The Economy, Stupid

The phrase made famous by James Carville resonates in our county today. Despite appearances, our pitched environmental battles here are not about the environment. They are about economic programs disguised as environmental programs. The Friends, for example, are not against development. They are very much in favor of Scenic Byway/transportation corridor development. That's the kind of development that favors their interests and business model. Never mind the environmental impact of tourists, which some studies suggest generate as much as 5 lbs of trash per day and use 100 gallons of water per day per tourist. That doesn't matter. What matters is that the Friends get an economic development program that suits their continued growth and power base. Tourists come here; fall in love with a crafted marketing image of the San Juans as a threatened natural paradise and then return home to donate to the Friends from afar. Plus, the Friends then get to use "visual impacts" to the Scenic Byway as one more legal strategy for hauling landowners to court or the Hearing Examiner, as already has happened on occasion.

Destination marketing is part and parcel of the Scenic Byway/transportation corridor/eco-tourist development program. We heard the "destination marketing" term bandied about at Council meetings just last week by Liz Ilig, promoter of the Scenic Byway. Destination marketing is the economic development plan pushed by our local "conservationists," which seems like it should be a cruel joke. Case in point, over a hundred businesses in the islands (many consisting of one-man bands) wrote to Obama in support of the National Monument/Conservation Area idea. This is what they said in their opening paragraph:

As business owners we have a strong interest in the economic health of the San Juan Islands. The economy of the San Juans depends on the natural beauty and recreational opportunities that attract residents, visitors and businesses to these islands.

Folks, I have news for you. That's not a conservation message. That's a destination marketing message.  That's not Rachel Carson or John Muir. That's Disneyland. That's using the environment for marketing.  This county is full of pretend environmentalists pursuing their own economic self interest while simultaneously wanting the sanctimonious image benefits from their eco-glorymongering.

It's phony. It's Vivien-esque.

The eco-tourist economic development path is the road to perdition, and by perdition, I mean County bankruptcy. It creates infrastructure needs that have to be sized for the peak season, supported by a tax base sized for the off-season. Couple that with our County's collective fiscal irresponsibility, and we are on the same trajectory as all those charter governments in California that are going bankrupt. Yes ... bankrupt, just like our insolvent solid waste program. We need to start talking about it because that is where we are headed, in my opinion. And it's not the fault of the "CAO virus" or "property rights" groups, or the bogey man or some other scapegoat. Our whole County is run the way our solid waste program was run. We do not have a sustainable model for government here in the islands, and our incapable public servants lurch from crisis to crisis in groundhog day fashion, surprised at every turn by foreseeable events.

Just like the solid waste program, our overall pathetic performance as a County shows up in the numbers, and thanks to some fantastic research by Lopezian, Nick Jones, we can say the following:

Coming up with a truly equivalent comparison from county to county is extremely difficult: Counties all spin budget numbers in slightly different ways, counties vary wildly in percentages of population in incorporated towns and cities, percentages of unoccupied or vacation homes can drive up county expenses and drive down population figures. And of course geography play a large role in the expense of administering a given area--a county composed of islands is a special case when it comes to delivering services to all residents--though there is some adjustment too for the much greater mileage of county maintained roads in any mainland county.

That said, the discrepancy between all levels of SJC budget and spending and that of other rural, waterfront Western WA counties is shocking. In the rawest form, unexamined numbers from other rural Western Washington show San Juan County spending as a wild outlier. Total county spending per capita, including general fund and non discretionary spending, ranges from $825 per capita in Island County (Whidbey and Camano Islands), $990 per capita in Clallam County to $1084 per capita in tiny Wahkiakum County, with practically no services provided by incorporated towns. San Juan County total spending currently runs $2613 per capita, or 241% of Wahkiakum County's expenditures. Pacific County in South West Washington seems to have more in common with SJC than any other Washington county. It has many of the same factors and limitations as SJC, and some unique or steeper challenges than we have here. Their raw budget comes to $1464 per capita, or exactly 56% of San Juan County spending.

More of that to come in later posts, along with economic analysis done by other citizens too. The excellent work done by these private citizens stands in stark contrast to the pathetic economic non-analysis done by our own County. It's one more example of how our County, dominated by special interests, doesn't do analysis. It's simply an out-of-touch echo chamber.

Why do we keep electing, appointing, and hiring people who perpetuate it?

Consensus Ineptitude

Collectively, our government officials have decided the CAOs will have no cost. Amazing isn't it? All these new code sections that "fix" all these terrible environmental problems we suffer from, and they'll hardly cost a penny. They're all benefit and no cost. Free lunch for everyone.

That's what our Auditor says. That's what our Council Chair says. That's what our Deputy Prosecuting Attorney says. The Assessor too ... oh ... and our Acting County Administrator and CDPD staff ... don't forget our temporary County management intern. For its lack of effort and simpleton logic, the memo below would have been an embarrassment had it been written by our County intern, so it is all the more disturbing that it was authored by our seasoned County Auditor who holds an undergraduate degree from Harvard and an MBA from Stanford.

A planning commissioner asked our well-qualified Auditor for her independent economic analysis of the impacts of the CAOs. In response, our Auditor principally acted as a scribe to convey the consensus opinions of herself and seven other County officials (intern included).

While concluding there would be no significant CAO cost, this crack group of professionals, assisted by our Economic Development Council, had the following quotable insights:

• A complex web of variables affects property value. 
• It is worth noting that market values are always shifting.
• One thing seems clear though: the CAO is mandated by the state and we’ll legally have to implement it sooner or later.
• The County is required to satisfy the requirements of the GMA.

Gripping albeit redundant stuff ("required to satisfy requirements"), but it fails to consider why our previous County Administrator contemplated the specter of "bankruptcy" in his last two budget documents. It fails to account for the Council's own observations that the CAOs could cost a bundle. It fails to acknowledge that our Prosecuting Attorney's office is asking for more funding.

It's funny how these non-costs can pile up.

I think my favorite part of the letter is the ending, which contains a customarily disjointed County premise and conclusion:

It is important to remember that there are multiple opinions on the regulations. Doing nothing will not solve the problem, as that would almost certainly result in litigation for “failure to act.”

Solve the problem? Failure to act? About what? What problem? Will anyone ever say what it is? The ending of the letter unabashedly displays all the prejudice permeating the CAO process. It assumes there is a problem without ever stating what it is.

Our County officials believe in environmental problems they can't describe, and they believe in legal restrictions and government services that have no cost.