, probably could. It's important to save the alluvial soil so the wetland can recover if this plan doesn't work out, and I am skeptical that it will work out, from all the science I have read on emergent wetland stormwater treatment facilities.
Anyone want to document a "maturity count" of trees bigger than 12" diameter at chest height? That would be good to do, unless PW already did that and it's obtainable. If so, would someone please direct me to that link or whom to ask for the documents on that?
If Shannon agrees to another open house, late July, this would be helpful. We can then present accurately to the public what's been answered and what still has holes. That date is fast approaching. (MOOT - too bad. The public should have been more involved in this process)
Who got to see the final planting list? Any red flags there? Has anyone seen copies of this on PW website or in the library, as promised?
all the best,
Sadie
RE: the Sounder's August 24 article on the Critical Areas Ordinance
Well done. Interesting article and thanks for the sensitive coverage.
Huh. As one of the 50% of us who must live in the UGA for economic reasons, seeing working homeowners and first time buyers with modest incomes forced to hook up to sewer at exhorbitant rates for our all-too-low incomes; as I see more and more UGA homes get foreclosed, and as I watch our trees die due to water diversion, poor planning and siting, overbuilding for a population that may or may not occupy the businesses being built; and as I watch certain commercial developers' unscrupulosity and the county repeatedly "missing" important environmental regulations put in place to protect places like Eastsound Swale - I take offense to Richard Fralick's insulting misbelief that we need little or no buffers protecting our critical areas in the UGA and elsewhere. I also rankle every time Mr. Fralick mentions that the "county can do whatever it wants" and his idea that "big dumb buffers" must go. I think the EPA and the State would also find alarming the idea that the County Council feels it can relax most or all environmental protections on one of our largest - if not the largest - category 2 wetland on the island. And, as the article points out, Eastsound has two of the largest category 2 wetlands out of 5. (Lopez Village UGA faces similar environmental issues.)
It insults our intelligence and care and stewardship of a part of the Island (Eastsound Basin) that affects all other parts due to its geological vulnerability, infrastructure, and shoreline habitat. Fishing Bay is one of the few herring spawning places on the Island. The waters do not flush out, thus everything we dump into it stays there.
Some of us are tired of seeing rampant commercial development going through in the UGA, with no EIS, no ramifications, and much of the time, repeat violators obtaining no legal permits - while homeowners get the brunt of the enforcement and heavy-handedness from CD&P, so I agree to a certain extent with property rights viewpoints and their concerns - provided that we all remember that our first mandate is to protect Critical Areas, while balancing the rest of the14 points in our County Charter.
I don't mind "giving a little" and compromise. I understand that all of us must give a little in order to have a situation that is fair. But it seems to me that the low and middle income people forced to live in the UGAs are giving up a lot - almost everything; and they have neither the time nor the money to fight the real deep pockets - those bent on profit first, even if it means destroying the Critical Areas there. Then when any of us tries to stop the destruction, we are seen as dragging the county down. The fact is, the County dragged itself down, and dragged its feet on the CAO for YEARS; thus we have lost a lot of grant opportunities and monies that would have helped to protect our Critical Areas and given the County a financial hand in doing it, and now the larger government will be ineffective to help us, due to attacks on the EPA and DOE.
For years, some of us have said repeatedly that Eastsound was a lousy place for a UGA - it's geographically, geologically, a hazard!. It contains sensitive areas everywhere. It is a narrow land bridge between two steep hills, at sea level. Nobody listened and nobody is listening now. The Growth Management Act doesn't only say that 50% of us must live in a UGA. It also says that we are mandated to protect our critical areas (even in a UGA). The UGA puts the burden on those who can least afford the time or the money to fight rampant commercial development in an area that is supposed to be slated for housing 50% of us, which none of us chose! It seems a little "sprawl" could happen in villages and hamlets and on the other 99% of the islands, thus unburdening us of a bit of our fate. If a tsunami hits Eastsound (likely) this discussion will all be moot because 50% of us and our housing will be washed away.
The decisions being made this year and next will affect all of us, long term. Can we all agree to some compromise, or will 50% of us be the sacrificial lambs for the wants of the rest?
