And The Walls Came Tumbling Down

The downfall of Oregon's four-term governor should be a cautionary tale to our Washington politicians, whether they hold office in Olympia or in our local rotten boroughs. It's quite the story, and the Washington Free Beacon has a good summary of the money and political relationships at work in Kitzhaber's downfall. If you read the linked article, imagine the howling there would be if you were to substitute "Koch" for "Steyer" in the report.

Shift WA summarized the situation by saying,

In June 2014, Shift exposed a series of emails that reveal how Jay Inslee’s green agenda is heavily influenced by outside extreme environmental organizations and paid-for political consultants. In fact, Shift discovered that the very environmental organizations caught in the Kitzhaber scandal—the Tom Steyer-fund Energy Foundation and Rockefeller Brothers Fund—are at work in Inslee’s administration. Despite the scandal that unfolded in Oregon and the newfound relevance of Shift’s investigation, most media outlets in Washington State are still not paying attention. Austin Jenkins picked-up on the link between Kitzhaber and Inslee in a recent article for the Northwest News Network, but it’s not enough. Inslee is picking winners and losers, just as Kitzhaber was caught doing. Unfortunately, in our state, the winners are Inslee and the extreme environmental industry and the losers are hardworking Washington families. Inslee is a part of what has become an environmental political complex. Just like Kitzhaber, he is part of a system that runs on hypocrisy, corruption and selfishness wrapped in a veil of self-righteousness. 

This is the same circus, just different clowns.

Ditto at the local level. Same circus, different clowns. We have all seen our local political environmental complex divert public resources to its own advantage. Surely this is corruption of the political process, but what about genuine scandal ... the kind of corruption that makes headlines, ends careers, and takes down politicians and career bureaucrats? That doesn't happen here, does it?

Has there been any long-term misuse of funds, retaliation against whistleblowers, crony no-bid contracts, lame pretexts to try to get the sheriff's department to act as henchmen, or interference with the duties of an enforcement officer? That sort of thing doesn't happen here, does it? ... in one of the 50 places to see before you die? ... in one of the best coastal small towns?

But wait, there will be more ...

Robins Can Be Territorial

Jamie Stephens recently proposed three appointments to our Marine Resources Committee (MRC). Stephens slipped in the nominees at the end of a long day, and Jarman and Hughes rubber stamped the appointments without thinking.

One of the newly appointed MRC members is a Nature Conservancy employee who lives in solitude on an 11-acre preserve on Yellow Island. Another appointee is the Chairman of the Board of Kwiaht. And the third appointee is probably best known for having allegedly impersonated a County employee in order to spy on her neighbors ... so she could then tell the Friends what the neighbor was up to ... so the Friends could then turn that neighbor into State authorities. Sound familiar?

Once they realized that they had been hoodwinked by Stephens, Jarman and Hughes asked for reconsideration of their unanimous MRC appointments. After further deliberation, the appointment of Robin Hirsch, the alleged County impersonator, did not go forward, but the other two appointments stood.

Below are excerpts of emails documenting the Robin Hirsch saga. In a nutshell, a neighbor of Robin Hirsch's was having work done on their shoreline property.  The work was being conducted with the permission of the County. All the necessary permissions and permits were obtained. The homeowners were being entirely cooperative with the County, including being cooperative about ameliorating past permit and construction errors. Nevertheless, Robin Hirsch was not pleased about the work, and ... well ... you can read the email excerpts below for yourself.

Guess how Robin Hirsch described herself on her MRC application? She said, "I am honest, hard working, and diplomatic."

What's the concern with honest, hard working, and diplomatic Stephens' nominees?

From: Chris Laws [mailto:ChrisL@sanjuanco.com]
Sent: Tuesday, April 09, 2013 12:24 PM
To: XXXXX
Subject: XX Hunziker Rd

Mr. XXXX, and Mr. XXXX,

It has come to my attention that someone maybe walking onto your property and impersonating a County employee, or suggesting that they work for the County.

Please be advised that this may be a violation of state law pursuant to RCW 9A.60.040 and the County takes this type of behavior seriously; the Prosecuting Attorney’s office has been apprised of the situation and recommends that those who have witnessed this first hand contact the Senior Prosecuting Attorney Charlie Silverman whom I have cc’d in this e-mail and can be reached at (360) 370-7605

I want to make it clear that all County Employees carry identification and will gladly produce them if asked; additionally, any County employee will also have their supervisor’s information readily available for you or your contractors and employees should they ask.

-       Chris

Christopher S. Laws

Code Enforcement Officer

San Juan County

(360) 370-7587

chrisl@sanjuanco.com

__________________________________________________________________________________

From:                                         XXXXX

Sent:                                           Tuesday, April 09, 2013 1:38 PM

To:                                               Chris Laws

Subject:                                     Robin [Hirsch] Impersonation of County Officer  / Orcas Island Residential Construction Project

Chris,

Thank you for this suggestion. We were outraged but hardly thought that we had any recourse.

Robin [Hirsch], who lives about a mile from our property ...  came down to the property about two weeks ago (March 20^th). She pretended to be a County employee, from your department, was extremely abusive to our contractor, Denny Howell, and threatened us with County revenge for “ruining” the place. When Denny asked to see her County I.D., Robin said she didn’t have it and continued to scream.

...

She took photographs and apparently returned to our property this weekend to take more ... We did forbid Robin and her husband to walk the property or trespass after the first incident. However, it now looks like we have to post No Trespassing signs and mount motion-activated cams / cameras around the place.  ...

I am just running out with our clients for lunch, but wanted to thank you first. I should be able to break away to call as you requested sometime tomorrow.

Yours Sincerely,

XXXX

From: XXXXX
Sent: Wednesday, April 10, 2013 5:07 PM
To: 'Mackie, Sandy (Perkins Coie)'; KRentz@perkinscoie.com
Subject: Report on 3/20/2013 Trespassing Incident / Orcas Project
Importance: High

Sandy,

What follows was relayed to us by Denny Howell, our general contractor on our residential construction project ... on Orcas Island:

On the morning of Wednesday, March 20^th, 2013, Denny and a member of his construction crew, Mike Welch , started work installing the planned and permitted metal deer fence along the west side of our property. A small excavator was used to clear a 5’ path through the salal in the woods. No trees were removed and only surface vegetation was cut back, leaving the root systems of the salal intact to regrow. Shortly after they started work, two men approached them crossing from the neighbor’s property on the west onto our property ... They demanded loudly of Mike: “What are you doing? Why are you working in the forest? Why are you removing salal?”

