Letter to Editor | Eastsound Water’s Clark Well update raises more questions than it answers

||| FROM CORY HARRINGTON |||

Eastsound Water’s latest installment in its Clark Well series (Episode #5) focuses heavily on history, engineering evolution, and inflation. It walks readers through a 2006 concept design, explains how treatment standards have changed, and argues that a project once estimated at $600,000 would reasonably cost around $1.2 million today.

That may all be true.

But it’s not what members have been asking.

The central issue is not whether a project designed in 2006 would cost more in 2025. The issue is whether the Clark Well project, as approved and managed in recent years, has followed proper financial oversight and governance.

And on that point, the update is notably silent.

There is no clear statement of what the approved project budget was. There is no timeline showing when or how costs increased. There is no indication of whether the Board formally reviewed or approved those increases. There is no discussion of whether the project was competitively bid, or how contractors were selected. And there is still no itemized cost breakdown of the current estimate.

Instead, the narrative shifts the conversation to a different question: how a conceptual estimate from nearly two decades ago compares to modern construction costs.

That is not the same thing as explaining how a current project was managed.

Members are not asking why infrastructure is more expensive than it was in 2006. They are asking how a project progressed from its original approved scope and budget to its current cost — and whether that process was transparent, documented, and properly authorized.

These are standard expectations for any organization managing significant capital projects, especially one funded by its members.

The Clark Well is an important investment in Eastsound’s water future. It may very well be necessary, well-designed, and worth the cost. But those qualities do not replace the need for clear financial accountability.

Transparency is not achieved through storytelling alone. It requires documentation.

At a minimum, members deserve straightforward answers to a few basic questions:

• What was the officially approved budget for the Clark Well project, and when was it approved?
• At what point did project costs exceed that budget?
• Did the Board formally approve those increases, and where is that documented?
• Was the project competitively bid?
• Can a full cost breakdown of the current estimate be provided?

Until those questions are answered, the discussion remains incomplete.

If the goal of this series is to build understanding and trust, the next installment should focus less on what the project is — and more on how it has been managed.

Clark Well & Treatment Plant: Episode 5 – Eastsound Water Users Association