News from Hughes: Roads and Jobs, Old and New

 — by Margie Doyle —

Council Member Rick Hughes

Orcas County Council Member Rick Hughes knows whereof he speaks when addressing Eastsound streets and Orcas roads.

His business property, Ray’s Pharmacy, experienced drastic flooding twice this fall, once on Sept. 25 when 2.2 inches of rain fell over a two-hour period; and again on Nov. 2 when .5 inches of rain fell over a four-hour period.

But as County Councilman, his concern goes beyond his personal business. Commercial and residential development without adequate stormwater drainage plans are at the root of recent flooding, he maintains. “Construction is slowly taking away the Eastsound swale… I don’t want to force our infrastructure on developers, but we have to define what the county role is,” Hughes says.

When newly-appointed County Development and Planning Director Sam Gibboney came to Orcas for the Dec. 6 Eastsound Planning and Review Committee (EPRC) meeting, Hughes, along with EPRC members Fred Klein, Ken Katz, Gilliver Rankin and County Senior Planner Colin Maycock, walked Eatsound from the Community Church on Madrona Street, up Prune Alley and down North Beach Road to survey the curbs, gutters and stormwater infrastructure of the “downtown” streets.

“We’ve got to be part of a team that works hard to get at the solutions,” Hughes says.

County Manager Mike Thomas, Public Works Director Frank Mulcahy, County Engineer Rachel Dietzman, and Russ Harvey for Orcas Public Works are now working on a maintenance system. Whether the responsibility for free-running drains belongs with the property owner or the county Public Works Department, Hughes says,  “I want us to figure out the problem and provide a consistent maintenance plan to do better next time.”

“I’m hopeful if all the drains are maintained we won’t have this situation again.”

How to upgrade the storm drains, develop the stormwater utility and allocate funding are all part of the flood prevention planning. “It’s a discussion we have to have, before we tackle Orcas Road, let’s look at where all the density is.”

He questions why the County Public Works focuses on bigger road projects such as Mt. Baker Road, and in the future, Orcas Road from Nordstrom Lane to McNallie Roads. Part of the rationale for the road improvement is to build in  bicycle lanes form the Orcas ferry terminal to Eastsound, but Hughes questions the safety and feasibility of such construction. He hopes instead to work in partnership with County Parks, the Land Bank, the Preservation Trust, and OPALCO on non-road-based trail systems. “If it makes sense to change for the greater good of the community, I want to help make that happen. But I want to do it right.

“Public works is not just a road company,” he maintains. “One of my goals for next year is to build up the county’s marine infrastructure.” His plan includes better access to barge transport and increased funding to the islands not served by Washington State Ferries. “We need to have the best marine facilities possible. Big plans are coming down the road,” he says, without irony. “I want to make sure we’re doing things for the right reasons.

An important part of the “right reasons” is employment, and Hughes is intent on bringing “real wage” jobs to the community. When $32,000 annually for a family of four is the poverty benchmark nationally, and high-end retail job holders may earn $16/hour, Hughes says “Working people are always playing catch-up.”

Hughes recently joined the Opportunity Council of Whatcom County, to keep abreast of job creation, expansion and re-training possibilities.

One way to boost job creation is encouraging new manufacturing, such as the high-end window production company in Friday Harbor. Another aspect is increasing the marketing presence off-island of local brews and wines. The November CenturyLink outage illustrates how high-speed internet coverage is critical to the county economy, he says. “The internet is a way to move people, goods and services, a way to compete with the mainland and a way to promote job growth.”

Hughes also sees no reason not to develop commercial marijuana growth, processing and sales. Over 68 percent of county voters approved the recreational use of marijuana and Hughes would like to see county commerce benefit from that change in law, rather than a huge national corporation.

He emphasizes that helping those addicted to marijuana use is part of the responsibility in developing local marijuana commerce.

He adds that, within the business license application review process, the County Council and the Sheriff may state if they have any issues with an application, “just as we do with liquor sales or activities.”

He points out that county government has a “hands-off” policy as long as the implementation of the law meets state requirements, which have “the premise of hard liquor sales as their backbone.” (For the rules regarding marijuana growth, distribution and sales in Washington state, go to lcb.app.box.com/adopted-rules).

“It’s not my number one goal,” Hughes says, “but we can create something original here to add to our tourist-based economy. As a community, we can take the assets we have and make it work for us — or at least get out of the way.”