Cost of Government Deniers

Folks have been reacting to the comparative budget analysis performed by Lopezian Nick Jones. Most people have been very supportive, and many citizens think Nick did a heroic job that is long overdue. For those who haven't seen the analysis, Nick computes the cost of government here versus other counties in Washington. He finds that costs are significantly higher here than in all other counties. Surprised?

Nick's clearly stated and well supported claim has brought out the traditional County apologists, who are attacking Nick's analysis on a variety of dimensions. One of the people trying to "set the record straight" is Sharon Kivisto of sanjuanislander.com. In the past, she has been fond of saying that we have the lowest tax rate in the state, and when you look at the tax rate on a per parcel basis, there is some support for her claim. However, when you look at tax rates on a per capita basis, the view is completely different. We have the highest, not the lowest, tax rate, and that is the gist (and genius) of Nick's analysis. Since it is people who pay taxes, not parcels, the better benchmark is to examine the burden on the taxpayers.

In her response to Nick's analysis, Kivisto uses many of the same arguments that we've heard over and over, especially during the solid waste fiasco: we have higher costs here; we have triplication of facilities; we have to ride the ferries. All have a grain of truth to them, but these "reasons" for our higher costs are overused and abused excuses. Ultimately, the public grew tired of these excuses for solid waste incompetence, and I think the same is happening with respect to the County as a whole.

More and more people are refusing to buy into the County's schtick. The County is about to pass a "tax" (CAO/SMP) that will cost private citizens a whopping amount off their personal "balance sheets." It will provide essentially no revenue to the County, but increase government's enforcement responsibilities and associated costs. The County is committing itself to what amounts to a no growth strategy, but they still want increased tax revenue too. We hear some Councillors say we "need to at least maintain what we have" regarding county infrastructure. But the County is not equally committed to the premise that private citizens should be able to "maintain what we have." In fact, via non-conforming policies, buffers, etc., it seems the County is doing everything it can to make sure we are forbidden from maintaining what we have. The County has shown no respect for maintaining the capital infrastructure of people's lives.

With no growth, all taxation efforts are a zero sum game, and government revenues can only be increased at the expense of the rest of society. It turns into "us versus them." Speaking of "them" (see attachment), how many people do you know who work 20 hours/week and get $753 per month paid by their employer toward health insurance (and dental) AND $3,000 for a spending account?  How many people do you know who work 20 hours/week (or even 40 or 60 for that matter) and get their kids covered UNTIL THEY ARE 25????

And a 3% COLA ... or full-time pension benefits?

Another Gem From Hruby

Much of the information, data, and reasoning that comes from the "experts" associated with the CAOs is embarrassingly poor. The emails below from Tom Hruby are about as bad as the letter he and Erik Stockdale co-authored to the Council on February 4, 2011. In that letter, I feel they demonstrated their complete ignorance of environmental risk. Their explanations appeared to confuse environmental risk with Type 1 and Type 2 error. I can only conclude that they have no idea that error, risk, uncertainty, and level of concern are all different concepts. To me, it's astonishing that they have their jobs without having a fundamental grasp of the differences among those concepts, much less be qualified to speak to the merits of statistical papers like Mayer.

At some point, the TH will post the Stockdale/Hruby 2011 letter and dismantle its reasoning. For now, have a look at the more recent Hruby missive below. It's hard to know where to begin commentary because it is just so awful, but maybe the best approach is to provide a few overall observations.

For Hruby, it seems the nitrogen cycle isn't a cycle. He only acknowledges nitrogen sources, but not denitrification.  He doesn't recognize that grasses (including corn) are heavy nitrogen users, and that's why people fertilize grass in the first place, so as to provide the added nitrogen that grasses demand.  Anyone who has ever had a compost pile knows that grass is almost pure nitrogen. And I don't know anyone in the islands who is even a moderate user of fertilizers, except perhaps the golf courses. Also, I don't think I've ever seen enough corn on the islands in one spot to qualify as a corn field either.

Hruby apparently is afraid of horse poop too, not realizing that the nitrogen in the poop is used by the grasses that get pooped on. The juxtaposition of his "grasses need nitrogen" point with his "manure has nitrogen" point shows no appreciation that the two competing processes might offset one another and be in balance here in the islands. Heck, with the surfeit of unfertilized hay that we grow, I would venture to guess that we might even suffer from general nitrogen deficiency and need more horse manure to be in balance.

The more these guys talk, the more it seems like we live in Bushwood Country Club and we're trapped in the movie Caddyshack.  Maybe given the leading role of Dr. Adamus, we should refer to it as Addyshack? How long before the experts recommend that we ban Baby Ruth bars?

I particularly enjoy how Dr. Hruby cites Europe and Australia when addressing Patty Miller's question about sources specific to San Juan County.

