||| FROM CINDY WOLF , DISTRICT #2 COUNTY COUNCILOR |||
Thank you for the opportunity to serve as your District #2 County Councilor for the 2021-2024 term. After giving careful thought to some recent family health news, I have made the hard decision not to run this year. I am committed to doing the Council’s work well for the remainder of my current term, but my values are family first and that is where my time and energy need to go given the current circumstances.
We’ve done a lot of good work together in a few short years:
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- putting in vacation rental caps.
- providing funds to our non profit partners that will provide over 100 units of affordable housing.
- structuring climate resilience into the County organization’s thinking by creating a Climate and Sustainability Committee that brings Citizen Experts, county staff and community partners together.
- Creating a Department of Environmental Stewardship that captures hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants each year for nearshore habitat restoration, innovative solid waste management and boater education.
- hiring a professional Communications Coordinator who has vastly improved our website interface and community outreach.
- building skills for strong working relationships with the Tribal governments whose citizens have ancestral ties to these islands and waters.
- making sure the County workers are paid at hourly rates comparable to their regional counterparts. After all, if you want to have a healthy local economy, it sure helps if your largest employer pays a fair wage.
This is just part of what we have accomplished together and I am proud to be at the table. I look forward to 8 more months of good work on your County Council.
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Thank you for all that you’ve done Cindy. Taking care of family comes first.
Your administration has indeed accomplished a lot… it’s a good start in the right direction, and one that I hope your successor will build upon and not tear apart. The time you’ve spent in office has been exemplary… there are many past and future councilmen who could learn from your leadership example.
Thank you so much… wishing you the best.
MJ
Thank you for all you have done.
That is actually good news, I know its a hard job but your mistake was that you publicly announced that you were there to support those that voted for you especially the so called ” Vacation Rental Study Group”. You as a public figure should have represented all the people.
If Cindy Wolf actually wants what is best for San Juan county, she should resign immediately.
Council Member Wolf, I appreciate the service you’ve provided to San Juan County over the last 3+ years. My thoughts are with you and the family.
With all due respect, Norris, no one in that position ever represents “all the people.” Every council member to have filled that post has a bias and a set of policies they lean toward and allegiances to certain tribes of people. Hopefully they’re good at “reading the room,” knowing when they’re wrong, and putting aside their personal/financial interests for “the greater good” — though the definition of that is always ripe for debate.
I appreciate most that Cindy was the one who stood fast to establish some kind of rational limits on short-term rentals.
Cindy: Thanks for all you’ve done. Ken Wood: That is so rude.
Marc Cohen – You are entitled to your opinion, as am I. Cindy Wolf has been the most divisive council member from Orcas in the last 35 years; our county government is dysfunctional and she has only made a bad situation worse.
Cindy has expressed perfectly the point I was trying to make. And yes, Ken, you are, of course, entitled to your opinion. But a mean-spirited, gratuitous, personal attack is not an opinion. Shame on you for having made one.
Ken, I think Marc’s point is people on the islands are usually kind towards each other when they hear someone is facing hard times. The compassion and support you and Norris have shown for my family during this challenging time speaks volumes. I am sure any candidate would value your endorsement and will be very interested to see who you support.
Politicians usually get called “divisive” when they are courageous enough to tell inconvenient truths, ask for accountability even from allies, and make decisions that do not benefit powerful interests and individuals. AOC gets it all the time. I think I remember from the Vacation Rental ordinance process that you are a real estate broker, which may explain your evident irritation.
The streets are clean and in good repair; for instance, the perpetual gaping utility holes in Eastsound have been covered. Prune Alley is done after 15 years of dithering. The Comprehensive Plan is up to date and on track to stay that way. Time to permits is down. The Courts are functioning under duly elected judges. There is now a metal detector in place and a dedicated security officer for the courtroom so that officials engaged in legal proceedings no longer have to tackle violent and potentially armed defendants. As per usual, elections are happening smoothly and fairly and our Senior Services case workers provide helpful, timely support. As of 2023 our vaccination rates for school aged children are no longer infamous at the State Department of Health and there are regular press releases to let people know what is happening at the County. The parks are open and well cared for, the toilets flush and the showers work. So, while there are still significant opportunities for improvement, I do agree with you that “dysfunctional” is an opinion.