Mike called Denny over to answer them, and he told them they were installing deer fencing that was permitted by the County. At that point a woman named Robin came up crossing from the Hammer property, carrying a clip board and a pen. Denny asked what she was there for and her response was: “I am with the County. I’ve come down to see what you are doing. What are you doing? Why are you working in the forest and removing salal?” Denny again responded as above, and then asked Robin for her County identification card. She seemed put out, but replied that she didn’t have one. Then she started darting around in the forest taking photographs and screaming threats at Denny and Mike. She yelled abusively that this was not allowed and she was going to report it to the County. At that point Denny asked her to leave the property ... The three left.

Randy Pence, a carpenter on our crew, witnessed at least part of the incident and recognized that she was Robin [Hirsch] Roser;  

...

Since then Robin has been seen skulking on our property, hiding in bushes or behind trees taking photographs of the project. When we met the County building inspector, Jason Hensel, a week later on the driveway into our place, I mentioned to him what had happened and the fact she had impersonated a County officer. He asked for her name and seemed generally surprised, saying that she should have bought the property herself if she had wanted it so much. Yesterday, we received an email from Chris Laws, the County Code Enforcement Officer who had clearly heard from Jason about Robin’s masquerading as a County officer. He was outraged, wrote that it was illegal and requested that we file a complaint with the San Juan County prosecuting attorney. His email also stated that someone was trespassing on our property and taking photographs. This we surmised from the issues that came up earlier this week and the photos attached to the email from Kurt Baumgartner at the Washington Department of Ecology, which we know were taken on site between last Thursday evening (after it started raining) and Sunday evening (April 4 – 7, 2013).

...

All the Best,

XXXX

How Much Is That In Dog Grants?

The Island Guardian has a current article about the amount of money that has been spent on Salmon Recovery Grants. It amounts to $9.6 million state-wide this year. Over the past 10 years or so, with matching funds thrown in, the amount spent in San Juan County is about $12 million, according to statements and presentations by the Lead Entity Coordinator for San Juan County.

One of the recent grant-funded salmon recovery projects has been the purchase of a conservation easement by the San Juan Preservation Trust to "protect" land on Stuart Island. Just to be clear, grant money is coming from the State to our County, and then our County is providing the money to the San Juan Preservation Trust, who is purchasing a conservation easement from some private citizens who own land on Stuart Island ... who get the money and then get reduced taxes too because of the easement (yes, the State and County are giving out grants to lower their own tax base). The Guardian has the financial details, but the grant is for $800,000 ... with matching, the cumulative total amounts to a little over $1 million being spent on salmon recovery ... on that project alone.

Reportedly, this Reid Harbor project was highly rated by technical and citizen reviewers associated with our MRC. However, by my estimate, this project "protects" about 0.1% of our county's potential intertidal salmon habitat, assuming it was "threatened" at that location to begin with. Furthermore, the Guardian quotes Governor Inslee as saying,

"these projects will provide construction jobs and help countless numbers of Washington families and businesses, including tackle shops, charter operators, restaurants and hotels, that rely on the world-renowned Pacific salmon.” 

Another official says,

 "Puget Sound Chinook are about one-third as abundant as they were a century ago,” said David Troutt, chair of the Salmon Recovery Funding Board. “As we have developed our urban and rural landscapes, we’ve damaged many of the estuaries, floodplains and rivers that salmon need to survive. These projects have been selected as ones that will make big impacts on Puget Sound and salmon recovery."

Does this Reid Harbor project provide construction jobs (nope)? ... protection (well, "they" say it does, but nope)? ... in Puget Sound (nope)? ... increase salmon populations (nope)? ... estuary, floodplain, or river (nope)? ... big impact on Puget Sound and salmon recovery (nope)? Does this project do any of the things talked about? Is it anything more than vacuous "save the environmental bureaucracy" PR messaging?

Answer: No

Mostly, San Juan County has intertidal salmon habitat rather than salmon spawning habitat. We don't have the really important "estuaries, floodplains, and rivers that salmon need to survive." State law provides a statutory path forward for counties that do not have "sufficient" intertidal habitat, and RCWs 77.85.220 & 230 set forth the requirements for an Intertidal Salmon Enhancement Plan. However, we don't have such a plan ... not one that follows the statutory requirements anyway.  So, by inference, it would seem that the State thinks we probably have "sufficient" intertidal habitat already.

There's a disconnect. We're spending millions to protect intertidal habitat here despite not having a proper Intertidal Salmon Enhancement Plan, which the State (the sugar daddy of habitat "protection" millions) would require if we had insufficient intertidal habitat.

How do we know when we're done with salmon recovery here? Is our goal to make intertidal habitat more than sufficient? How do we know if any of our salmon recovery efforts are doing anything? Do we know if we're making any progress?

Answer: We don't know.

Barbara Rosenkotter, Salmon Recovery Lead Entity Coordinator for San Juan County

The ABCs of Political Patronage

Lead Salmon Recovery Entity ... MRC ... LIO/AAOG ... Conservation District ... Stewardship Network ... Madrona Institute ... Friends of the San Juans ... ECONet ... PSP ... glossy Friends messaging brochures funded by State-government (PSP) Targeted Awareness Grants (TAG) ... millions spent on "salmon recovery" with no measurement of results and no accountability for failure ... frivolous and abusive Friends legal actions opposing everything from an 80-year old widow wanting to retire, to the CAOs -- whose passage and approval the Friends demanded.

You can cut the environmental phoniness in this county with a knife. We don't have "save the environment" groups. We have "save the environmental bureaucracy" groups.  Their primary interests are ensuring that they continue to get paid while they protect the political patronage system they've built.

The current titular heads of the patronage system are Jamie Stephens and Ron Zee. They are working in tandem to hold on to as much of the patronage system as they can, despite the election outcome.  So far, they're doing a pretty good job, and Stephens, in particular, is doing a superb job.

One of the greatest achievements of the patronage system is that we all take for granted that the County deserves a "seat at the table" with the tribes, the PSP, and even its own departments ... instead of actually running the County itself. The County has been demoted to being just another stakeholder, and the group-think of unelected employees and appointees has been promoted to government. That's how the LIO/AAOG works ... and the Stewardship Network ... and the ECONet ... the Lead Entity ... even the County's own MRC.  These groups are accountable to no one, and they represent no one but themselves. They reward themselves and their patronage cronies with money and multi-decade appointments while the County sits on its hands, convinced that it's just a "fiscal agent" or some other bureaucratic label that equates to "eunuch."

