Citizen groups keep pressure on county, OPALCO regarding VRs and dam removal

— by Matthew Gilbert, Orcas Issues reporter —

In what seems to be an emerging trend here on this increasingly feisty archipelago, citizens are coming together to resist decisions being made that don’t reflect the “will of the people” or at least as close as that will can be determined. Three such cases have been foremost in just the last few months:

• The Port of Orcas – Despite overwhelming resistance to the most aggressive version of a 20-year Master Plan that would significantly reshape north Orcas, Port commissioners (along with a Seattle-based consulting firm) ignored public pushback and approved it. Most of those commissioners are now gone, replaced in the last election by a group that seems much more wary of the Plan’s ambitions and in a position to scale some or most of them back.
• OPALCO – The county’s member-owned utility cooperative recently took a position formally opposing the removal of Lower Snake River dams. Research has shown that dam removal would greatly improve the survival rate of spawning salmon just when our endangered Orca population need them most – in the spring. It would also eliminate an arguably critical source of hydroelectric energy capacity while making it harder for wheat farmers to ship their harvest. The issue for members of the Environmental Action Team (EAT) of the Orcas Women’s Coalition (OWC) is less about choosing one option over the other – though the group is firmly in the dam removal camp – than in how OPALCO came to its decision: without informed member input. Along with other environmental groups, EAT is asking OPALCO to rescind the resolution and put the decision to a vote as per the co-op’s own bylaws and policies.
• Vacation Rentals – As has been well-documented in this journal, a local group on Orcas Island has been the driving force behind calls for a deeper understanding of VR impacts and the possible need for stronger regulatory controls. Emboldened both by a petition for a moratorium that has exceeded 2,000 signatures (countywide and beyond) and an invitation by county commissioners to propose specific ideas for regulating VR growth, the group delivered a letter to the Council dated December 18. The letter has little preamble; it essentially goes right to eight specific recommendations, each one followed by its intended benefits and links to other places that have taken similar action. A moratorium is still on the table, though the shape it would take is not yet clear. (EPRC is setting aside time on their agenda this Thursday for an update on VRs in Eastsound: www.sanjuanco.com/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_01092020-2111

One can also imagine the blowback that would have ensued if the decision to remove those stately maples and 200-year-old Douglas firs along the straightaway just south of The Exchange – turning a corridor of beauty into just another stretch of Olympic Peninsula highway – had been given its proper airing in a truly public forum. Unfortunately, that decision can never be rescinded.

When one considers Hedrick Smith’s new series, “The Democracy Rebellion,” airing this week and throughout the month on PBS, San Juan County looks just as mainstream as any community where the decisions of elected officials and the will of those who elected them don’t always add up.