Ah yes, citizen input is such a messy thing.
Dan Chasan at Crosscut writes about Senate Bill 6406, a bill "streamlining" some regulatory requirements– and denying citizens — or citizens’ groups — standing to challenge growth management decisions, and maybe even delaying or eliminating current requirements to deal with stormwater.
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Environmentalists on alert over ‘streamlining’ measure in Legislature
The House Democratic budget proposes eliminating the Washington State Conservation Commission effective July 1. All state funding to conservation districts for FY 2013 will be amended and cancelled.
http://www.islandssounder.com/news/140510133.html
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Conservation Districts faces elimination
The House Democratic budget proposal reduces the agency’s budget by 31 percent, or $1.7 million, which would jeopardize federal funding of more than $5 million. The proposed House Republican budget does away with the Partnership. The Olympian editorializes:
Cutting partnership gambles with future of Puget Sound http://www.theolympian.com/2012/02/26/2005863/cutting-partnership-gambles-with.html
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
Connie Gallant in Quilcene asks if you would sign an online petition to the City of Port Angeles, Port Townsend, county and state government:
A moratorium on construction/operations of biomass incinerators/boilers
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 3 Comments »
The 685-foot U.S. Military Sealift Command-contracted ship, SS Cape Island, lost propulsion early Sunday while heading westbound into the Pacific off Cape Flattery. The Department of Ecology and Coast Guard said the ship posed the risk of an oil spill, and dispatched the Delta Lindsey, an industry-funded emergency-response tug stationed at Neah Bay. The ship returned to Port Angeles safely.
Thanks to all of you who helped get this tug funded, and Kevin Van de Wege for pushing it over the goal to success in the legislature. This is why we do this work. Protection is far better than cure.
Support your local newspaper: subscribe to the PDN.
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Military cargo vessel safe after being adrift–PDN
Sad news: It was L112, a female born in 2009, that died and washed up at Long Beach, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service and Center for Whale Research.
http://today.seattletimes.com/2012/02/young-orca-from-puget-sound-pod-found-dead-on-coast/
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Young orca from Puget Sound pod found dead
Chris Dunagan at the Kitsap Sun reports on how the Port Gamble Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe is now moving its juvenile coho salmon from shore to its net pens through pipes rather than from trucks loaded on a barge and floated to the pens. Less stress on both fish and crews.
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2012/feb/13/tribe-adopts-piping-system-to-transfer-coho/
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Tribe adopts piping system to transfer coho
Come out and support a film maker!
Cities throughout the state, including Port Townsend, are considering a ban on plastic grocery bags with handles. These bags harm wildlife by ingestion and entanglement. To get people interested in the subject, “Bag It,” a movie about plastics, is shown for free Sunday, Feb12 at the Rose Theater, 235 Taylor St., with a panel discussion to follow. Doors open at 12:20pm and the film begins at 1pm. The event is co-sponsored by the Food Coop, Port Townsend Marine Science Center and Environment Washington.
Discussion runs from 2:15 – 3pm wit City Council member Michelle Sandoval, PTMSC executive director Anne Murphy, Food Coop general manager Kenna Eaton and Environment Washinton program associate Robb Krehbiel.
Whole Foods Bag On Belize Beach
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Sunday Night at the Rose Theater – Bag it!
Kimberly Kindy of the Washington Post goes deep in reporting on how Rep. Norm Dicks and former Puget Sound Partnership director and son David Dicks worked together, with the congressman directing millions more to Puget Sound recovery, including a $1.82 million earmark and more than $14 million in grants and other funds that went to his son’s agency.
There were no competitors for the funds. “It was a difficult time,” the younger Dicks said. “I left a lucrative law practice to help save Puget Sound. No one was expecting the response that me and my father got.” Dicks channeled federal money to Puget Sound project his son ran.
Alf says: The Partnership, by it’s very existence, has helped focus federal funding towards projects to enhance and protect the Sound and Salish Sea. However, it’s been a very strange thing to watch the issues that this article raises over the last few years. I think, in balance, we are better off for this having gone through than not, though the latest tilt of the Governor and State in total support of the shellfish and netpen industries raises very difficult questions for the environmental community moving forward.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2017449699_dicksearmarks08m.html
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound, Puget Sound Partnership & Norm Dicks investigative report | 1 Comment »
Here’s an excellent article by Arwyn Rice, Peninsula Daily News.
Thank you to the PDN and Arwyn, for this sound coverage.
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on More on Tsunami debris coming our way
Nice short piece featuring John’s work. Enjoy!
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on KOMO TV features local Filmmaker John Gussman’s Elwha work
The new national planning rule governing individual national forest plans include changes in how wildlife would be protected. Some scientists and environmental advocates say the plan’s change, scheduled to go into effect in early March, would be bad for wildlife.