The congress of "environmental groups" operating here traces back to relatively few people who appear over and over again, but the proliferation of organizations, committees, and trusts makes it seem like the County is outnumbered. The County has been Delphi'd ... go along with the crowd ... behave ... fall in line ... be patient ... be part of a team ... you want to agree with the rest of us, don't you? ... DON'T YOU?!?!

Stephens has this down pat, and he is working the other two Councilmen for all its worth. Stephens' protection of the patronage system is nothing short of heroic. He got himself appointed Chair of the Council. Stephens sits on the MRC. He's the Council representative on the LIO/AAOG too ... all the key places the patronage system wants to protect. Also, despite the fact that major aspects of the patronage system should have been (and could have been) dismantled immediately, Stephens' has effectively used a series of delay tactics and other maneuvers to convince the other Councilmen that they're "part of a team" and reform "takes time" and we need "patience" ... let's get more "input." When you hear one of our politicians use those words, that's the patronage system talking ... that's a Delphi zombie courtesy of Stephens.

John Cleese recently wrote a satirical piece about terror alerts in various countries in Europe.  Here's what he said about the French.

The French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from "Run" to "Hide." The only two higher levels in France are "Collaborate" and "Surrender." The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France 's white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country's military capability.

Aside from that excerpt being terribly ironic given the positions taken by the UK and France over the last two days, let's hope it's not the role model for our new Councilmen as they contend with our system of political patronage.

Jamie Stephens, Chair of the San Juan County Council

Ron Zee, Chair of the San Juan Islands Conservation District

Conservation District Ploy

Yesterday afternoon at 1:02 pm the County Council discussed the possibility of moving grant funding for all or part of the PSP LIO/AAOG and AOC together with the MRC and Lead Entity to the CD. Make sense?

This is why the average citizen has no hope of tracking County shenanigans. Even the jargon is an insider's game, and when you add in the artful half-truths and deception that are the hallmarks of our zombie-Friends staffers ... you get an impenetrable web of eco-deceit.

If you watch the linked video, you will see that not even Jamie Stephens (our County Chair) can keep the acronyms and responsibilities straight. He struggles like grasshopper while Barbara Rosenkotter rattles off acronyms and committee names as if she were a shaolin priest of eco-bureaucracy.

The Puget Sound Partnership (PSP), which is funded by the State and the Feds, is embodied on the local level by an organization created by our County Council, the Local Implementing Organization (LIO). What does it implement? It is supposed to implement the PSP's Action Agenda for San Juan County, which is the PSP's local plan for cleaning up our local waters. If you actually read the PSP's Action Agenda, you will note that they plan to clean up our local waters by having endless grant-funded coordinating meetings. The LIO is also known as the Action Agenda Oversight Group (AAOG), and so you often see the acronyms LIO and AAOG used interchangeably or written as "LIO/AAOG." Subordinate to the LIO/AAOG are two policy-making bodies:  the Implementation Committee (which helps draft the County Action Agenda) and the Accountability Oversight Committee (AOC), which is a committee comprised of the County in league with the Tribes. Both the County and the Tribes have veto votes regarding policy initiatives associated with the AOC.

Rosenkotter, Lyshall, and Zee hatched a plan to move this alphabet soup out of the County offices and into the enlarged quarters of the Conservation District (CD). In addition, they want to take with them the Lead Entity Coordinator role for salmon recovery (a watershed-oriented program funded by the State). Up until now, this whole shooting match has been jumbled together with the County's Marine Resources Committee (MRC). However, with greater scrutiny being placed on County Advisory Committees, especially the MRC, Rosenkotter, Lyshall, and Zee want to take the meat of the MRC's funding and "authority" and stash it in the Conservation District.

Why should we care?

We should care because these people are sneaky, because they are thinking several steps ahead of the rest of us, and because they have a pervasive influence on the lives of everyone who lives on our shorelines. For example, let's take a look at the Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife (WDFW) TACT grant to San Juan County for a moment. TACT stands for "Trouble shooting, Action planning, Course correction, and Tracking and monitoring." Via this grant, the MRC jumble was working in boats with the Friends and armed enforcement officers from the Department of Ecology to map possible shoreline violations. Even Pictometry got mixed up with the activities associated with this grant, since sources suggest that Amy Windrope (from WDFW), Stephanie Buffum (Friends), Rosenkotter, and Lyshall were eagerly anticipating the synergies that would accrue from having Pictometry support the TACT pre-enforcement mapping. The County Council didn't authorize this work, and when certain County staffers threatened to bring these activities to light, their jobs were threatened. These are the kinds of things that happen in our County now when we supposedly have control. What would it be like if these roles and responsibilities were to be splintered?

Although the Conservation District is purportedly a non-regulatory body, the scheming that's going on right now is an effort to transform the Conservation District into grant central for facilitating enforcement actions against shoreline owners. The CD may not do the actual enforcement, but they figure they can support enforcement by others.

Thankfully, at least in the discussion yesterday, Jarman and Hughes saw the ploy for what it was.

Speaking For The Fish

Despite the continuing mayhem about the CAOs, this year is likely to be dominated by shoreline discussions related to the Shoreline Management Plan (SMP) update. From CAO testimony, we have already had a prologue of what these discussions might look like.

Watch the clips below to hear Barbara Rosenkotter of the County (and formerly of the Byers campaign) speak for the fish. Then watch Jim Slocomb speak on behalf of the Marine Resources Committee (MRC) in recommending that all shorelines be considered critical ... essentially because fish need water and fish might use any of the marine water in the county at some point or other.  The Rosenkotter/Slocomb view is that "protection" means that every inch of shoreline in our county has to be designated as critical.

This raises a major question that our County government has yet to wrap its head around. Are we protecting "areas of use" or "areas needed for population viability?" The CAOs say we are required to protect population viability.

But that isn't the view of the Salmon Recovery Lead Entity or the MRC in these video clips.

Note: we apologize for the A/V sync issues but they are on the original video from the County.

Elections -- Our Fouled Waters

In a recent letter to the Journal, we find the latest person making the baseless claim that our CAOs are needed to protect our environment. Like Judge Darrah's earlier letter, it is devoid of specifics as to how the CAOs purportedly achieve environmental protection.