_______________________________________________
From: Patty Miller [mailto:PattyM@sanjuanco.com] 
Sent: Sunday, June 03, 2012 9:35 PM
To: Shireene Hale; Ingrid Gabriel; howier@sanjuanco.com; RichardF@sanjuanco.com; richp@sanjuanco.com; LovelP@sanjuanco.com; jamies@sanjuanco.com
Subject: FW: Our discussions regarding pollutants coming into wetlands

Hello,

I apologize for not forwarding this to you all earlier.

Thanks, Patty

From: Hruby, Tom (ECY) [mailto:thru461@ECY.WA.GOV]
Sent: Friday, May 18, 2012 9:36 AM
To: Patty Miller
Cc: Stockdale, Erik (ECY)
Subject: Our discussions regarding pollutants coming into wetlands

Dear Patty, 

I would like to summarize our conversations and my e-mails from yesterday into one to make it easier for you to follow my thoughts.  Please dis-regard the e-mails I sent yesterday, especially the first one that had an error in the math.

As I understand it from our conversations, you are concerned about three major issues (and please correct me if I am wrong):

1.       Do the articles referenced in the Mayer paper address the pollutants commonly generated in the dominant land uses of San Juan County?  Since most land uses in the non-urban areas do not generate toxic or hazardous materials, the removal of these compounds by the buffer is not a significant issue. 

2.       Were the amounts of pollutants used to calculate the removal rates in the articles reviewed appropriate for the amounts that might be found coming from the dominant land uses in SJ County?  

3.       Do we need to have a 75-80% removal of pollutants in the buffer if the amount of pollutants coming in is very low in the first place. Could we get by with a lower % removal because the amount coming through the buffer was so low? 

My analysis of your questions:

1.       Yes, the Mayer article does address pollutants generated by the rural land uses in SJC.  The Mayer article reviewed the literature on the removal of nitrogen by buffers.  First, when scientists talk about pollution from nitrogen we do not mean nitrogen gas but rather the different nitrogen compounds that act as fertilizers for both terrestrial and aquatic plants.  Excessive amounts of "nitrogen" cause eutrophication in wetlands, streams, ponds, and lakes.  The BAS report for SJC mentioned that nitrogen removal could be used as a surrogate for the removal other toxic pollutants and I think this is where it became confusing.  The major pollutant coming from the  rural and agricultural land uses common on the islands is nitrogen in form of fertilizers and ammonia and nitrate in animal wastes. Since the Mayer paper reviewed only the articles on nitrogen removal it is appropriate to use it for SJC.  If the lands uses in SJC do not generate toxic materials then we do not have to assume that the removal nitrogen can be used as a surrogate for the removal of toxic pollutants as well.  It becomes a moot point.  In urban and suburban areas of the county however, it is an issue because of the application of herbicides and pesticides used in gardening and landscaping. 

I should mention however, that there is one other pollutant coming from rural land uses that can be an issue.  This is pathogens (coliform bacteria and viruses) from animal wastes.  This is not considered an "toxic" material but it is a pollutant.  Pathogens by themselves have little impact on the functions of a wetland, but they do become an issue if the aquatic resource downstream is a source of drinking water or recreation.  Buffers can remove pathogens before they reach aquatic resources. 

2.    Most of the 88 articles used by Meyer to develop his model of nitrogen removal measured nitrogen removal in the field under actual conditions.  The studies were done throughout the country and in Europe and Australia.  The sources of nitrogen to the buffer zones therefore represent a wide range of different land uses that generate different amounts of nitrogen.  Some of the studies were done in forested system where very little nitrogen is released and some were next to pastures and cattle feedlots where the amounts (called the "loading rate") were extremely high. For example, one article (Hubbard and Lowrance 1997) looked at the effect different forest practices had on nitrate removal in buffers while another (Young and others 1980) looked at nitrate removal in buffers where the runoff came from feedlots.   

My conclusion is that the amount of nitrogen coming from the rural land uses in SJC fall within the amounts that were used to develop the Meyer's model of % removal. I did a quick search of how much nitrogen is applied in the land uses most commonly used for the buffer studies (agriculture, urban, residential)

For agriculture, corn is one of the most nitrogen demanding crops and it requires about 100lbs of nitrogen per acre per year.  Most crops require 50 - 100lbs/acre.  Note: nitrogen loading rates are measured as lbs of "atomic" nitrogen per acre.  For example there is only 1 lbs of nitrogen in 6 lbs of sodium nitrate, the rest consists of sodium and oxygen.   

