A flotilla of boats Saturday surrounded the net pens on the south end of Bainbridge Island. Sequim photographer/filmmaker John Gussman was there.
It’s time to demand an end to net pens in the Sound.
Look at the full set of stills at
http://www.dcproductions.com/nofishpens/
Filed under: Around the Salish Sea, Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Fish Farming, Puget Sound | Comments Off on Protest flotilla surrounds net pen off Bainbridge
The incredible short life of Twyla Roscovich has ended in Campbell River, B.C. Twyla was the documentary filmmaker who worked with biologist/activist Alex Morton to create the documentary “Salmon Confidential”.
The post on Facebook said that foul play was not suspected at this time. Twyla went missing last week, as she headed down island to see medical specialists. Her car was found at the Quadra Island Ferry parking lot in Campbell River.
Twyla leaves a four year old daughter who was with her father at the time of Twyla’s disappearance. A Go Fund me site was created to help fund future educational needs of her daughter. This is the link to it.
You can support the legacy of Twyla by watching her movies, sharing them and never eating farmed salmon. It’s time to end this destructive industry forever. It is destroying salmon runs around the world, both here and in South America, Norway, Scotland and other places, along with pouring millions of gallons of anti-biotics into the sea. Just say no to farmed fish. Always ask your wait person whether the salmon they are serving is wild or farmed. They will know.
Resist propaganda by the fish farming industry and the aquaculture industry (who is fighting any regulations on aquaculture, even though it’s not shellfish). Paid spokespeople for the industry attend Marine Resource Committee meetings in the north Sound as part of the mix of shoreline industries with a stake in making our waters clean. The industry does much good work in helping pass laws that protect our waters, as they are major employers in our rural counties. I am not here to damn them entirely. But I have been the target, and have listened to their people denounce Alex Morton and her work, along with politicians that oppose them, such as ex-Commissioner Phil Johnson. They come on as bullies, talking over and down to anyone who questions them, but just remember that if they weren’t being paid by their industry, they wouldn’t likely bother to show up. Just tune them out, and challenge them when they attack anyone who tries to regulate or discuss regulating the farmed fish industry. It’s just fake news.
We call on Governor Inslee and the State House and Senate to watch this film and take action to permanently ban all future in water fish farms in Washington waters. There is new technology available to put fish farms in tanks on land. That should be the way forward.
I am crushed to hear of this woman’s death. She was dedicating her life to create a better world for herself, her daughter and the rest of us, especially those in British Columbia. We are all lessened by her passing. Go in peace, Twyla Roscovich.
Filed under: Around the Sound, Environmental Protection, fisheries, Puget Sound | Tagged: Alexandra Morton, Environmental Protection, Puget Sound, Twyla Roscovitch | Comments Off on Canadian environmental activist and documentary filmmaker Twyla Roscovich found dead
Over the last month, we have had a full taste of global warming. We are breathing it. It’s no longer just some abstract event impacting people in some far away third world country like Bangladesh or even heat waves and droughts in Australia, on the other side of the planet.
Scientists (perhaps now fired by the current administration in Washington D.C) have been warning for decades that the effects of global warming will be much larger, more frequent storms. With the oceans being heated up, the normal storms will get even greater strength. And that is exactly what is happening with Irma and Harvey. There are still thousands of people, maybe tens of thousands, that have never recovered from Sandy or Katrina, or any of the other storms we now have forgotten in the last ten years.
In the western U.S. a heavy drought with intense heat has laid in from California to British Columbia. Hundreds of fires are raging across the west, destroying Southern Oregon forests, the north side of the Columbia Gorge, the Cascades and into central British Columbia. Many of these fires are being described as the largest ever witnessed in these areas. Thousands have been displaced while the smoke from these fires are being breathed by millions for weeks on end, including us here on the Olympic Peninsula. The outcome of that will be greater lung cancers in years to come.
Snow packs in this heat continue to melt and rise. I drove north from San Francisco to Seattle last week, driving through Arizona desert like temperatures of 112 degrees F. in Redding California. It was over 100 at the summit of Shasta’s I5 pass.
If this kind of heat continues, it will make farming in California very difficult. Along with the physical stress of trying to expect humans to farm in 112 heat, is the question of whether there will be snow pack for drinking and agriculture in 20 years. California produces a huge amount of our vegetables. Adapting farming for this kind of scenario is going to cost all of us a lot more at the grocery store.
The Americans who have willfully ignored the warnings of scientists now are part of the refugee pool in Houston and much of Southern Texas’ coast. We can look at that outcome and say, well, you asked for it by continuing to elect politicians that want to tell you that all is well. But this country is not red or blue. It’s purple everywhere, with people supporting each side in elections, or no side at all. Unfortunately, the neighbors of these ignorant climate change deniers voted for people who wanted us to pay attention, had their candidates lose and also find themselves in the same, literal and physical boat.
This emerging crisis needs leadership. We unfortunately now find ourselves turning to local and state politics as the Presidency and Congress seem, for reasons harder and harder to comprehend, to willfully want to ignore the alarm bells of climate change. What is it going to take? A hurricane to level Washington D.C.?
Locally we need to continue to talk about where Port Townsend is going to get it’s water if drought continues for decades and snow packs continue to recede. I don’t hear much about that issue at all.
Time to get serious and act as if every decision by our local and state governments is going to have to take global warming into consideration. Now.
Filed under: Around the Sound, Climate Change, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
Chris Dunagan is one of the best reporters in the Pacific NW covering the Salish Sea. Here’s a great overview of the state of the salmon.
Are we making progress on salmon recovery?
In recent decades, hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent to restore habitat for Puget Sound salmon. In this article, we look at how scientists are gauging their progress. Are environmental conditions improving or getting worse? The answer may depend on where you look and who you ask. Chris Dunagan reports. (Salish Sea Currents)
https://www.eopugetsound.org/magazine/is/salmon-recovery
Filed under: Around the Sound, Endangered Species, fisheries, Puget Sound, Salmon | Tagged: Puget Sound, Salmon Recovery | 1 Comment »
A brief overview of the good news on the State budget front.
Washingtonians are parsing the state budget passed last weekby a divided legislature. It adds $1.8 billion for basic education over the next two years. A big chunk of that comes from the closure of a so-called “extractive fuel” loophole, which is one of several new policies that many environmentally progressive groups like.
Eric de Place, an energy and climate policy analyst at the Seattle-based Sightline Institute, says from his perspective, the new state budget is mostly good news.
“I think on net, the budget was a win for the environment and a win for the climate,” de Place said.
http://knkx.org/post/wash-budget-has-pros-and-cons-environmental-policies
Filed under: Around the Sound, Environmental Law, Puget Sound | Tagged: Air Pollution, Puget Sound | Comments Off on Wash. Budget Has Pros And Cons For Environmental Policies – KNKX
The real damage is likely to not be known for decades. That’s the effect on our fisheries and underwater world from this massive, unprecedented spill that in effect, brought Seattle to the 1920s all over again dumping untreated sewage into the Sound for months.
The new price tag for the catastrophic Feb. 9 flood that crippled the West Point Treatment Plant is up to $57 million — more than double the previous estimate. But taxpayers may be off the hook for most of it. The Wastewater Treatment Division, in a letter Friday to the Metropolitan King County Council, updated its initial estimate of $25 million in damage, stating major repairs and replacement of equipment will continue through October and cost $49 million to $57 million. Christine Willmsen reports. (Seattle Times)
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
As if it’s not bad enough with the lack of money to deal with the public schools, now this. I think a change to a state income tax is a way forward to properly make the wealthiest of our high tech workers, etc. pay their fair share. Property taxes are a joke. You can’t get to funding of all our needs by property taxes and you end up hurting fixed income elderly the worse.
Washington state lost a major legal battle Friday that could force it to spend nearly $2 billion to restore salmon habitat by removing barriers blocking fish migration. A panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last year affirmed a lower court’s 2013 ruling ordering the state to fix or replace hundreds of culverts — large pipes that allow streams to pass beneath roads but block migrating salmon. Phuong Le reports. (Associated Press)
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound, Salmon Recovery | 1 Comment »
Good news, albeit a small thing.
The governor signed a bill sponsored by Rep. Dick Muri, R-Steilacoom, that would help the on-going efforts of the Puget Sound Partnership…. Every two years, the Puget Sound Partnership is required to produce a State of the Sound science work plan. The plan identifies recommendations for improvements to their ongoing work in Puget Sound. Because of the short interval for updates, they are in a continuous planning mode. Muri’s bill changes the frequency of the report from every two years, to four years. By reducing the frequency of the updates, the proposal would help free up the Puget Sound Partnership’s resources. This would allow them to focus on meeting restoration performance targets. (Suburban Times)
http://thesubtimes.com/2017/04/20/muris-bill-supporting-puget-sound-partnership-signed-into-law/
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Al Latham just alerted me that a fellow from the Farm Bureau will be doing a presentation on the Hirst Decision (on building permits and water rights) and current legislative activity around exempt wells at the Chimacum Grange, 7pm Wed April 12.
What is the Hirst Decision? It’s an extremely important new ruling that addresses an ongoing battle over development vs. water rights. Let me copy from the Dept of Ecology web site:
“A recent Washington State Supreme Court decision has changed how counties decide to approve or deny building permits that use wells for a water source.
In the Whatcom County vs. Hirst, Futurewise, et al. decision (often referred to as the Hirst decision), the court ruled that the county failed to comply with the Growth Management Act (GMA) requirements to protect water resources. The ruling requires the county to make an independent decision about legal water availability.
We protect rivers and streams across the state by creating instream flow rules, which set the amount of water necessary for protecting fish, wildlife and recreation. In 1985, we adopted an instream flow rule for the Nooksack River (WAC 173-501) in Whatcom County. This rule closed most streams in the watershed to new water right permits but allowed landowners to use permit-exempt wells in most of the area. Whatcom County’s development regulations followed our instream flow rule.
A reliable, year-round supply of water is necessary for new homes or developments. Before the Oct. 6, 2016, court decision, many counties relied on what the Department of Ecology said about whether year-round water was available. This court decision changes that – counties now have to make their own decisions about whether there is enough water, physically and legally, to approve a building permit that would rely on a well.
The case directly relates to Whatcom County but appears to set legal precedent that applies in other counties where there are instream flow rules that were not intended to regulate permit-exempt water uses. It is unclear how the decision affects areas of the state where there are no instream flow rules. Counties are working to review the decision and what it means for them. Contact your county’s building, planning or health departments if you have questions about how the Hirst decision may affect you.
Filed under: Around the Sound, Events, Government, Jefferson County, Puget Sound | Tagged: Jefferson County SMP, Puget Sound | Comments Off on EVENT: Farm Bureau to present on Hirst Decision 4/12 @7PM Chimicum Grange
Would be nice to think this bill has a chance, but appears that it doesn’t. There is always next year.
…. The House Finance Committee in Olympia is set to vote Thursday on a measure to require tug escorts for articulated oil barges. HB 1611 aims to address some shortcomings in the state’s oil spill prevention program. It would improve safety requirements for water transport, including mandating tug escorts for oil-transporting vessels. It also would tighten safety standards for pipelines and provide additional funding for the oil spill program administered by the Department of Ecology. Strong opposition from Republicans in the Senate means the bill faces a steep uphill climb, its sponsor, Rep. Jessyn Farrell, D-Seattle, acknowledges. She failed to get similar legislation passed two years ago, instead passing a bill that improved safety only for oil transport by rail. Adiel Kaplan reports. (Investigate West)
http://crosscut.com/2017/03/if-canada-ups-its-oil-shipping-should-we-worry-trans-mountain-pipeline/
Filed under: Around the Sound, Environmental Law, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on If Canada ups its oil shipping, should we worry?- Crosscut
It’s no longer theoretical about what the Republicans might do to the environment. It’s here now and it’s real. They are going to take the money from environmental restoration and pour it into bombs and more border patrols. Is that really in our best interest as a country? What really matters to you as a citizen and what are we defending? We need all hands on deck to register disgust and anger at this proposed budget. Eastern Washington Republicans, Republicans from all over the Puget Sound region, including Mason county and other locales, and Representative Dave Reichert, the “brave” ex-sheriff that is afraid of holding public town halls because he doesn’t want to face the public that he is personally impacting with his support of these changes, all need to hear from you now. A year from now will be too late. Your neighbors, your environment, restoration of salmon stocks, the protection of the Orca, and by the way, your health care if you are not employed by a major corporation or the military, is all on the line. Our fellow citizens in the midwest have allowed us to be taken over by a far right wing zealot and a congress that will stop at nothing to strip us of our hard earned gains in environmental protection, health care, and much more. Time to speak up, or forever hold your peace.
President Donald Trump unveiled a $1.15 trillion budget on Thursday, a far-reaching overhaul of federal government spending that slashes many domestic programs to finance a significant increase in the military and make a down payment on a U.S.-Mexico border wall. Trump’s proposal seeks to upend Washington with cuts to long-promised campaign targets like foreign aid and the Environmental Protection Agency as well as strong congressional favorites such as medical research, help for homeless veterans and community development grants. Andrew Taylor reports. (Associated Press)
http://www.seattletimes.com/business/trump-budget-defense-spending-a-priority-over-agency-money/
Filed under: Around the Sound, Environmental Activism, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 2 Comments »
The state’s newly elected lands commissioner says her top priorities will be to find ways to strengthen local rural economies and to prepare state lands and communities to deal with climate change. Hilary Franz, an environmental attorney who beat out retired Navy commander Steve McLaughlin, will take over the helm at the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) in January from two-term commissioner Peter Goldmark. Phuong Le reports. (Associated Press)
Filed under: Around the Sound, Government, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Climate change, rural growth are priorities for new Washington lands commissioner – Seattle Times
So after fighting this all the way to the Supreme Court the county now wants us taxpayers to foot the bill for trying this out. I suppose this might be a good trial situation. But let’s remember we don’t offer government sponsored trials for solar panels.
The County Council has asked the state Legislature to pay for a three-year pilot project that could address a state Supreme Court mandate that Whatcom County ensure new permit-exempt wells don’t hurt minimum stream flows and senior water rights. The idea came from County Councilman Rud Browne. The council voted Dec. 6 to ask the state for money, although no specific amount was requested…. The system – which includes software, water tanks, water meters – would allow homeowners in rural Whatcom County taking part in the pilot to seasonally store water during the wet winter months to offset the impact of their use in drier months. It would cost a little over $16,000 for a four-person household. Kie Relyea reports. (Bellingham Herald)
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/local/article121447892.html
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Whatcom asks state to pay for pilot program to offset well water use – Bellingham Herald
Kudos to the Jefferson County Democratic Party, which helped create an amazing voter turnout this year. Chairman Bruce Cowan deserves credit for steering a contentious turnout for the two candidates into a high turnout of ballots.
At last count, 85.45 percent of registered voters in Jefferson County turned out to vote. San Juan County beat Jefferson for turnout honors, with 86.62 percent of registered voters there casting ballots.
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
Goodbye to another legend.
The majestic wilderness of Shi Shi Beach, an indelible sight for many visitors to the Olympic wilderness near Neah Bay, might look entirely different today if not for the cheerful tenacity of Polly Dyer, a conservationist icon who died Sunday in Shoreline. She was 96. Equally at home testifying before Congress or entertaining a new generation of environmentalists in her Lake City living room, Pauline “Polly” Dyer came from modest means to become a driving force in Northwest wilderness and conservation circles. While unable to attend college as a young woman, she would grow up to count governors and Supreme Court justices among her friends. Claudia Rowe reports. (Seattle Times)
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
Another article outlining some of the difficulties in getting to the truth about the TPP this election year. As I have said before, I don’t believe that the TPP is the problem, just a symptom, and that the real problem that we face by these massive trade deals, which are always done with an eye towards helping American businesses, is that the tax law is what ultimately defines whether companies can outsource their work to low wage countries. If the tax laws make it unfavorable to move factories overseas, then they won’t. An unintended consequence of that is that they may just choose to open new factories overseas and slowly shut down antiquated ones, by not investing in them, but again, tax law dictates such issues as depreciation schedules of equipment. One reason Japan outcompeted us in the 198os was due to a very favorable depreciation schedule of 1 year to our 5 (or more) years. A company could write off the depreciation of a large manufacturing machine in 1 year, and then buy the latest state of the art one the next, making them more and more competitive. By the time our companies would have depreciated the equipment, the Japanese were 5 or more times efficient against our companies.