The CAOs do not protect anything. Even if we had a problem, the CAOs would miss it. That is the simple truth, but there is a lot of eco-cachet associated with pushing even pointless environmental regulation in the San Juans.

And this latest letter in the Journal by Steve Ulvi describes our local waters as being fouled. They are ... but only metaphorically. They are fouled by the widespread, relentless pollution of the truth by people who rely on deception, evasion, and fallacy to make their points.

Our waters have been repeatedly described as "pristine" and "spectacular," but to keep the grant money flowing in, serious problems have to be alleged -- never proven -- but always suggested. The pervasive eco-deception is to try to convey a contradictory mythology to visitors and outsiders that these islands are untouched ...  virgin ... but we are also somehow impaired and imminently threatened by further degradation because of development too. The reality is that these islands have been resource harvested for decades and have been scraped clean at least twice, but despite that, our islands are nonetheless "pretty spectacular" to use a phrase by NOAA. In fact, we probably live more lightly on the land now than we have in decades.

Harken back to our August 23, 2012 post which recounts the appearance of a NOAA official in front of our County Council in July 2012. Regarding our local marine habitat, Mindy Rowse said:

Habitat in San Juan County is pretty spectacular. I don't think anyone is doing anything wrong at this point.

See for yourself by following this link which provides further links to Rowse's Council appearance. Along the same lines, but separate, view the video below of a presentation by Dr. David Hyde.

For those of you who are still trying to make up your minds about this election, one side is clearly lying about the CAOs. It is the side with the outspoken judges and retired Park Service employees grasping for unachievable aspirational goals of a world uninfluenced by any people ... except them.

The CAOs will not return us to an eco-virginal state because, even if that were possible, no one knows what it means anyway, but somehow that aspirational eco-standard is what we are always compared to by the likes of Ulvi and Darrah.

The CAOs don't save our environment for our children and our grandchildren's future; they protect self-interested eco-bureaucrats and preserve eco-deception for our children and our grandchildren's future.

All Things Being Equal

One of the commenters to the last post said that we have organizations in this county that look like separate entities A, B, C, and D; but when you look at them more closely, you realize that A=B=C=D=County.

How true.

Over the last few posts, we've been examining the PSP ECONet, which is the same as the Stewardship Network, which we now know receives its funding via the Madrona Institute as of last April.  According to the website of the Madrona Institute:

Program managers at the Madrona Institute include:

Karrie Cooper, Program Manager & Network Coordinator, Stewardship Network of the San Juans, joined the Madrona Institute April 1, 2012, to coordinate the operations and projects of the Madrona Institute-sponsored Stewardship Network of the San Juans.   The Stewardship Network  is a coalition of public and private conservation organizations in the San Juan Islands whose mission is to promote a stewardship ethic in the San Juan Archipelago from land to sea. [Additional biographical info on Karrie Cooper forthcoming.]

The point of our tale is that we have a Network that consists of the County and its most influential committees, the Friends and Kwiaht, the Tourist Boards, various parks and the Conservation District. The people who comprise the Network turn up time and again in all sorts of places from the Planning Commission to political campaigns. For example, consider just Linda Lyshall -- she is a County employee who serves as the coordinator for the MRC. As an MRC member, she's part of the Stewardship Network. She's listed as being on the Advisory Council of the Madrona Institute. She's the Curriculum Committee Chair of Leadership San Juans. In the past, she's also been an employee of the PSP involved with the AAOG/LIO.

The management arm of the Stewardship Network is the Madrona Institute. Its education arm is Leadership San Juans. Its funding arm (or one of its funding arms) is the PSP's ECONet. Its political arm is our local Democratic Party (more on this in a moment). Its economic development arm consists of the parks and Tourist Boards. Its housing arm consists of the various Housing/Land Trusts. The Networkers give awards to one another through various programs such as the Good Steward Awards. And most of our local news outlets, being deeply superficial, never report on the dizzying inter-connections, and so might as well be the Network's Pravda.

If you let it, the Network will tell you how to think (ECONet), educate you (Leadership San Juans), promote a certain type of economy for you (eco-tourism), house you (land/housing trusts), and tell you how to vote. It's a one-stop shop for everything in life, and if you want a job involving "coordination" and "facilitation," you're probably in luck there too. That's why it's so important for the Network to get the right people in power who will keep the grant-based economy flowing. That's why the Network shows up heavily in the campaigns of Byers, Stephens, and Pratt.

Honestly, in all this, I feel as sorry for Democrats as I do for environmentalists. I feel "environmentalism" has been stolen from real environmentalists, and environmentalist issues are simply used now as bait to get a grant and push a planning-based agenda for every facet of life -- because, as we seem to be often told, we need a vast planning infrastructure to ensure positive outcomes. Ugh!! In the same way, I feel planning and coordination Ubercrats have taken over the local Democratic Party, and the Party label is serving the self-interests of the Network leaders. I know many Democrats who feel alienated from the behavior of their local Party leaders.

_____________________________________________________________

From: Nancy DeVaux [mailto:nancy@hometrust.org]
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2012 11:46 AM
To: info@stewardshipsjc.org
Subject: membership in the Network

The San Juan Community Home Trust is interested in joining the Stewardship Network. We wondered how we might be able to become a  partner organizations.

We are proud of our efforts to create permanently affordable housing using Low Impact Development and Green Building techniques. One of our major goals is to become the first residential neighborhood in the State of Washington to use reclaimed (treated) wastewater, from our innovative “Living Machine” on-site sewer system,  in toilets and for landscape irrigation.

We’re interested in focusing on this at the County Fair, possibly  in the Stewardship Network area, possibly with the other Community Land Trusts on Orcas and Lopez, that also focus on sustainable development. What would the process for this be?

Thanks for your assistance!

Nancy

Nancy DeVaux

Executive Director

San Juan Community Home Trust

P.O. Box 2603

Friday Harbor, WA 98250

Phone: (360)378-5541

Fax: (360) 378-3742

nancy@hometrust.org

Spreading Like Wildfire

In the last post, we introduced readers to the local PSP ECONet, which is the PSP appellation for one of our local organizations more commonly known as the Stewardship Network. The Stewardship Network is an organization of organizations.