The 1982 rule required the Forest Service to manage fish and wildlife habitat so that healthy populations of animals are "well-distributed" throughout each forest.
The new plan drops that language. Instead, it requires forest managers to maintain habitats. It leaves it up to the official in charge of a region’s forests to decide whether any individual species needs extra protection to ensure that it will continue to exist over the long term with "sufficient distribution.""
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2012/02/02/2377463/new-forest-management-plan-weakens.html
Support your local press. Subscribe to the Bellingham Herald
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on New forest-management plan weakens wildlife protection
Samuel P. Schuchat, executive director of the Coastal Conservancy,
left, walks through the Ballona Wetlands during a conservancy tour of
the natural reserve in Marina del Rey. New studies show that wetlands
do not quickly return to their original vitality once destroyed or
altered. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times / January 19, 2012)
By Bettina Boxall
February 1, 2012, 1:23 p.m.
How easy is it to recreate nature? When it comes to wetlands, the
answer seems to be "not very."
A new paper examining data from more than 600 restored or man-made
wetlands found that in key ways, they don’t measure up to the real
thing.
Read the whole story at
Link to the PLOS Biology study:
http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.1001248
Restoration of Ailing Wetlands
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound, restoration, wetlands | Comments Off on Restored wetlands no match for real thing
At the Port Townsend Yacht Club. The public is invited, but non members are asked to pay $7.
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | 1 Comment »
A community meeting will be held at the Crescent Grange, Hwy 112, Joyce Washington on February 21, 2012 at 4:00 – 6:30 pm. Focus will be on the Twins nearshore riparian restoration plan.
The Coastal Watershed Institute with partners North Olympic Land Trust, Lafarge North America Inc., Olympic Peninsula Surfrider Foundation, WA State Dept. of Fish and Wildlife, and Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe will be hosting the kick-off community meeting. We will provide an overview of the riparian planning project, including links to the overall restoration project, proposed timeline, and seek input from the community on the planning process. We look forward to your participation in this long overdue collaborative restoration project.
This work is sponsored in part by the North Olympic Peninsula Lead Entity (NOPLE). Details on the project can be found at the Habitat Work Schedule site: http://hwsconnect.ekosystem.us/Project/180/12716.
Contact Anne Shaffer, Coastal Watershed Institute, 360.461.0799, or anne.shaffer@coastalwatershedinstitute.org, for more information.
Please join us!
Anne Shaffer
Coastal Watershed Institute
P.O.Box 2263
Port Angeles, Washington 98362
anne.shaffer@coastalwatershedinstitute.org
360.461.0799
www.coastalwatershedinstitute.org
"It’s life.For heaven’s sake-lean forward"
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Feb 21 – Community meeting in Joyce on Twins nearshore riparian restoration plan
From our friends at NASA comes this amazing 26-second video, depicting how temperatures around the globe have warmed since 1880. That year is what scientists call the beginning of the “modern record.”
http://www.climatecentral.org/videos/web_features/nasa-finds-2011-ninth-warmest-year-on-record/
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on NASA posts 131 years of global warming in 26 seconds
Up to 20ft. high waves hit yesterday, might again today. Westport was experiencing pretty high water, apparently. Forecasters say they threaten severe erosion of the jetty protecting La Push and the lower Quileute tribal village during high tide around noon Monday.
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2012/01/23/2362433/big-waves-high-tides-on-washington.html
Support local journalism, subscribe to the Bellingham Herald
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on High tides threaten coast. Caution advised today
Elwha Love: Katie Campbell and Ashley Ahearn update the progress being made in Elwha restoration.
http://earthfix.kcts9.org/water/article/checking-in-on-the-elwha/
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Elwha, elwha dam, Puget Sound | Comments Off on Empire of Dirt Gives Way to the Return of the Salmon–KCTS
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Saturday 1/21! Short films to support the Jefferson County Marine Resource Committee!
If you have friends who may not understand the subtleties of the differences between wild and farmed salmon, this is a good, consumer overview of the subject, hosted by a registered dietitian (Melinda Hemmelgarn) and a life long NW salmon fisherwoman( Anne Mosness) who is also , former Food and Society Policy Fellow.
http://kopn.org/aasp?u=http://kopn.org/a/showrss4.php?n=http://kopn.org/dc/dircaster2.php?p=fs
or: http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/kopn-food-sleuth/id330698483
Enjoy and please feel free to share the links! Food Sleuth Radio can be downloaded by any radio station, free of charge, that subscribes to the Pacifica network.
Filed under: Puget Sound | Tagged: Puget Sound | Comments Off on Good overview on wild salmon vs farmed
