Olympic Peninsula Environmental News

So now it’s clear that President Trump and his minions do not care about Puget Sound. His proposed budget essentially eliminates funding for cleanup of Puget Sound to further military spending in this country, probably for more jets for Whidbey Islands’ Naval Base, along with more Navy ships passing by. And he’s going to defund much of the Coast Guard, who protect our shipping lanes.

It’s very likely we will see a dramatic drop in Federal money that support the thousands of jobs we have that here that are focused on cleaning up Puget Sound. While there will be enormous pain to these people and their families as they scramble to find work, let’s focus on the bigger picture for a moment.

The effort to clean up and restore Puget Sound is not going to end with Donald Trump’s budget. We are not going away because money dries up. The Tribes that drive this work, the local governments, the non-profits and their backers, live here. The work will continue through this horrible moment in American history, while we struggle to throw off a megalomaniac with fascist tendencies. We are likely to see a lot of short term pain, but in the end, Trump will have his day and recede into history.  And we will still be here. The work will be refunded by future officials who will be elected in the aftermath of Trump. We will rewrite rules, probably even better than before, because we will have to start from scratch.

The Marine Resources Committees that advise our county commissioners, like the one I sit on in Jefferson County, will continue even without federal funding. We aren’t paid and we can meet anywhere we want to. We can fund raise ourselves to do our work if needed. We will get by.

So fight against this now with all you have, but understand that one president cannot roll back the future. He will be stopped legally through the people of this country who have a tendency for preferring the middle road, rather than extremes of either side. The damage that he will do will wake them from their Fox News induced trances, and they will not vote for his ilk in the midterms nor in the next election. While this is often frustrating, it does seem to have moved us forward more than back. We are at a very important crossroads in the history of this country and now is the time to stand up and be counted. We need you to come out from behind your computers to slow this and make sure we are prepared for a better future when this storm front passes over and blue skies show up in it’s wake.

Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound |