Port of Bainbridge Island | Letters | July 15

Published 3:56 pm Thursday, July 14, 2011

Island doesn’t need another taxing agency

Press reports indicate that supporters of a Bainbridge Island-wide port district have set the issue now before Kitsap commissioners aiming for a November ballot validation. Port district supporters claim City Council always puts harbor issues at the bottom of its priority list.

Unless you are a BI Rip Van Winkle in deep slumber for the past six years, you know City Council has been operating with a broad, ill-focused and wasteful priority list not limited to port issues. COBI teeters on insolvency and struggles with economic focus and leadership.

Bainbridge citizens demand COBI focus on core missions: roads, public safety and service. If in fact voters believe port issues are a key priority, the answer to council inattention is pressure on council members to perform their duties. Calls to create another government entity/taxing authority are a dysfunctional solution. We need efficient and smaller government, not more government.

Forward your comments on this push for government growth to county commissioners. Contact council members and tell them to facilitate private sector port development. On election day, give this grow-government tax initiative a resounding “No, thank you.”

James Olsen

Fort Ward