         For residential lawns, the recommended amount is about 40-50 lbs nitrogen/acre per year thought most people apply more. 
www.neuse.ncsu.edu/lawncare.htm 

         For pasture grasses it is about 60-80 lbs N/acre/year http://www.extension.iastate.edu/Publications/PM869.pdf 

I believe that the biggest source of nitrogen in the rural areas of  SJC would be livestock of one type or another (horses, cattle, sheep, and even the camel on San Juan Island).  The amount of nitrogen coming from livestock in the county can fall within the range found for other land uses.  For example, a horse produces 9.1 tons of manure per year (see attached report).  Typically a ton of horse manure will contain 11 lbs of nitrogen so one horse will produce 100 lbs of nitrogen per year.  If that horse is confined to one acre the "loading rate" for nitrogen is similar to the highest level that is applied in agriculture.  If that one horse is pastured on 5 acres the loading rate is still 20lbs/acre/year.

3.    The one question I cannot answer is "how much removal is enough?"
If a rural land use generate 20lbs of nitrogen per acre per year is it adequate to remove 50% of this in the buffer or do we need to remove 80% to avoid impacts to the water quality in the wetland?    None of the articles cited by Mayer address this question and I have not been able to find any published research on this subject.  There is much research on eutrophication lakes caused by fertilizers, but none that I have found on eutrophication in wetlands.   The decision then becomes one of policy.  How much risk we are willing to accept?  We can be pretty sure that there will be little risk that the wetland becomes eutrophic if we remove 90 - 100% of the nitrogen going into it.  Removing only 80% increases the risk, and this goes even higher if we remove only  50% of the nitrogen coming in.  As you mentioned it may be worthwhile exploring buffer regulations based on the density of livestock upslope of the wetland rather than the size of the lot when addressing water quality. 

Tom 

Tom Hruby, PhD, PWS
Senior Ecologist
Washington State Department of Ecology
PO Box 47600
Olympia WA  98504
(360) 407-7274
tom.hruby@ecy.wa.gov <mailto:tom.hruby@ecy.wa.gov>

Friends Board Member Wants Ag Restrictions

No Ag, no septic, no view.  Why doesn't she just say, "No people"? This is a letter from Janet Alderton, a Friends Board member who is considered a technical expert on the CAOs by CDPD. She's also one of our most outspoken citizens about the CAOs.

Outspoken? ... hmmm ... that doesn't quite capture the frequency and tone of her comments from my perspective.  Abundantly outspoken? ... artless perhaps? ... relentless? As always, you decide. However, if you added up Janet Alderton's emails (word count especially), transmitted articles, private meetings with staffers, technical meetings with government staffers, comments during citizen access time, and hearings testimony, I doubt there is any other citizen who can match her volume of CAO-related comments. There is probably no other citizen who has had freer access to the CAO process.

Never was so much said by so few, it seems, and I think it suggests that some of us are more equal than others.
_____________________________________________________
From: Janet Alderton [mailto:jmalderton@yahoo.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, May 15, 2012 3:41 PM
To: Lovel Pratt; Rich Peterson; Howard Rosenfeld; Richard Fralick; Patty Miller; Jamie Stephens
Subject: Fish&Wildlife CAO draft May 1, 2012

May 15, 2012

Dear County Councilors & Planning Commissioners,

A "High Risk" approach requires monitoring of both water quality and habitat components to assure "no net loss" of Critical Area functions and values. The May 1, 2012 draft of the Fish and Wildlife Habitat Conservation Areas (FWHCA) component of the Critical Areas Ordinance update moves beyond a "Moderate Risk" approach in the following key areas.

1. On page 24 of 36, Table 3.10 f. permits new and expanded agricultural activities in critical areas, the first 50 feet of the buffer closest to the water, and in the remainder of the buffer. There is no special consideration given to threatened, endangered, or sensitive species (Table 3.12) or to habitats of local importance (Table 3.13). Best Management Practices must be used, but these practices do not protect locally important habitats and the species that live within these habitats. The Voluntary Stewardship Program for agriculture requires water quality monitoring, but Table 3.10 f. requires no monitoring for water quality. 

Limited new and expanded agricultural activities might be permitted in the outer portion of a buffer (outside of the first 50 feet closest to the water) for Critical Areas without the species listed in Table 3.12 and for Critical Areas that do not contain the habitats listed in Table 3.13. Water quality monitoring should be required as it is by the Voluntary Stewardship Program.

2. On page 26 of 36, Table 3.10 r. Components of on-site sewage systems should be permitted only in the outer 25% of the buffer (not in the entire buffer), and annual testing of the septic system should be required and enforced. 

3. On page 27 of 36, #6, the variance for a "view," is vague and will allow a building to be sited anywhere on a parcel. #7 is specific for a 90-degree view from the shoreline. #6 should be removed from this draft ordinance. Mitigation should be required for a variance in a Critical Area as it is required for the Reasonable Use Exception.