If anyone else in the UGA is interested in more visionary planning and saving our Critical Areas from destruction (outsiders welcome!), then we need some intelligent dialogue, long-term visionary planning and actions to address our conflicting issues in a balanced way. Perhaps it's time for a UGA Citizens' Watchdog Group if the County won't do its job to protect our critical areas. Interested parties, please contact me. I'm in the phone book; or stop and talk with me at Island Market.
Huh. As one of the 50% of us who must live in the UGA for economic reasons, seeing working homeowners and first time buyers with modest incomes forced to hook up to sewer at exhorbitant rates for our all-too-low incomes; as I see more and more UGA homes get foreclosed, and as I watch our trees die due to water diversion, poor planning and siting, overbuilding for a population that may or may not occupy the businesses being built; and as I watch certain commercial developers' unscrupulosity and the county repeatedly "missing" important environmental regulations put in place to protect places like Eastsound Swale - I take offense to Richard Fralick's insulting misbelief that we need little or no buffers protecting our critical areas in the UGA and elsewhere. I also rankle every time Mr. Fralick mentions that the "county can do whatever it wants" and his idea that "big dumb buffers" must go. I think the EPA and the State would also find alarming the idea that the County Council feels it can relax most or all environmental protections on one of our largest - if not the largest - category 2 wetland on the island. And, as the article points out, Eastsound has two of the largest category 2 wetlands out of 5. (Lopez Village UGA faces similar environmental issues.)
It insults our intelligence and care and stewardship of a part of the Island (Eastsound Basin) that affects all other parts due to its geological vulnerability, infrastructure, and shoreline habitat. Fishing Bay is one of the few herring spawning places on the Island. The waters do not flush out, thus everything we dump into it stays there.
Some of us are tired of seeing rampant commercial development going through in the UGA, with no EIS, no ramifications, and much of the time, repeat violators obtaining no legal permits - while homeowners get the brunt of the enforcement and heavy-handedness from CD&P, so I agree to a certain extent with property rights viewpoints and their concerns - provided that we all remember that our first mandate is to protect Critical Areas, while balancing the rest of the14 points in our County Charter.
I don't mind "giving a little" and compromise. I understand that all of us must give a little in order to have a situation that is fair. But it seems to me that the low and middle income people forced to live in the UGAs are giving up a lot - almost everything; and they have neither the time nor the money to fight the real deep pockets - those bent on profit first, even if it means destroying the Critical Areas there. Then when any of us tries to stop the destruction, we are seen as dragging the county down. The fact is, the County dragged itself down, and dragged its feet on the CAO for YEARS; thus we have lost a lot of grant opportunities and monies that would have helped to protect our Critical Areas and given the County a financial hand in doing it, and now the larger government will be ineffective to help us, due to attacks on the EPA and DOE.
For years, some of us have said repeatedly that Eastsound was a lousy place for a UGA - it's geographically, geologically, a hazard!. It contains sensitive areas everywhere. It is a narrow land bridge between two steep hills, at sea level. Nobody listened and nobody is listening now. The Growth Management Act doesn't only say that 50% of us must live in a UGA. It also says that we are mandated to protect our critical areas (even in a UGA). The UGA puts the burden on those who can least afford the time or the money to fight rampant commercial development in an area that is supposed to be slated for housing 50% of us, which none of us chose! It seems a little "sprawl" could happen in villages and hamlets and on the other 99% of the islands, thus unburdening us of a bit of our fate. If a tsunami hits Eastsound (likely) this discussion will all be moot because 50% of us and our housing will be washed away.
The decisions being made this year and next will affect all of us, long term. Can we all agree to some compromise, or will 50% of us be the sacrificial lambs for the wants of the rest?
If anyone else in the UGA is interested in more visionary planning and saving our Critical Areas from destruction (outsiders welcome!), then we need some intelligent dialogue, long-term visionary planning and actions to address our conflicting issues in a balanced way. Perhaps it's time for a UGA Citizens' Watchdog Group if the County won't do its job to protect our critical areas. Interested parties, please contact me. I'm in the phone book; or stop and talk with me at Island Market.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Say Goodbye: September 7; the day the bulldozers begin deconstructing a functional mixed-forest wetland for an "engineered wetland" stormwater treatment facility
Mark your calendars. September 7, 2011.