Who belongs to the Stewardship Network? Their webpage currently lists 24 member organizations. Curiously, included among those 24 members are 5 separate County entities: the Agricultural Resources Committee, Land Bank, Marine Resource Committee, San Juan County Noxious Weed Board, and San Juan County Lead Entity Program for Salmon  Recovery.  Not only that, but the Steering Committee of the Stewardship Network consists of Lincoln Bormann of the Land Bank, Linda Lyshall of the Marine Resources Committee, Stephanie Buffum of the Friends, Ron Zee of the Madrona Institute (more on that in later posts), and Kathleen Foley of the San Juan Preservation Trust. In fact, until recently, Lincoln Bormann of the Land Bank and Stephanie Buffum of the Friends were identified as the Co-Chairs of the Stewardship Network Steering Committee.

How is it that so many County organizations are involved in the Stewardship Network? How is it that County personnel are "steering" the Stewardship Network (Bormann, Lyshall) jointly with the Friends when there isn't any Council input or approval related to their participation. I don't even understand how the County can be represented by five separate entities in one Network? Even if the County were to participate, wouldn't we want just one person/group representing us?

We saw in the last post how the ECONet/Stewardship Network received money from Puget Sound Partnership (PSP) "Targeted Awareness Grants" to spread very specific PSP-formulated messages. Knowing that and seeing the Stewardship Network's membership list, we have to conclude that the County member entities must have been in on it too. Furthermore, below is another email discussing yet another grant related to communication, this time focused on "social marketing behavior change." From other documentation we have, this second grant seems to have focused on spreading two of the perennially favorite talking-points of the Friends, namely reducing pesticide use (remember Janet Alderton's pyrethrin obsession?) and increasing native vegetation.

Now, these topics may or may not have individual merit, but even if they do, we all know how twisted even meritorious topics can become when in the hands of the Friends.  But of greater concern is how we can have multiple County entities involved in a naked advocacy Network that promotes the favorite talking points of the Friends with PSP grant funding for "targeted awareness" and "behavior change"? How does that happen?

And rather than just promoting certain messaging, the Network isn't shy about trying to quash messaging that they don't agree with either. For example, at several times in the past, the Trojan Heron has noted that "civility" has been used in attempts to silence we critics who want reform of the County's environmental approaches. Of particular note, back in April 2012, there seemed to be a coordinated effort by multiple members of the Friends and County sympathizers to use a meme of civility to pressure CAO critics to shut up. Now we find a possible explanation in the March 2012 minutes of the Stewardship Network where it is noted that the Friends introduced the following item for discussion (emphasis added):

Friends of the San Juans: Need to address as a Network the anti-environmental messaging that is spreading like wild-fire in our community. “Environmentalism is killing property values”. “There’s a strategic wide-spread land grab occurring in SJC by environmental organizations”. As a Network we need to strategize our messaging that Nature is our Economy. Consider a communications forum on civility in the face of aggressive confrontation.

And based on the latest civility admonitions by Kit Rawson, not to mention some of the economic talking-points of some current candidates, it would seem that the Network is still working this agenda item.
_______________________________________________________________

From: Karrie Cooper [mailto:karriedcooper@gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, September 18, 2012 2:10 PM
To: Judy Cumming; Shann Weston; Erin Corra; Barbara Marrett; Barbara Rosenkotter; Linda Lyshall
Subject: Upcoming Social Marketing Grant

Hi all, I just spoke with Kristen Cooley about the upcoming grant to design and implement a social marketing behavior change project. 

We should be getting official notification in the next two weeks.  With approximately 6 weeks to submit.  The project lead needs to have participated in Nancy Lee's training, hence me sending this to you all.

The process will involve submitting a letter of intent outlining the proposed project (2 letters may be submitted per ECO Net). Then, if choosen, a full proposal will be requested.

The grant will involve going throught the 10 Steps of a Social Marketing campaign.  The behavior, audience and focus will need to be directly connected to addressing an area of the Action Agenda, regional and/or local. 

The amount will range from $20,000 to $40,000 with a 20% match and 2 years to implement.

We need to put on our thinking caps for what we might want to do with this grant opportunity. Please let me know of your interest and ideas. 

Thanks Much!

Karrie

Karrie D. Cooper, Coordinator
Stewardship Network of the San Juans

www.stewardshipsjc.org
karriedcooper@gmail.com
812-322-0453 work cell

Question Time Should Be All The Time

The latest comments regarding the civility (or lack thereof) of the Trojan Heron in Kit Rawson's post cause me to reflect, once again, on the Trojan Heron's perspective on the matter.

The photo and inscription below is that of Stephen Fry, who is the Fry part of the famous British comedy team of Fry and Laurie. Fry's former comedy partner, Hugh Laurie, has since become better known as the character of Dr. Gregory House of the hit TV series House, which is the most successful TV program in the world.

Stephen Fry is a Cambridge-educated supporter of the Labour Party. He's vice president of an environmental group called Fauna and Flora, International. He's a gay man, an atheist, a comedian, an actor, and intellectual ... and I couldn't agree more with his view of civility. But then again, the Trojan Heron has often cited the Brits, especially their conduct in Parliament, as a model of brutally frank talk that I wish we could emulate here. Thatcher's last Question Time, for example, is a masterpiece of blunt political talk from both sides, with incriminations, recriminations, retorts, humour (notice I wrote that with an accent) ... and stirring, raucous dialogue all around.

By comparison, we sit here with a going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket bumper crop of vapid ungovernable quangos and think it polite to put up with the whole mess.  How in the name of George Washington did we become more timid than the Brits?

Having said that, and before moving on to a description of the Stewardship Network in the next post, have a look at the MRC's Annual Report from 2010. How many citizen committees put out an Annual Report? How many claim responsibility for nearly $1.3 million in grants? The report says that the grants support jobs and the economy of the County, but we'd be curious to know who exactly benefits? Did the Council approve all these grants, or were they the result of the MRC establishing financial and policy obligations for the County of their own accord? I can't find any Council resolutions regarding the grants, but maybe I just missed them. Is the MRC working on any grants currently that the Council doesn't know about?

Rawson's Response To Our Recent MRC Posting

A couple of days ago, we put up a post regarding the MRC, including an email from a constituent to the Council asking some questions about the activities of the MRC. Kit Rawson of the MRC felt the post was inaccurate, so we said we'd let him post a response to set the record straight from his perspective.