Thank-you,

Janet Alderton
PO Box 352
Deer Harbor, WA
98243
360-376-3905

Living Between Their Lines

Fortunately, something that did NOT make it's way into the draft version of the wetlands CAO (just barely) was a requirement for permanently demarcating buffers with signs. Excerpts from some of the emails discussing signs are shown below, and I've included a photo of a CAO sign from Whatcom County.

While we were able to avoid signs in our draft wetlands CAO for now, we nevertheless know where some community members want to take this County.

Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign? We might as well be a lifelike display at Disneyland or a Potemkin village.
__________________________________________________

--- On Mon, 1/23/12, Scott Rozenbaum <rozewood@rockisland.com> wrote: From: Scott Rozenbaum <rozewood@rockisland.com> Subject: Re: permanent markers for buffer boundaries To: "Paul Adamus" <adamus7@comcast.net> Cc: "Janice Biletnikoff" <janiceb@sanjuanco.com>, "Ed Kilduff" <ed.kilduff@me.com>, "Janet Alderton" <jmalderton@yahoo.com>, "Shireene Hale" <shireeneh@sanjuanco.com>, "Dan Nickel" <DNickel@watershedco.com>, "Rachel Dietzman" <racheld@sjcpublicworks.org>, "Erik (ECY)Stockdale" <ESTO461@ECY.WA.GOV>, "Anderson Paul (ECY NWRO SEA)" <paan461@ECY.WA.GOV>, "Belluomini Steve" <sbelluomini@yahoo.com>, "TomHruby" <thru461@ECY.WA.GOV> Date: Monday, January 23, 2012, 3:29 PM I was off on the prices of the signage. See excerpt below from King County Wetland regs: Wetland Not in Tract Wetland signs and fences may be required by the department. Sign and fence Requirements The signs must be placed at the edge of the required buffer, between the buffer and the 15-foot BSBL. The spacing of the signs will be determined during the review of the development proposal. Generally signs are spaced every 50 feet to 150 feet and stationed in a prominent location (i.e. at the closest point to the proposed development). Signs may be attached to a post or fence. Wetland Areas Boundary signs are available from the King County Department of Development and Environmental Services for $2.50. A Stream Sign Installation Detail is available from DDES. Scott On Jan 23, 2012, at 12:36 PM, Paul Adamus wrote: How about "permanent and obvious..." ?   More than just having a legal record of where the buffer is supposed to be, the purpose of markers is to visually dissuade people and ATVs from overusing the buffer area and thus compacting the soil or unintentionally disturbing wildlife in the wetland.  A survey pin would not accomplish that. Paul Adamus From: Janet Alderton [mailto:jmalderton@yahoo.com]  Sent: Monday, January 23, 2012 10:01 AM To: Shireene Hale; Scott Rozenbaum; Dan Nickel; Janice Biletnikoff; Rachel Dietzman; Erik (ECY)Stockdale; Anderson Paul (ECY NWRO SEA); Belluomini Steve; Ed Kilduff; Paul Adamus Cc: TomHruby Subject: Re: permanent markers for buffer boundaries Hi everyone, I know that we are outside of the commenting window, but I have found reference to the marking of buffer boundaries for Kitsap County in WA State. I favor some permanent marking of buffer boundaries. Regards, Janet #07 49708               Brown Reasonable Use Exception Staff Report              6 2. Buffer enhancement shall occur pursuant to the February 10, 2007 buffer enhancement plan prepared by B & A, Inc. Enhancement shall include plantings as specified in the plant list (Table 1), and removal of blackberry plants and fill within the designated buffer area. 3. The final planting schedule and monitoring plan shall be conditions of future building permit approval. Written confirmation of fill removal shall be submitted to Kitsap County DCD, by the applicant’s wetland consultant prior to building permit issuance. 4. A split rail fence shall be installed along the perimeter of the replanted buffer area prior to final occupancy, as indicated on the site plan. Wetland buffer signs (available from the Department) shall be installed at 50 foot intervals along the fence. cc:           Hearing Examiner Clerk of the Hearing Examiner Kitsap County DCD, Development Engineering Kitsap County DCD Staff Planner: David Greetham DCD File

The Most Important Question Is "Why?"

In the emails below, Shireene has a lot of questions for the authors of the Zhang paper, and she relays to Dr. Adamus the results of a conversation she had with Richard Fralick, Patty Miller, and Pete Rose.

Of all the questions being asked about the CAOs and SMP, I think the most important question has to be, "Why?"  Why is the County conducting itself in this manner? Why can't the citizens of this County hear conversations in the open? Why the secret "science" conversations? Why does Shireene take such a lead on "science", to the point of seeming to influence the answers and implementation? Why the secret CAO Implementation Team meetings? Why the claims of public threats and incivility from the County when there appear to be none. According to sources who have checked on the matter of "threats", not even the sheriff's office knows what "threats" they may be talking about.