Part of our complicated tax law in the US gives different industries different depreciation schedules. For example, replacing computers at companies like Microsoft can be done more rapidly than standard companies, due to the ability to classify them as Research and Development (R&D) tools, rather than just standard business equipment. That Microsoft tests new Operating systems and programs like Word on their internal computer users first, allows them to take advantage of this tax law issue.
Another thing to think about, is that we currently dominate the world in software, a business that generates not only great middle class and upper class jobs, and has an enormous effect on follow on jobs for low income workers, that often supply goods and services to these businesses, and to the universe of partner companies that establish offices in the area of the business, such as we see with partners to Microsoft,Boeing and Amazon. These businesses all generate enormous tax revenues for our country. Working towards a beneficial trade agreement that forces other countries, like China or India, to get better at supporting our intellectual property, such as software, music and film rights, is a good thing for American workers. Fighting trade deals and making it more punitive or operating outside of trade deals leads to piecemeal implementation (or no implementation) of protection of these laws.
There is always an inbalance between competition between nations and even states. Most people have heard that Delaware has a special tax law that allows corporations to form easily there and shelter themselves from taxes. Nevada, likewise is a haven for companies in other states, to use as a tax haven for their revenues to be gathered. A large global company, headquartered in the Bay area, can open a subsidiary in Nevada, and have all their revenues go there first, to avoid California tax rates. You likely have heard of our massive tax breaks to Boeing and other companies. These are our states’ TPP deals with internal US companies, and external foreign companies that can bring jobs. This is the way states compete. It is legal. Allowing corporations to have signification input on trade deals is the way to get US subject matter expertise to the table so that our negotiators can best understand what we need from other countries. It’s our governments fault if they allow corporations to bury tax advantages into these but it is not the fault of the agreeement. And it is a political football to pretend that the deal is the problem.
To be clear, there are many other isssues that are concerning in TPP, and again our Congressional delegation should support taking it out from behind it’s secrecy and opening the process up for feedback. I support the documented TPP problems and the solutions to them that were laid out in a 20 page detailed over veiw by a consortium of the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen, Institute for Policy Studies and Earth Justice in 2012. If you like detail on these issues go and read the document.
But the following article is a good generic article, useful for much more discussion, I present it with an eye on helping us better understand why our representatives in Congress in the Pacific NW are not flocking to damn TPP, while the outsiders, who have nothing to lose, are. Ultimately we need trade deals, but they need to protect our environment, our hard won intellectual property. We must make sure they don’t give hidden benefits to countries and companies that are working against these issues.
Politics Of Trade: The Northwest’s Complicated Relationship To The TPP
Filed under: Around the Sound, legislation, Puget Sound | Tagged: Government Legislation, Puget Sound, TPP | 1 Comment »
I’m afraid that I’m not on board with these new rules, unless we the tax payers are going to offer no interest loans or fund their needed work. I want these dairies cleaned up, but am not willing to force them into it when this state could help them out. There is a middle way between forcing the change quickly or exempting huge amounts of dairies. Maybe a tax on all milk for 5 years to help fund the cost of the conversion?
The unintended consequence of this could be farms downsizing to just under the limit, or going out of business all together. Puget Soundkeeper Alliance has sometimes taken wrong approaches in the past to situations like this. It’s not the first time I’ve found myself disagreeing with their tactics. They often take too much of a “Big City” approach, and see the people in the hinterlands as easy targets.
