The coalition will agitate for the protection of local waterways.
What’s most clear about the new Puget Sound Partnership is what it is not.
“The Puget Sound Partnership is not going to be the cop on the street,” said Kathy Fletcher, executive director of People for Puget Sound, during a discussion Thursday at IslandWood about the new state agency tasked with cleaning up the sound by 2020.
The partnership is, instead, more like the scratchy wool uniform that agitates and motivates the existing environmental police to keep working their beat.
“The partnership weaves (other agencies) together and influences them,” said Fletcher, who was also a member of an earlier version of the partnership. “It lays out a roadmap, is responsible for overall goals.”
If the Department of Ecology or local jurisdictions don’t step up, the partnership can get really itchy, reporting enforcement shortfalls to the governor, Legislature and, possibly, withholding some state funding.
Some who attended the event, which included a number of island environmental activists, had hoped for more. Fletcher admitted she too had higher aims for the group, which will work toward scientific oversight and public education Still, the partnership is a great leap forward, she said.
“The overall trajectory has been one of decline,” Fletcher said. “A lot of very good things have happened,” such as the construction of sewage treatment plants and the cleanup of many industrial sites, “but at the same time, we’ve done more damage and haven’t kept pace. It’s time to face facts. We have to step up the effort.”
Fletcher recited a long list of the sound’s ills: industrial toxins, runoff from streets, heavy doses of sewage, oil spills, climate change and the amplifier of all these ailments – rapid population growth. The symptoms include diseased shellfish, toxic milk passed from mother orcas to their young, disappearing salmon runs and the near extinction of certain shorebirds.
But talk of the sound’s ailing health is nothing new, Fletcher said, citing the work of an earlier blue-ribbon panel.
Appointed by governor John Spellman, the Puget Sound Water Quality Authority in 1984 sounded alarms for immediate action. Those alarms were followed by a deafening silence. Despite carrying the “authority” moniker, the group had nothing of the sort. To this day, none of its recommendations have received state funding, Fletcher said.
Which begs the question, some asked, how the partnership is any different than the “authority” with no authority.
“It will mobilize pre-existing authority and bring pressure to bear on authorities,” said Sen. Phil Rockefeller, a Bainbridge Democrat who spearheaded the effort to make the partnership a permanent state agency this year in the Legislature. “If an existing authority does not (exert) their authority, (the partnership) will call them out and it will come back to the governor and the Legislature, who will force some action.”
According to Fletcher, plenty of rules and regulations are on the books to protect the sound. The problem is, “many of them are simply not enforced,” she said. “No one’s held accountable, there’s been no sustained effort.”
Even more powerful is the partnership’s control over their purse strings, she said.
A $238 million “downpayment” was placed into Puget Sound clean-up and restoration efforts this year, which more than doubled the typical outlay. The partnership will have a strong say over where that money, and possible future funding, is spent.
For instance, she said, if Kitsap County is not doing their part to curb runoff or other pollutants, the state can yank away funding.
But future funding to clean up the sound – which could amount to a $12 billion by 2020 – is unclear, said Fletcher, expressing one of her key concerns about the partnership’s future.
Another concern, she said, is how big a role the public will play in the partnership. In essence, the public must put pressure on the partnership to, in turn, keep pressure on other state agencies and local authorities.
Bainbridge should play a key role, as it deals with the sound’s root problem: population growth and development.
More people living near the water means more septic waste, impervious surfaces, shoreline construction and polluted runoff, she said.
“The partnership needs to be pushed to deal with these battles and what’s happening on the shores of Bainbridge Island,” she said. “I hope this gets some brain cells going and some neurons firing and that this isn’t the end of the conversation.
“You can’t go home and watch TV. You’ve got to demand results.”
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Get muddy
People for Puget Sound and other environmental groups launched the “Mud Up” campaign to enlist citizen help in various efforts to clean-up and restore Puget Sound.
The campaign has established www.mudup.org as a centralized clearinghouse for events, such as invasive plant removals, beach cleanups and tree plantings, and information on how to petition elected officials.
Also sponsored by the Nature Conservancy and the Trust for Public Land, coalition aims to create 10 new parks, restore 100 miles of shoreline, and protect 1,000 miles of shoreline by the summer of 2009.
– Tristan Baurick