Ken, our government was dysfunctional long before Cindy’s term! When was it functional? I suppose that depends on perspective. I strongly disagreed with some of Cindy’s decisions, and shared my concerns about them with her – as I would want someone to do with me. Did you? Our island was always divided. Now it’s gone into blatant and angry, irrational, even hateful, divisiveness. That’s not all on Cindy.
I wish things had gone differently – collaboration instead of more division or anyone trying to strong-arm or manipulate events. Our long-standing concerns for the environment and any kinds of real protections for it – especially in Eastsound Swale contiguous riparian wetland watershed – were always thrown under the bus. At least Cindy listened.
As for pandering to the Vacation Rental Study group; I doubt that. My concerns about the insane lack of balance in how many MORE VRBOs were in Eastsound UGA than Friday Harbor, prompted me to contact Cindy. These concerns were/are primarily environmental.
I appreciate that Cindy worked hard for something besides anthropocentrism and ‘property’ rights, unlimited growth and economic growth over quality of life, the environment, and rural character. When you consider that the bulk of our year-round population is being squished into the UGA (most of them working or working poor, which was always the intention of having a UGA in the first place), I think that the bulk of the living-here population should have SOME say in things.
We’re not some golden cash cow or a pin on a land use map -but we’re an abstract concept on pieces of paper to anyone who doesn’t live here, yet decides our fates for us. Our Orcas Councilperson needs to have a special relationship to the place and community, and we hope they will represent all of us and attempt to achieve balance, not just represent a small minority of profit-driven special interests, or those with the means and lawyers to threaten lawsuits every time they don’t get their way.
What I value is all the work that Cindy did on behalf of the environment, and that she fought for the Eastsound UGA residents who, up until her term in office, had no real voice. We p.i.t.a. ‘environmental types’ appealed to Council for a moratorium on adding new VRBOs. I wish the same moratorium held true for disallowing more luxury condos springing up and gobbling forests throughout original grounds of Co-Salish peoples. That VRBO moratorium in just the UGA gave the County time to collect and compile that data so everyone could see the grave imbalances; so we could figure things out and create some badly-needed parity. For that, I’m grateful.
NO ONE is talking about WATER, as we continue to over-grow and over-develop. That’s just insanity.
Cindy was the only one of the Orcas commissioners that I can remember who thus far has really stood up for the environment, ecological diversity, protecting our shorelines, working toward salmon habitat recovery, working with the Co-Salish people, and more. A few Lopez and SJI councilors tried – and were given a hard time for it. I still cringe when I remember what some very ugly people did to slander Lovel Pratt through vicious lies and hate speech – also to Rick Hughes. (Trojan Heron – no real names used. Cowardice!)
Our government and its priorities have been so out of balance for so long. That said, it’s a thankless job for anyone who steps up. Thanks, Cindy – we didn’t always agree, that’s for sure! But I knew you had the right priorities about the environment. Now I hope you can rest, be just a community member again. I hope that the best of your works will continue and expand, and that you get to focus on your family now.
Norris and Ken… always showing your true colors.
Norris, multiple vacation rental operator that you are… some people can just never have enough. The citizen’s action group that you speak of wasn’t the “supposedly called Vacation Rental Study Group”…. it’s officially titled the “Vacation Rental Working Group.” And in a democracy good politicians normally support the majority of the citizenry that voted them in office, and not the minority special interest groups of which you are representative of. This is called, “serving the will of the people.”
Ken, still pissed that you can’t get that third vacation rental? Could you give us some examples of the following please:
1) How you think SJCs best interests would be served by Cindy not fulfilling her term in office?
and,
2) The reasons why you think Cindy Wolf has been the most divisive council member from Orcas in the last 35 years?
and,
3) The reasons why you consider our current government to be so dysfunctional?
and,
4) The reasons why you think that it’s Cindy’s fault that it is this way?
Rick, how fitting of you to find the dignity to give Cindy such an eloquent public syonara on her way out the door… perhaps you might also now consider giving her that long overdue traditional congratulatory phone call for having won the election.