Letter to Editor | Are we on the right track?

||| FROM ED SUIJ |||

In February 2020 the CO2 content of the atmosphere reached a new high of 416 parts per million (ppm). The last time it was that high was in the Pliocene epoch, between 3-5 million years ago. Temperatures were 5 to 7 degrees F higher and sea levels were 60 to 90 feet higher. The speed with which the current CO2 increase is happening is unprecedented. There is no comparison in the last 800,000 years of change happening this fast. We are leaving the comfort zone for Homo Sapiens at breakneck speed. We have already entered the 6th great extinction. Hundreds of species of animals and plants that coevolved with us for millions of years are disappearing for ever. The biosphere is all one interactive system. We are part of it. We are not apart from it. Our existence as a species is in the balance.

As a planet we are on the wrong track. As a nation we are on the wrong track. A recent article by prominent scientists mentions that 4 more years of the current administration will push life on the planet past a point of no return. How about San Juan County?  What track are we on? For 8 years we have gone in a certain direction.

• Do we want more infringement and exploitation of the Commons? More airplane noise, more polluted waters, more waterfront development? More defilement of our uplifting vistas, precious views and night time skies? More Russian roulette with our health?
• Do we want the annual headache (the tourist season) to extend from the summer months into the Spring and Fall?
• Do we want the small town character of Eastsound gone for good? Do we want the rural character of our island to be completely lost?
• Do we want even less protection of the shoreline, wetlands and our biodiversity?
• Do we want wider roads, ever more cars, an expanded airport and every other house a vacation rental?

Sure, if you want all this, then vote for the incumbent in the upcoming election. It will be “business as usual” and we will continue on the same track we are on. A track never agreed to by the residents. The track we say we want to be on has been crafted: it’s called the Vision Statement, the North Star of the Comprehensive Plan. Where we are going is astray if not backward from this community-crafted Vision.

Just ask yourself,  do you trust the incumbent with your future or the future of this island? Do we see leadership, wisdom, a vision, integrity, trust?  I don’t. My personal experience is one of unresponsiveness and empty promises.  Do we see a person who listens to his constituency when they organize, rally and petition? One who will listen to reason and science and then can make the right decisions?
I don’t. So many examples. The gas tank,  the sidewalk near the Odd Fellows Hall, the paving of Dolphin Bay Road, the Deer Harbor bridge, the Prune Alley road plan, updating the Comprehensive Plan, vacation rentals, etc.

Four more years of further eroding quality of island life will not do. We need to choose a different, better track. The Lummi tribe inhabited these islands for hundreds if not thousands of years.  We see the evidence in the shell middens, almost their only trace.
They left us beauty, bounty and abundance. Waters full of salmon and orcas, old growth forests, skies full of birds, thriving ecosystems.
In a mere 120 years the waters of the Salish sea have been seriously depleted of salmon. The orca, a keystone of our marine ecosystem, are starving and the water they live in is heavily polluted.  The number of waterfowl has plummeted and the old growth forests are reduced to a few specimens in “parks”. Thousands of precious acres on this island are covered in asphalt and concrete for ever. Our CO2 emissions have grown exponentially.

What will be our legacy?

Most locals believe in nurturing and protecting these islands, instead of exploiting and ruining them for short term personal gain. They believe we can steward these islands into the future,  while preserving as much as possible of the beauty, biodiversity and magic that is left. By making this effort , we can preserve some of what we value and maybe pass on to the next generations cleaner water, healthier ecosystems, more biodiversity, more soil fertility, and more sequestered carbon.

Many would like to do their share to get off the track we are on. Four more years on the current track and we will never have to go to the mainland again. The mainland will have come to us! We can do better. We deserve better. We have an alternative. Please vote.

I have lived in these islands for 37 years and have a degree in regional planning and ecology.