The grim and, to my mind, horrible, beginning of a dubious experiment will begin on this day. Amid the sounds of grinding engines, scraping blades, chain saw roars, snapping tree limbs and trunks, roots ripping from the earth, amid the scramble of terrified birds, bats, and amphibians to escape the crushing 'dozers and find themselves homeless and possibly doomed to die, amid confused bees with no place to go or winter over - 'progress' is being made by destroying a functional wetland ecosystem that only needed a little help, in order to build an elaborate "engineered wetland stormwater treatment facility."
After June's 'open house' with 3 days notice for a handful of people, no newspaper notifications, the inevitability of this disastrous error looming, and the refusal of Public Works to entertain a low-impact alternative requiring only simple grading with shovels and some low-key clearing with maybe a backhoe - much, much cheaper - I'll admit I just wanted to curl into a fetal ball and suck my thumb until the carnage was over. Only it doesn't end in September. We will be seeing the visual impact of this and the dearth of diversity for a long time to come. Think on how long it took to grow each and every filtering tree. Think of all the bio-diverse life that each tree and shrub houses, shelters, shades. Think of all the mature and maturing trees - all soon to be lost.
To their misguided credit, Public Works actually thinks they are doing the right thing: No blame. But they're sadly mistaken. Besides the small plant specimens picked to stay within the woefully inadequate plant budget, many of which will need to be caged for a long time against the onslaughts of rabbits and deer, there are other crucial issues as yet unaddressed. This site is a wind tunnel in an extreme wind area. This parcel is the last forested piece in this particular north-south strip of land - on a section of Orcas that is only one mile wide and at sea level; Eastsound Urban Growth Area. This area contains a large category two wetland - Eastsound Swale. The stormwater facility parcel was once part of the Swale, and not that long ago. 20 yrs. max. Another pressing question that has yet to be satisfactorily answered is: will the grant money run out with no money left for maintenance (weeding, watering), monitoring of how well the filtering is working, and operational costs? From the other projects done by PW, I feel pessimistic, and pretty sure there'll be no money for operations. So what's the motive for obtaining large grants to engineer elaborate things with no budget to follow through and monitor and maintain?
Then there's the science. Scientific field evidence (some of which is included in the Best Available Science documents for SJC's Critical Areas Ordinance in the Wetlands and Stormwater sections), seems to point to 4 unavoidable facts about why this project is likely to fail:
1) stormwater should be diverted AWAY from an existing functional wetland, not into it. Why? Because they eventually, within 20 years, dry it up, as do sedimentation ponds.
2) After 20 or so years of observing failed and failing "emergent" engineered stormwater treatment facilities, the conclusion from many wetland field scientists is that mixed-forest is, after all, best. (We already have that now.)
3) When you remove alluvial soil from a wetland (which Public Works plans to do), it can't recover; maybe not ever.
4)Sedimentation ponds such as retention and detention ponds (which will be built on this site) are not advised for dryland summer areas (two or more months of dry weather, which is what the San Juans have.)The pollution issue alone of storms after a dry season is scary, and probably a topic for another blog post.
At the end of this post I put up a few pictures of the "proposed stormwater site" that I took in spring. The trees were blooming, the bees were humming, the place was full of life, horsetail softly waving on the forest floor, and the honey smells of blooming flowers. Birds darted among the trees. Coolness and shade, wind shelter, and so many shades of green graced this land. I will not forget.
Walk this land while you still have time. Get in touch with the pulse of Life there. Appreciate all that is there; life in abundance. Say good bye. And vow to be vigilant to never to let a poorly planned, over-engineered project such as this happen again in our "Urban Growth Area" home. We must do better to protect our critical areas.
-
Surround this land with protection and your highest thoughts. Send your love and good energy to the tree-beings and their inhabitants and dependents, that their spirits remain eternal and intact although their bodies will die. Send your healing thoughts to the soils and waters of the wetland, that they be protected. Send your respect to the Native ancestors who might lie here, perhaps in middens. (I hope at least we can have someone on site to observe if there are bones, and stop work if there are.) Send your scientific evidence to Public Works and the Council and ask that it be put into the records. Ask, in whatever fashion you do, that the Universe helps the new plant beings to be nurtured and grow and thrive to heal the land.