Why does our County government act this way?
______________________________________________________________
From: Paul Adamus [mailto:adamus7@comcast.net] 
Sent: Monday, April 16, 2012 7:08 PM
To: Shireene Hale
Subject: Re: Zhang et al. 2010 questions

Thanks, Shireene.  I'm unavailable this week (working in Alberta again) but am willing to communicate with those authors if they, too, are willing.

Paul
 _____  

From: "Shireene Hale" <shireeneh@sanjuanco.com>
To: adamus7@comcast.net
Sent: Monday, April 16, 2012 4:05:32 PM
Subject: Zhang et al. 2010 questions

Paul,

I met with Patty, Richard and Pete this morning. They were not crazy about a conference call with the scientists to discuss the Mayer and Zhang papers (which the Planning Commission recommended). They are however discussing the CAO schedule with the full Council tomorrow. 

They are hoping that you, Dr. Mayer, and Dr. Zhang can perhaps have a conversation about the two papers and provide them an explanation of the merits and draw backs of each approach.

I contacted one of the authors and received this response. The primary author is Xuyang Zhang, and her e-mail address is xzhang@cdpr.ca.gov. See my e-mail below.

If something changes as a result of the Council meeting tomorrow I will let you know.

SH

P.S. It is taking a while for Lynda to complete the minutes from the four Planning Commission meetings. It will probably be later this week before we have a draft with their changes integrated, and probably next week before we have the approval of the Planning Commission officers. 



From: Minghua Zhang [mailto:mhzhang@ucdavis.edu] 
Sent: Monday, April 16, 2012 1:26 PM
To: Xuyang Zhang; Shireene Hale
Subject: Fwd: Zhang et al. 2010 questions

Hello,

I forward this email to the senior author of our paper who reviewed hundreds of papers and put the paper together.  She will know by heart on the work and can better answer your questions without having to re-think about the paper.  So your questions can be better handled.

Xuyang, go ahead and answer these questions.  Thanks.

If you have more questions, feel free to contact me.  Thank you for your interest in our work.  It is pleasing to hear that you may take some of the approaches for management.

Minghua

-------- Original Message -------- 


Subject: 
Zhang et al. 2010 questions
Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2012 13:14:08 -0700
From: Shireene Hale  <mailto:shireeneh@sanjuanco.com> <shireeneh@sanjuanco.com>
To: <mailto:mhzhang@ucdavis.edu> <mhzhang@ucdavis.edu>

Good morning,

I work for San Juan County and we are in the process of reviewing and updating our wetland, stream and shoreline protection regulations to meet Washington State requirements (including the requirement that we consider the best available science and ensure no net loss of the functions and values of these areas). 

As part of this effort we are attempting to develop a site specific approach to sizing wetland and riparian buffers, and of course protection of water quality is an important consideration. At this point our proposed approach for the water quality component of the buffer uses rational method runoff coefficients to predict whether the runoff will be above or below ground, and Figure 1 of Mayer et al. (attached) to determine appropriate buffer sizes for a given percentage of pollutant removal (using nitrogen removal as a proxy for all potential contaminants flowing into the buffer). 

As an alternative, there is now interest in using the paper you co-authored as a guide to appropriate buffer sizes (again, just for the water quality aspects of the buffer), and I have a few questions.

First, it appears your focus was on buffers for agricultural land uses. Did you review any studies of buffers for residential and commercial land uses, where lawns and hardscape (e.g. roads/ driveways, parking areas, roofs, tennis courts etc. ) cause more of the runoff to flow above ground?  Do you think we can apply your results to the runoff and buffers for residential and commercial land uses?

Dr. Mayer's paper presented results based on whether the runoff is above or below ground. That seems important for runoff from residential and commercial areas. If we were to use your paper as a guide, should we assume that figure 3 depicts the situation for runoff that is below ground, and increase the buffers as sites become more impervious and more of the runoff is above ground? 

In comparing the two papers, it looks like the pollutant  removal estimates for nitrogen, with a 10 meter buffer, and runoff mostly below ground, both show a removal efficacy of about 70%. For a 20 meter buffer, your paper shows about 90% removal, while Mayer et al. shows about 75%. Do you have any thoughts on why they are different? 

Finally, would you or another member of the team that worked on your study, perhaps be willing to talk with me, Dr. Mayer, and our consultant, Dr. Paul Adamus, about your results and the use of your paper? I spoke with a portion of our County Council this morning, and they are hoping we can facilitate a dialogue on the use of either or both papers as a guide to the water quality component of our buffer requirements.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Shireene Hale
Planning Coordinator/ Deputy Director
San Juan County
360.370.7569

shireeneh@sanjuanco.com

Dumb and Dumber

At least one Council member keeps saying that our current buffers are "dumb" because they were established without the benefit of Best Available Science (BAS). In her mind, the "problem" with our current version of the CAOs is that we must revise our buffers to comply with WAC 365-195-900 (RCW 36.70A.172):

Counties and cities must include the "best available science" when developing policies and development regulations to protect the functions and values of critical areas

But the requirement to include BAS in our considerations doesn't automatically mean changing our buffers. Besides, many who have been following our County's BAS and the travails of Dr. Adamus are not at all convinced that the new proposed buffers are any smarter than our current buffers, and they may be a good deal dumber.

The fact is, whatever the official BAS might say, our current buffers are the only buffers we have empirical evidence for, and they appear to have been doing a pretty good job. In that regard, they represent the best, most local, and only proven BAS we have about buffers for our County environment. Who abandons a system that is working for a theoretical, unproven method of protection?

It looks like our County might, that's who.

Thought Terminating CAOs

With respect to the CAOs, many of our residents have asked for a long time, "What is the problem?" We have been at a loss to understand why new restrictive environmental regulations are needed here, of all places.  Why would we need giant buffer strips more suited to areas of large-scale crop production?

The truth is that none of us in the San Juans are causing any widespread problems to the San Juans. Global and regional problems may affect us, but the scale of those problems far outweighs our poor power to add or detract.

When the logic of the CAO proponents has been exhausted, they usually resort to a thought terminating cliche. We have heard them say, "Our hands are tied", "We have no choice", or my personal favorite, "It won't be that bad". 

These easily memorized and easily expressed statements are used by the speaker to quell their own cognitive dissonance, and they are symptomatic of an absence of thought. Thought-terminating cliches are just one more example of a seemingly endless stream of fallacious arguments used to advance the CAOs through our local system. When it comes right down to it, there sometimes seems to be little support at all for many CAO proposals except fallacious arguments. When we hear our public officials say things like "Our hands are tied", they are using a convenient phrase to advance the CAOs and end discussion, not make a point.

This is where our public officials have really let us down, in my opinion. When we hear them use celestial teapot arguments, thought terminating cliche's, and all the other gimmicks of avoidance and distraction, we know we are dealing with folks inculcated in a belief system. We are dealing with zombies and the psychology of totalism. 

The question really isn't "What is the problem?" anymore.  The question is "What is the problem with our public officials?"

Feeling himself unable to escape from forces more powerful than himself, he subordinates everything to adapting himself to them. He becomes sensitive to all kinds of cues, expert at anticipating environmental pressures, and skillful in riding them in such a way that his psychological energies merge with the tide rather than turn painfully against himself. This requires that he participate actively in the manipulation of others, as well as in the endless round of betrayals and self-betrayals which are required. But whatever his response - whether he is cheerful in the face of being manipulated, deeply resentful, or feels a combination of both - he has been deprived of the opportunity to exercise his capacities for self-expression and independent action. - Psychology of Totalism

Venn Diagramming Our CAO Woes

Many of you already may be familiar with the clever, cheeky graphs of the Indexed blog. Below is my effort to cast our CAO woes in a similar vein.

Why Nitrogen?

At a March 6 meeting of the Planning Commission, Mike Carlson asked Dr. Paul Adamus a simple two-word question, "Why nitrogen?"  Mike was referring to the fact that Dr. Adamus' buffer proposal in the wetlands CAO draft had used nitrogen as a proxy for all other pollutants. Why did Dr. Adamus base all his wetland buffer calculations on nitrogen?

You can watch Dr. Adamus' reply in this clip. Referring to the 2007 Mayer meta-analysis of nitrogen, Dr. Adamus says, "Simply because it's the only published meta-analysis that there is out there. It's Best Available Science, so that's basically why we went with that."

This is not the first time Dr. Adamus has made this claim. Frequently, he has said that there is one and only one published meta-analysis that evaluated the relationship between buffers and pollutants: the Mayer 2007 paper which examined nitrogen.

The troubling aspect to Dr. Adamus' answer is that it is not true, and he apparently knew it wasn't true.  A few weeks after the March 6 meeting, a "new" meta-analysis of buffers with respect to four pollutants came to the public's attention, although it really wasn't such a new paper after all.  The peer-revewed "Zhang paper" had first been published online in 2009 and in print in 2010, old enough to make its way into our County's adopted Best Available Science (BAS).  When confronted with the Zhang paper at the next Planning Commission meeting, Dr. Adamus admitted that he knew of it, knew it was in our BAS, but preferred the Mayer paper, because, he added, Mayer's paper had a larger sample size.