Below is Rawson's response.
________________________________________________________

Thanks for the opportunity to correct/amplify on a few statements made in the January 10 posting regarding the MRC.  My interest right here is to correct the facts, not debate the issues.  There certainly are issues to debate, but I think that debate is most constructively carried out on a factual basis.  By way of background, I have been a member of the San Juan MRC since 2001 and have been employed by the Tulalip Tribes since 1986.  I am stepping down from the MRC when my current term ends at the end of February of this year, and I am retiring from my job at Tulalip in early March.  My wife and I have owned property on San Juan Island since 1982, and we built a cabin there between 1987 and 1990, which we use throughout the year.  Our principal residence is in Mount Vernon. 

I was chair of the MRC from 2005-2010, but I am only a member now.  I offer these comments on my own behalf and am not speaking for the MRC or anyone else on the MRC.

The original posting stated “.. the MRC has been corresponding with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) about closures on the west side …”.  This was corrected to state the correct topic of the correspondence after I let the Trojan Heron know of the error, and the posting has been edited.  Thank you. I provide a little more information on this below:

The recent communication with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife was regarding new information on the timing of juvenile salmon presence in the San Juan Islands.  Currently they base decisions on regulating the timing of in-water work to protect salmon on information from mainland areas near river mouths that does not apply to the San Juan Islands.  So we sent the new information from the San Juan Islands to WDFW.  This was a follow up to discussions with WDFW over the past several years.  The original salmon recovery chapter for the San Juan Islands pointed out that protection of juvenile salmon in this area could be greatly improved by the application of local data to the problem.   The letter we sent was merely communicating the latest local data to them and asking them to meet with the MRC in a public meeting to discuss the information.  Our data also includes detailed information on the location of juvenile salmon as well as their timing.  Work windows do not have to be “one size fits all” but rather could be based on location, timing, and even year-to-year variability in fish presence.  They are also based on a consideration of the safety of workers and the protection of materials and other factors. Our goal was to convene a discussion of local data and local concerns with this state agency. 

A San Juan County council member who graciously volunteered to serve as pro tem liaison to the MRC was present during the MRC’s discussions of this letter.  This member did not express agreement or disagreement with the letter, nor of our sending it, but the member was aware of the letter and of the discussion we had on it.  The MRC was following up on a longer term discussion with WDFW and acting in good faith.  The MRC’s intent was not to presume to speak for San Juan County or anyone else in a matter of policy but rather to be sure that WDFW had the most recent local data on this topic, which they had asked for previously and been expecting.   In fact, I and others asked for the letter to be edited so that it was clear that is wasn’t asking for a specific policy but rather only for a discussion.  It was the edited version that was adopted by the MRC.

An email quoted in the posting states “…is it true that one of the tribes paid for the MRC coordinator’s salary for 6 months … .”  No, it is not true.    The Tulalip Tribes provided $15,000 in 2011 or 2012 (I can’t remember which) to help seed the fund for projects to implement the San Juan Islands action agenda, which is part of the Puget Sound Partnership’s action agenda.  The local agenda was developed locally and represents local needs and concerns.  The $15,000 went into a fund that was divvyed up into three or four small projects, carried out by locally-based project proponents, to implement the local action agenda.  All of this information is publically available, and I and others can help find more information if requested to do so.  The funds came from funds that the tribal casino designates for community projects and was awarded based on a request to the committee that awards these funds to community groups following normal procedures for such requests.  This was a one-time donation to help get the local program going under the Puget Sound Partnership.

It is important for people to have correct information about the background of issues they are concerned with.  It is a matter of common courtesy to first ask the subject of the discussion about a factual matter.  So it would have been appropriate here to ask someone in the MRC office, or the MRC chair, or an MRC member, or the council member who is attending MRC meetings about recent correspondence of the MRC.  Or MRC minutes could be consulted, either online or as requested from the MRC office.  In this case, the TH did correct the posting after getting a correction from me, after checking up on it, I would guess.  That is great, but it would have been better if the facts were correct from the beginning, which I don’t think would have been very hard to do.  Similarly, it would be courteous and respectful to ask the someone in the county, or the local integrating organization coordinator, or someone from one of the tribes, about a supposed source of funds for work that is being coordinated through the county.  Of course it is always appropriate, and sometimes wise, to check these facts.  But good relationships are fostered by observation of the rules of common courtesy in my opinion and in my experience.

In my opinion, the points I read in the TH about whether or not it is wise for San Juan County to accept grants, what the rules of operation for the MRC and other advisory bodies should be, whether or not the county should participate in the Puget Sound Partnership, and others are all worthy of discussion.  But, if the discussion starts with distortions and attacks, the response will most likely be to defend against the distortions and attacks rather than to debate the issues. 

MRC WTF?

Here's the text of an email to the new Council from a constituent (see below). If you've been following recent events regarding the Marine Resources Committee (MRC), you will have noted that they seem to have a problem with authority, specifically the Council's authority. Back in November, Linda Lyshall of the MRC sat in front of the Council and told them that the MRC reported to the Northwest Straits Commission, not the County Council. Then, in the past week, we find out the MRC has been corresponding with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) about fish window closures*, and then cc'ing the Council after the fact.

Business as usual for the MRC.

I apologize for my recent barrage of comments, but given that the Council is addressing the committees issue, I wanted to raise a few more points about the MRC that have troubled me, as a lawyer, for some time.

First, is it true that one of the tribes paid for the MRC coordinator’s salary for 6 months, and if so, isn’t that a conflict of interest, given that the tribes have repeatedly threatened to sue the County if they are not happy with the “all shoreline is critical” and sea level rise provisions that Council enacts?

Second, has the MRC figured out where the $17,000 came from? This money is almost certainly grant funds provided to the County (although I understand that a few dollars may be contributions, which fact raises its own issues—is the MRC authorized to solicit, accept and spend donations?). Grant funds come with obligations that the state and federal governments take seriously, and the County is almost certainly on the hook for them. In my experience, grant funds are tightly supervised and an accounting rendered quarterly or annually, depending on the program.