The grim and, to my mind, horrible, beginning of a dubious experiment will begin on this day. Amid the sounds of grinding engines, scraping blades, chain saw roars, snapping tree limbs and trunks, roots ripping from the earth, amid the scramble of terrified birds, bats, and amphibians to escape the crushing 'dozers and find themselves homeless and possibly doomed to die, amid confused bees with no place to go or winter over - 'progress' is being made by destroying a functional wetland ecosystem that only needed a little help, in order to build an elaborate "engineered wetland stormwater treatment facility."
After June's 'open house' with 3 days notice for a handful of people, no newspaper notifications, the inevitability of this disastrous error looming, and the refusal of Public Works to entertain a low-impact alternative requiring only simple grading with shovels and some low-key clearing with maybe a backhoe - much, much cheaper - I'll admit I just wanted to curl into a fetal ball and suck my thumb until the carnage was over. Only it doesn't end in September. We will be seeing the visual impact of this and the dearth of diversity for a long time to come. Think on how long it took to grow each and every filtering tree. Think of all the bio-diverse life that each tree and shrub houses, shelters, shades. Think of all the mature and maturing trees - all soon to be lost.
To their misguided credit, Public Works actually thinks they are doing the right thing: No blame. But they're sadly mistaken. Besides the small plant specimens picked to stay within the woefully inadequate plant budget, many of which will need to be caged for a long time against the onslaughts of rabbits and deer, there are other crucial issues as yet unaddressed. This site is a wind tunnel in an extreme wind area. This parcel is the last forested piece in this particular north-south strip of land - on a section of Orcas that is only one mile wide and at sea level; Eastsound Urban Growth Area. This area contains a large category two wetland - Eastsound Swale. The stormwater facility parcel was once part of the Swale, and not that long ago. 20 yrs. max. Another pressing question that has yet to be satisfactorily answered is: will the grant money run out with no money left for maintenance (weeding, watering), monitoring of how well the filtering is working, and operational costs? From the other projects done by PW, I feel pessimistic, and pretty sure there'll be no money for operations. So what's the motive for obtaining large grants to engineer elaborate things with no budget to follow through and monitor and maintain?
Then there's the science. Scientific field evidence (some of which is included in the Best Available Science documents for SJC's Critical Areas Ordinance in the Wetlands and Stormwater sections), seems to point to 4 unavoidable facts about why this project is likely to fail:
1) stormwater should be diverted AWAY from an existing functional wetland, not into it. Why? Because they eventually, within 20 years, dry it up, as do sedimentation ponds.
2) After 20 or so years of observing failed and failing "emergent" engineered stormwater treatment facilities, the conclusion from many wetland field scientists is that mixed-forest is, after all, best. (We already have that now.)
3) When you remove alluvial soil from a wetland (which Public Works plans to do), it can't recover; maybe not ever.
4)Sedimentation ponds such as retention and detention ponds (which will be built on this site) are not advised for dryland summer areas (two or more months of dry weather, which is what the San Juans have.)The pollution issue alone of storms after a dry season is scary, and probably a topic for another blog post.
At the end of this post I put up a few pictures of the "proposed stormwater site" that I took in spring. The trees were blooming, the bees were humming, the place was full of life, horsetail softly waving on the forest floor, and the honey smells of blooming flowers. Birds darted among the trees. Coolness and shade, wind shelter, and so many shades of green graced this land. I will not forget.
Walk this land while you still have time. Get in touch with the pulse of Life there. Appreciate all that is there; life in abundance. Say good bye. And vow to be vigilant to never to let a poorly planned, over-engineered project such as this happen again in our "Urban Growth Area" home. We must do better to protect our critical areas.
-
Surround this land with protection and your highest thoughts. Send your love and good energy to the tree-beings and their inhabitants and dependents, that their spirits remain eternal and intact although their bodies will die. Send your healing thoughts to the soils and waters of the wetland, that they be protected. Send your respect to the Native ancestors who might lie here, perhaps in middens. (I hope at least we can have someone on site to observe if there are bones, and stop work if there are.) Send your scientific evidence to Public Works and the Council and ask that it be put into the records. Ask, in whatever fashion you do, that the Universe helps the new plant beings to be nurtured and grow and thrive to heal the land.
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