Regardless of his reasons for preferring Mayer over Zhang, it does not explain why Dr. Adamus never mentioned the Zhang paper. Never.  It does not not explain why he repeatedly said there was only one published meta-analysis when he apparently knew that wasn't a true statement.

It turns out, had Dr. Adamus' buffer proposal been based on the Zhang paper instead of the Mayer paper, the resulting proposed buffer calculations might have resulted in smaller buffers.  As a result, I have a new question for Dr. Adamus?

Why hide Zhang?

The 9% Solution

Ever ride a bicycle in low gear? You pump your legs like mad, but make practically no headway. That's similar to the way buffers work, according to the Mayer paper, because there is a weak relationship between the inputs and outputs. Buffers can use up land like mad but make practically no headway on pollutant removal.

The Mayer paper calculates that only 9% of pollutant removal can be explained by buffer width.  John Wanamaker, an early pioneer in marketing, used to say that half the money he spent on advertising was wasted, he just didn't know which half. For a buffer-based world, we might say that 91% of buffer space is wasted, we just don't know which 91%.

Buffers can eat up lots of land for practically no pollutant removal effect, especially after they exceed a certain effective size.

Yesterday, our Planning Commission passed the draft wetlands ordinance of the proposed CAO. Giving credit where credit is due, they took a terrible proposal and made quite a few improvements. Overall, however, we still don't know what the problem is, if any, and the proposed CAO will force us to live in an inefficient, costly, buffer-based world.

Buffers are the 9% solution, and they're still looking for a problem.

When Is 88 Greater Than 246?

Apologies to my fans for not posting over the last few days.  An accumulation of personal and professional responsibilities diverted my attention. One reader wondered where I had gone. I am here, and I am back with a new CAO riddle.

Question: When is 88 greater than 246?

Answer: When you are discussing Best Available Science for wetlands with a nationally recognized expert.

During the past week, a new controversy arose at our Planning Commission meeting (see previous post) regarding the scientific justification for our buffers. Our County has based its wetland buffer proposal on a paper by Mayer (Mayer et al, 2007). Dr. Paul Adamus, who is an unpaid non-tenured courtesy faculty member at Oregon State, is the "nationally recognized" wetland expert serving as our County consultant. He has been unwavering in his support for the Mayer paper as the basis for our buffer sizes.

One of our local citizens decided to discuss the Mayer paper with Mayer himself. Interestingly, Mayer recommended several other papers that he thought provided equal or greater insight into the workings of buffers.  Mayer also acknowledged that his study had not demonstrated a strong relationship between pollutant removal/retention and buffer width. As Mayer shows in his paper, buffer width explains only about 9% of pollutant removal/retention. Pollutant removal depends 91% on something other than width.

An additional reference recommended by Mayer was a statistical meta-analysis by Zhang, et al., 2009. The Zhang paper is very interesting for several reasons. First, as mentioned, it is a meta-analysis, and we have been told by Dr. Adamus on innumerable occasions that meta-analysis is the best of the best. It's state of the art. It's the kind of analysis performed by epidemiologists. So, the Zhang paper would appear to be in the same category of excellence as the Mayer paper (and remember, Mayer himself is recommending Zhang). Second, the Mayer paper looks at only one pollutant, nitrogen/nitrate, whereas the Zhang paper looks at four: sediment, nitrogen, phosphorous, and pesticides. Third, Dr. Adamus admits that the Zhang paper already is part of the BAS adopted by the County.

One of the major conclusions of the Zhang paper is that buffers, for all practical purposes, have a maximum effective width. At some point, buffer width reaches diminishing returns. Had this principle been incorporated into our County's proposed buffer methodology, we would have ended up with smaller (probably much smaller) proposed buffers. Dr. Adamus acknowledges that he discarded the conclusions of the Zhang paper in favor of the Mayer paper. The question becomes why did Dr. Adamus choose one meta-analysis (Mayer) over another (Zhang)?

The Planning Commission asked Dr. Adamus that question: why Mayer and not Zhang? The answer from Adamus: Mayer used a bigger sample size. Adamus stated this as justification more than once during the Planning Commission meeting.

There are several difficulties with that answer, not the least of which is that it may not be true. The Zhang paper looked at 81 studies for sediment removal, 61 for nitrogen, 52 for phosphorous, and 52 for pesticides. The Mayer study looked at 0 studies for sediment removal, 88 studies for nitrogen, 0 for phosphorous, and 0 for pesticides. If you look at the data across all pollutants, Mayer's sample size was 88 and Zhang's was 246 (81+61+52+52). Mayer's sample size was greater only for nitrogen specifically (88 versus 61). On that basis, Adamus decided to use the Mayer nitrogen results as a proxy for every other pollutant, even though Zhang had actual data for other pollutants.