Third, I did not understand why the MRC sought and why the prior Council granted the MRC $10,000 out of County “rainy day” funds for a coordinator. The MRC is legally authorized to perform two functions, so far as my legal research has gotten: advise Council on marine matters and advise Council on which projects should be funded through the salmon recovery program. The “Lead Entity” coordinator seems to be the natural coordinator for the second responsibility. The MRC members are supposed to be experts in the relevant areas, with the exception of the general citizen member. That being the case, it is a bit puzzling why the MRC would need additional staff support. They already have a third County staffer preparing minutes, which is something else that is puzzling. Based on PRA documents that I have reviewed, I believe that the current MRC coordinator has even undertaken to revise and amplify the “contractual requirements” demanded of the County beyond those originally proposed by the NWSC/Ecology, to include more “work.” Negotiating against the County, as it were. Given the fact that NWSC funding (and most other state and federal funding) is drying up, that does not seem wise, even if allowing a County employee to write his or her own position description ever made sense.

Fourth, the County allocated $10,000 to the MRC conditionally in the 2013 budget, based on what was unearthed about the MRC “mystery” funds recently brought to light. I believe that a decision whether to charge those costs against the MRC mystery funds instead should be teed up before the end of the current 6-month obligation.

Finally, I assume that Council and the Prosecuting Attorney will be conferring on the committee issues. I have raised several and the PA has agreed that, in the two specific cases, the committees had exceeded their authority.

* note the original post said that the letter concerned closures on the west side, whereas the letter actually deals with extending the work window closures in marine areas to protect juvenile salmon. A copy of the letter is available from the linked article in the Island Guardian.

2012 Year In Review

We hope all of our readers have been enjoying Christmas. The Trojan Heron hasn't published in about a week, but we've been busy making use of our holiday by researching stories for the upcoming year. The Trojan Heron isn't even one year old yet, but in our short life span, we've had about 85,000 hits. Each month, our hit count increases, and in many ways, we are just getting started.

We are loved and hated. Many people have accused us of defamation. Friends Board members, members of our citizen committees, Councillors, and several members of the eco-aristocracy claim that we take things out of context. For example, here is a quotation from a November 7 meeting of the Marine Resources Committee (MRC):

There was discussion about the local blog that appears to be following all of the emails coming to Linda's county email address; some of the blog commentaries have been written in the worst light, Linda said, and information is taken out of context. Members agreed with Kit Rawson that the MRC has nothing to hide.

All we really do is report events as we see them, using primary sources of information (such as emails) as much as possible. If the MRC has nothing to hide, why are they included on emails involving the Friends and County consultants arranging meetings to "happen outside of the County’s public participation plan?" Those aren't our words. And as far as Linda Lyshall is concerned, she provided testimony before the Council on November 20 stating that the MRC's parent organization isn't the Council but the Northwest Straits Commission. Lyshall, one of the more prominent members of the MRC and a County employee to boot, doesn't even know who she works for ... doesn't even know enough to hide her spectacular ignorance of County committee hierarchy.

As for whether the Trojan Heron reports in the correct light, we report stories in the light in which we find them. Often, it shows our appointed public servants to be oblivious of their public responsibilities. Often, it shows our citizen committees to be entirely out of control, and the MRC is one of the best examples of the worst behavior of committees. Frequently, the corruption and dysfunctionality of our County (and State) officials seems to be exceeded only by their breathtaking hypocrisy and ignorance.

Before we press on with 2013, take a moment to review where we've been. We think some of the biggest stories of 2012 were:

• The needless persecution of Charles Dalton
• Friend's Board member Vivian Burnett's hypocrisy
• Ecology's pervasive influence on our "local" processes
• Adamus' horrific performance as our expert on Best Available Science (BAS)
• Secret CAO Committee Meetings
• The County's disregard of overwhelming public input on CAOs
• The desperate and shameful performance of our Council throughout the CAO deliberations

Most of our stories have to do with Iceberg Government. They'll be lots more of that in 2013.  What do you think the top stories have been?

Iceberg Government

Who runs this County? Is it the people we elect? Sometimes it's hard to tell.

Many of the posts on this blog present evidence of how this County operates. We've shown emails of public officials and contractors conspiring to avoid public participation. We've seen State officials tell whopping lies. We have accounts from former citizen-committee members about being led around by the nose by staff and consultants.  We've watched consultants dodge questions and ignore evidence contradictory to their recommendations. We continue to hear double-talk, such as the State contending it has no authority over the CAOs yet the Council uses them as a scare tactic. Latest case in point, we currently hear some existing Council members saying that they have to pass the CAOs otherwise the State will slap a building moratorium on us.

A building moratorium? For what? As a penalty for all the horrible pollution here?

Threats. Sometimes our government seems to be nothing more than a network of bullies insisting that the public be ignored. Along those lines, the latest veiled threat from the Friends came out in the past few days. You can read Kyle Loring's buzzword-laden diatribe here, which combines several environmental themes shotgun style in an effort to strike a chord with the public on something ... anything. Having trouble getting traction on your CAO position?  Mix in a little coal outrage and re-launch.

Let's look at one of Loring's CAO comments:

San Juan County is on the verge of adopting one of the weakest critical areas ordinances in the Puget Sound region. The ordinance’s buffers are designed to allow 40 percent of all local pollution into our streams, lakes, and seas.

This is akin to saying we have the weakest air pollution laws in the region because 100% of our air is allowed to flow unfiltered into our lungs and homes. It's like saying that we have the weakest food laws in the region because we are allowed to eat 100% of the produce from our gardens. We have some of the weakest standards for public responsibility in the region because we let our grant-funded local environmental non-profits baldly misinform and conspire against us.

When our local smoking-gunners can't rely on authenticated facts or sound logic, they rely on their network to back them up. That brings us to "iceberg government," which is the term I've coined for the unseen people and organizations who really wield power here. They drown out and "out-consensus" the views that conflict with their bureaucratic self-interests. They freeze out the public good.

As a summa graduate of Bowdoin, Loring might claim some familiarity with icebergs (Bowdoin alums are known as "polar bears"), and he might even claim some experience with environmental truth. Here's a clip from Bowdoin's Kent Island Research Station from 1998.

Kyle Loring ('98) conducted an experiment to test whether false eye-spots taped to the back of a hard hat truly deter Herring Gulls from dive-bombing. To my surprise, after exposing himself to daily systematic walks through the gull colony, he found no difference in the frequency of attacks or the number of direct hits with or without eye-spots -- it appears that we may have been fooling ourselves into thinking that the eye-spots conferred some protection. He did document, however, that most attacks come from behind (60%) or the side (35%) vs. the front.

