Jefferson County is updating its Shoreline Master Plan and is being heavily lobbied by the shellfish industry to allow for the approval of additional geoduck farms in our tidelands without public input. Neighboring counties–Kitsap and Clallam–allow for public input but Jefferson hasn’t yet committed to this. Find out what’s at stake as this multimillion dollar export business looks to expand here. Local environmental activists will talk about their work and how you can get involved.
With a growing multimillion dollar marked in Asia, the shellfish industry is eyeing Jefferson County’s tidelands for increased geoduck cultivation. Geoduck cultivation involves the intense use of plastics—some seven miles and eleven tons of tubing per acre. Each tube fosters a wholly unnatural density of the large clams that are then “harvested” using hydraulic hoses to liquify the tidelands down to three feet. Then the whole process starts over again. Geoduck cultivation raises many environmental concerns, among them: competition for marine nutrients, displacement of tideland marine life, and plastics pollution. Sierra Club is asking the Jefferson County Commissioners to require a thorough review and public input before issuing any permits to farm geoducks. A standard “Conditional Use Permit”, as is required in neighboring Kitsap and Clallum counties, should be the norm.
When: Thursday January 18, 7PM on Zoom
https://act.sierraclub.org/events/details?formcampaignid=7013q000002Hy4YAAS
Filed under: Admiralty Inlet, Aquaculture, Environmental Activism, Environmental Protection, Events, Jefferson County | Tagged: aquaculture, Environmental Protection, geoduck, Hood Canal, Permitting, Port Townsend, Shoreline Master Program, SMP |
The County commissioners should be reminded about the recent litigation over similar nonsense: https://casetext.com/case/olympic-forest-coal-v-coast-seafoods-co-3
A lot of adverse impacts could be avoided if the permitting governments would listen to the people impacted by their actions and exercised their authority to protect the public interest.
Unfortunately, it’s all too often about the money. Been there, spent years here in the county fighting the industry and their flacks.
I get that; I can rant against it, can’t I. 😉