It's hard to completely fathom Dr. Adamus' answer, and he appears to be suggesting that data quantity trumps data quality too. As a result, not only his conclusion but his entire reasoning about statistical validity may be specious. Data quality and usability are critically important, and there are several acceptance criteria typically employed to evaluate data on those dimensions. They are called the PARCC criteria: precision, accuracy, representativeness, completeness, and comparability. Occasionally, these criteria are supplemented by a sixth criterion, sensitivity.

Sample size, if it has an effect, exerts its influence on these quality criteria, but sample size is not necessarily a worthwhile discriminator in its own right. Did Zhang's smaller nitrogen sample size affect the precision, for example? Actually, for the Zhang paper, the variance of the nitrogen data appears to be smaller than Mayer's, indicating that the Zhang data may be more precise even though it has fewer nitrogen data points than Mayer. Overall, based on a more thorough evaluation of acceptance criteria, Zhang may be the better study to use, even for nitrogen.

Mayer might think so.  That's probably why he recommended it.

Reading The Buffer Tea Leaves

Since "they" won't show us the problem, we can try to read tea leaves instead. I reckon we can read tea leaves mathematically by back-calculating. The buffer abacus targets 70% to 75% pollutant removal. It is largely based on the Mayer paper (Mayer et al, 2007). The Mayer paper considered only nitrates, so let's consider nitrate regulatory limits.* The drinking water standard for nitrates, the maximum contaminant level (MCL), is 10 mg/L, which is the same level established as the aquatic life criterion set by EPA.

Presumably, "they" sized our buffers so that our water would be safe coming out of the buffer, meaning nitrate levels no higher than 10 mg/L. At efficiencies of 75% removal, that would imply that our pre-buffered water from development areas could have ambient nitrate concentrations around 40 mg/L. For 70% removal, that would imply a figure as high as 33.3 mg/L.

Is that a lot?

Yes, it is, especially for surface waters. I believe it is unreasonable to think concentrations around here could ever be that high. Those levels are high even for aquifers in heavy use areas, such as the Salinas Valley in California, where there has been decades of intensive nitrogen fertilizer use associated with agriculture.

The USGS says the background concentration of nitrate in groundwater in the Puget Sound region is only about 3 mg/L. As for surface water data from the San Juans specifically, there is no mention of nitrates in the 303d reports. However, a study by Huxley College monitored nitrates and several other constituents in the islands, and they found nitrate concentrations to be around 2 mg/L or less. They had just one data point that was significantly higher in concentration, a 7 mg/L reading that they attributed to alders, not an anthropogenic source.

The Huxley comment about alders raises an interesting point. Many plants fix nitrogen into the soil, like alders. Other plants take it out, like grasses. A typical crop rotation schedule has a plant from the grass family (e.g. corn) followed by a legume (e.g., alfalfa). The grasses use nitrogen, and legumes put it back into the soil. Despite the fact that grasses are well-known consumers of nitrogen, our proposed County buffer calculator assumes lawn buffers are less effective than other vegetation at removing nitrogen. That is a peculiar conclusion since grasses are very good at withdrawing nitrogen from soil, and that is why people apply nitrogen fertilizer to lawns in the first place. Grass is so good at taking up nitrogen, it needs extra.

Is it possible that with fertilizer use or other behaviors that we might develop a nitrate problem somewhere in the county at some time? Sure, anything is possible. In fact, a 2008 Eastsound water supply report from the County Health Department suggests that nitrates may be slowly accumulating in the Eastsound aquifer, but levels are still quite low.  Further research (e.g., isotopic analysis of nitrogen and oxygen) may be needed to better define the source, and the situation is being monitored.

But it is fantasy to think that our county-wide pre-buffered ambient environmental concentrations of nitrate could be in the range of 30 to 40 mg/L (measured as nitrogen). Yet, by back-calculating, that appears to be the unspoken design criterion for all our buffers.

Even if we ignore all the other questions about the derivation of the buffer calculator, I still have to wonder why "they" sized buffers for 70% to 75% removal? Where is the justification for a problem so large and widespread that we all need buffers that robust? 

Why are our buffers so big? For the same reason "they" consider grass to be relatively ineffective at nitrogen removal. That is to say, for no reason at all apparently.


* - the MCL and aquatic life criterion express nitrate as nitrogen. Nitrate can be measured as nitrogen or as nitrate, the difference being the ratios of their molecular weights.  The same concentration of nitrate, measured as nitrate instead of nitrogen, is roughly 4.5 times higher than that same concentration of nitrate measured as nitrogen.  A 10 mg/L limit for nitrate as nitrogen is equivalent to a level of 45 mg/L for nitrate measured as nitrate.  If you click the link for the Salinas Valley data, they show nitrate measured as nitrate, so a 90 mg/L data point in their figures corresponds to a 20 mg/L level as compared to the MCL provided here.