Maybe his research gave Loring insight into how to conduct attacks regarding the CAOs (i.e., approach issues obliquely, from behind or from the side, not head on), but I prefer to think that it might offer a clue as to why Loring's arguments customarily lack cogency (too many blows to the head?).
____________________________________________________

Data by the Back Door

We know the County is looking for an ecological "smoking gun" that can be used against all of us for the CAOs and SMP. We know the Friends have a propensity for "compiling data" on individual citizens (to put it mildly) so they can persecute them. If you're interested in eco-framing everyone in the County using bad ecological data, who ya gonna call?

Below are a series of emails regarding County shoreline data. It mentions the Shoreline Management Plan (SMP) update, but the same information is being used for the Fish & Wildlife Habitat CAO. These and other emails reveal the Friends and their friends as some of the puppet masters of County data. Data enters the County GIS/data system with the deliberate intent to avoid any public participation or independent third-party review.

The parties involved in the emails below are Stephanie Buffum and Tina Whitman of the Friends; Amanda Azous, Land Bank Commissioner and one of the consultant authors of the County's Best Available Science (BAS) synthesis; and the cc's include Linda Lyshall, Marine Resources Committee (MRC) Coordinator; Steve Revella, MRC Chair; and Jose Carrasquero, another BAS and SMP consultant from Herrera. Colin Maycock is the County planner in charge of the SMP update.

As Tina Whitman says ... fyi ...
___________________________________________________

From: Tina Whitman [mailto:tina@sanjuans.org]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 11:05 AM
To: Linda Lyshall; 'Steve Revella'
Subject: FW: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

fyi

From: Tina Whitman [mailto:tina@sanjuans.org]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 11:04 AM
To: 'Amanda Azous'
Cc: 'Stephanie Buffum'; 'mrc@sanjuanco.com'
Subject: RE: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

Thanks Amanda,

I totally agree that a face to face meeting is the best tool to help all of us gain a better understanding of what potential changes could be made, using existing data, to address concerns of the mrc, fsj and the tac and improve our support of the inventorty document.

I appreciate your willingness to do this.

-tina

From: Amanda Azous [mailto:aazous@herrerainc.com]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 10:02 AM
To: Tina Whitman
Cc: Stephanie Buffum; mrc@sanjuanco.com
Subject: RE: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

Hi Tina,

I am working on making this meeting happen outside of the County’s public participation plan, which means it must be a private meeting and not on the County’s budget. I think that is the only way to get a constructive dialogue going. I hope to know within the next few days if Herrera can do this, and have the meeting on San Juan Island (I think that would be best). I would really like to resolve these important issues or at least all leave with a better understanding of why certain decisions were made and what should be fixed where needed. I think we all want the same thing which is for the County to be able to move forward to update its SMP and prevent further degradation of our County’s shoreline and nearshore environment. I don’t have Steve Revella’s email but have copied the general MRC email.

Thank-you for your patience in this matter,

Amanda

AMANDA AZOUS

Science Associate

direct 206.787.8251 | cell 206.920.8044 | main 206.441.9080

2200 Sixth Avenue Suite 1100 Seattle, WA 98121

Find Herrera online at: www.herrerainc.com

This electronic transmission may contain privileged and/or confidential information intended only for the recipient(s) named.  If you have received this message in error, please delete it from your system without copying it, and please notify me by reply electronic mail.  Thank you.

SEATTLE, WA | PORTLAND, OR | MISSOULA, MT | OLYMPIA, WA | WINTHROP, WA | GUANGZHOU, CHINA

From: Tina Whitman [mailto:tina@sanjuans.org]
Sent: Tuesday, March 06, 2012 10:56 AM
To: 'Colin Maycock'; 'Stephanie Buffum'; Amanda Azous; Jose Carrasquero
Subject: RE: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

Thanks colin,

From my perspective, it would be a gathering of the SMP team (consultants, staff and your tac), with representatives (small number of for efficiency) from the MRC, the lead entity, and FSJ (these groups selected for their familiarity with local data sets and ongoing concerns over current inventory framework), to discuss specific concerns over current integration of existing shoreline data sets, with a goal towards improving everyone’s understanding of the current inventory’s analytical approach and improving representation of existing data into the inventory to end up with a document that better supports next phases of the SMP.

From my own review of the document, as well as communication with tac, salmon recovery and other MRC members, I believe that face to face communication and discussion could help facilitate some changes to the inventory that would make those of us most familiar with local shoreline data sets and their ability to inform management of key processes, species and habitats much more comfortable moving forward. 

As you are aware, the formal public comment process doesn’t support the kind of interactive conversation we feel would be most productive; however, it has been the only tool available to date.

Thanks.  I look forward to working with you all.

Regard

tina

From: Colin Maycock [mailto:Colinm@sanjuanco.com]
Sent: Tuesday, March 06, 2012 9:11 AM
To: Stephanie Buffum; Amanda Azous; Tina Whitman; Jose Carrasquero
Subject: RE: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

Hey There,

Before going any further, what exactly are you trying to achieve with this proposed public meeting? Is there a specific result you expect?

Respectfully,

Colin

Colin Maycock, AICP

Planner IV

San Juan County Community Development and Planning

PO Box 947, Friday Harbor, WA

98250

Phone: 360-370-7573

Email: colinm@sanjuanco.com

From: Stephanie Buffum [mailto:stephanie@sanjuans.org]
Sent: Friday, March 02, 2012 4:56 PM
To: 'Amanda Azous'; 'Tina Whitman'; 'Jose Carrasquero'; Colin Maycock
Subject: SMP San Juan data stakeholder meeting

Hi Amanda, et all:

I think there is a much larger group of people besides ourselves that would like time in front of the consultants so that we can be better informed about the application of local data in the SMP. These groups include: the MRC, the Salmon Lead Entity, members of the SMP technical review team, the PSP/San Juan Initiative, Skagit Systems Cooperative and Kurt Fresh. 

We believe that such a meeting is essential in ensuring we have a credible SMP Characterization Report. We believe that this meeting should be in San Juan County, but since this is an SMP product and DOE is a part of this process,  Padilla Bay may be a good travel neutral location for all interested parties.

I would be willing to look into the availability of the facility if we can get agreement that this meeting is necessary for the good of the order. 

Stephanie

Stephanie Buffum Field

Executive Director

FRIENDS OF THE SAN JUANS

POB 1344 Friday Harbor, WA  98250

360. 378.2319 office

360.472.0404 cell

Stephanie@sanjuans.org