Dairy farmers and environmentalists are criticizing new manure-control rules the state Department of Ecology plans to finalize early next year. The Capital Pressreported that at a public hearing on Tuesday, July 26, farmers said dairies already are heavily regulated and that Ecology’s new layer of mandates would be unnecessary and expensive…. After Tuesday’s hearing, Ecology’s special assistant on water policy, Kelly Susewind, said the department may consider redrawing the line and exempting more dairies…. Environmentalists testified that the department should require dairies to line lagoons with synthetic fabric to prevent leaks and to install wells to monitor groundwater. (Associated Press)
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/business/article92244202.html#storylink=mainstage
Filed under: Around the Salish Sea, Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound, Water Pollution | 1 Comment »
This proposal has been in the discussion phase for a couple of years now. We discussed it in the Jefferson County Marine Resources Committee back in 2014 I believe. It was clear then, and is clear now, that if they are going to do this, it should be in more than one stage, with exemptions for working commercial vessels that cannot retrofit for the new rules. I have to say that I agree with the critics that are quoted in the story. What those of us involved with the preliminary rules found back then, was that a number of tug boats, have never had an ability to have a holding tank, because they were built in an era where it wasn’t required, and they filled the hold with engine. There is no way to retrofit some of these working boats. As you can see from the reaction of commercial interests in this article, the issue has not magically gone away. That Ms. Bellon has chosen to ignore this feedback and simply given them 5 years to comply or have to buy a new tug is not going to solve the problem. It leads to the kind of anger against agencies like DOE, run under this Democratic governor. It can be fuel for the fire of the Republicans which is not needed in this election year. Ms. Bellon needs to come to the table with an exemption status for the small number of commercial vessels, perhaps establishing a 20 year exemption, what would allow the natural cycle of vessel replacement to happen.The small amount of treated human waste from these commercial vessels pale in comparison with the fecal runoff of the roads, which carries away pet waste by the ton every time it rains. I don’t see DOE getting all upset and banning cities from expanding until they fix their storm sewer systems. We know that it would not be politically acceptable. I highly recommend that if you are involved in any kind of organization or NGO that is involved in Puget Sound protection, that you write Ms Bellon, and call your legislators, and tell them and her that we need to have the commercial interests on board with this proposal before inacting it. As to the recreational boaters, getting them to go to pump out stations is a good idea, but DOE better fund an expansion of those stations. There are not enough around the Sound.
Boaters and vessel operators would not be able to release sewage, treated or untreated, into Puget Sound under a proposal by Washington state regulators. The Department of Ecology said Thursday it and other state agencies petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to designate the waters of Puget Sound a “no discharge zone” to improve water quality and protect shellfish beds and swimming beaches from harmful bacteria. If approved, the zone would cover waters from near Sequim to south Puget Sound to the Canadian border, and includes Lake Washington and Lake Union. There are dozens of no-discharge zones in the country, but this would be the first in the Pacific Northwest. Phuong Le reports. (Associated Press)
Filed under: Around the Salish Sea, Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 2 Comments »
There may still be spots open for this. Check it out! It was a lot of fun last year. 
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Event: Saturday – Diggin’ For Dinner!
Good news. If the Seattle area can get massive budget busting huge bridges and tunnels to support their never ending growth needs, we in the hinterlands should be getting safe updated ferries, since they are our bridges, are considered state highways in their own right, and support our commerce.
Washington state is moving closer to adding a new ferry to its fleet. But before that, one of its older vessels will likely enter retirement. The state hopes to have a 144-car Olympic class ferry on the waters of Puget Sound by next year. By then the much smaller Hiyu ferry will likely be gone, according to state transportation officials. Even with the future additions to the fleet, the state will still need more vessels to accommodate a record amount of ridership. Michael Konopasak reports. (KING)
http://www.king5.com/news/traffic/state-says-more-ferries-needed-for-aging-fleet/169823226
Filed under: Around the Sound, Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on State says more ferries needed for aging fleet – KING
