Really good post, Greg.  Your series of posts have shed light on the disconnects in the park plan - and on the foggy thinking of those few who planned this in secret for years and tossed it out to the public for what they thought would be a sure fire campaign winner last summer. 

A wise person once told me that when something does not make sense then you do not have all the facts.  What is missing here?  I think the motivations of the park pushers are being veiled - and denied.  The park will enable more development around the park.  So - who owns the land around the park?  Or has options on the land - to be exercised when zoning is changed?  Ahh - the park pushers avoid discussing this. 

Heck, the park pushers - after screaming last fall that NwCitizen should open up for comments - won’t even register to comment here.  Why?  They won’t say.  Greg has researched carefully his series of articles here - but they will not enter into the discussion.  Maybe they are afraid of open discussion of their park plan.

I think there appear to be a couple of reasons the park is being proposed:

It appears to be a great thing; who wouldn’t want a large park so close to town? And, for all we have been told, it will cost nothing at all.

Folks who are not really in tune with water quality issues and what causes them seem to think this will help to save Lake Whatcom. As Greg has pointed out, it will do at best nothing at all.

As someone who has looked into forest practices in the watershed for years, I can see clearly that there are no forest practice issues that will be solved by the “park”; as Greg also points out, the county has taken absolutely no interest in forest practices in the watershed up to now.

I am very interested to see what the “committee” comes up with regarding costs. I know that county managers are being told to brace for a tight budget period (2009-2010). There is also evidence that the county will fight the draft TMDL mandate.

These two things add up, I think, to the county claiming that reconveyance will actually satisfy some of the TMDL requirements. I don’t see how they can do that, but I won’t be surprised to see them try.

Tom Pratum

In a post to the Lake Whatcom listserv in July, 2006, a slightly younger and perhaps less-jaded Tom Pratum wrote, “I still believe there should be no logging at all in the watershed, or selective cutting at most.”

Makes sense to me. Seattle allows no logging in its watershed. Portland put up a monster fight against logging in its Bull Run watershed, which is national forest. Salem the same. Tacoma has a lot of catching up to do with the White River, but spent millions to help protect old growth in the Fossil Creek tributary. I think Everett’s eliminated most, or all, logging around its Spada Lake, involving trades and protection of state trust land.

I don’t put much stock in what the draft TMDL says about logging impacts to the lake. For one thing, it’s a draft. For another, my understanding is that the model treats all forestry as having little relative impact. In other words, the TMDL shows no difference between a park, logging restricted by the Landscape Plan (which would build over two dozen miles of new logging road), or even old school rape-and-scrape clearcutting. I have a hard time accepting that the massive amount of phosphorous-loaded soil that entered the lake from the logging-induced Smith Creek slide in ‘83 was irrelevent.

Why would DOE produce such a model? Because it’s DOE! This is the same wobbly-kneed agency that signed off on the Port’s plan to leave 10 tons or so of mercury in the Bay when a more affordible and better clean-up option exists. (I seem to recall that Mr. Pratum had his gun aimed the wrong way on that scrap too. How’d that work out for you, Tom?) I’d be delighted if DOE would stand up to DNR, but I’m not going to bet our drinking water on it.

Tom wrote that a park will do “at best, nothing at all” for the lake. Presumably that means that it won’t reverse phorphorous impacts. I agree. But preventing future additional inputs from new roads, not to mention reducing the risk of future slides, is well worth the relatively modest cost incurred through foregone timber revenues. (Note this isn’t a zero sum game, as those foregone revenues would not likely be otherwise spent on lake protection.)

Greg’s also got some whacky stuff in his post. Did he really write “... most of those poor practices, and past disasters, were the result of the county’s lack of management and enforcement before the lands came under DNR control”? The state took over management of forest board lands in the 1930’s, 50 years before Smith Creek. And if Greg’s meaning wa that the impact happened before the land swap, which blocked up state ownership in the watershed (and Chuckanuts) in the late ‘80s, it’s noteworthy that private forest practices are regulated by the DNR. I’ve been party to 20 years of litigation and attempted rulemaking on forest practices regulations and have to say that what Greg wrote about the county’s role has me, well, stumped.

Similarly, Greg’s feigned confusion at why advocates insist on a park is unconvincing. Greg has enough legal education to understand that the statute authorizing counties to regain control of their trust land limits the purposes for doing so to recreation. His suggestion of alternatives is a smokescreen.

Lastly, the conspiracy theory. Like the little prize inside Cracker Jacks, one is always rewarded with a novelty buried in the writings of gk. (Good company for js!) In this case, the boogey man is that developers must be jerking the strings in the park pageantry.

Sure enough, a big park will make the watershed more attractive. It will show up in real estate brochures, perhaps on trailhound web sites, etc. After 50 years of regrowth and restoration, the forested slopes of the park will look lovely. Yep, making a place better does have the downside of increasing its appeal.

Deal with it.

Perhaps with some quality advocacy, aided by TMDL constraints, we can make as much progress in curtailing development impacts to the lake as we’ve been making with respect to forestry. But playing one against the other ain’t gettin’ it done.

Yes, Mr. Friedman, I did write that private landowners were principally responsible for the logging that subsequently led to the huge landslide in the late 80’s, which was the impetus for the land swap.

And it is my feeling, and the meat of my argument, that the county’s poor management, in particular the lack of enforcement of county codes intended to prohibit activities that would result in such destabilization and extreme erosion, were a significant contributor to that event.

I would go on to argue that if the county would enforce its codes aimed at preventing land disturbances that create the possibility for such flood events and their consequent erosion reaching the lake, the rationale that we need a park to prevent such activities goes away.

As I heard again today from David Wallin, “It’s all about landslides carrying sediments into the lake.”

Now, far be it from me to suggest that there was ever anything like a conspiracy between private landowners and county government that created an environment of non-enforcement. I know how sensitive you are about conspiracy.

But your park won’t repair the threats that remain from past activities.  It can only prevent future activities that will threaten the lake.

My point is that lack of county enforcement is what created the problems in the past.  Perhaps the Landscape Plan doesn’t regulate DNR sufficiently.  Well, there are county laws that can without going to the expense of a park.

So get your friend over at the courthouse to protect the lake.

Greg’s suggestion that the county has been (or is) responsible for landslide risk is a bit like blaming the victim. Do you have examples from other counties in the state, King or otherwise, that have regulated logging on DNR-managed land?

The county, city, and others (including Conservation Northwest) put a lot of effort into getting the DNR to put out the Landscape Plan. It’s better than anywhere else in the state. But not only does it not limit landslide risk to the same degree that nonlogging (e.g., park) would, but as Greg is well aware, it’s being dragged through court by trusts (Mt. Baker School District and Skagit County) that want revenue from logging.

The alternative that Greg offers - better county oversight of logging on DNR land - is a smokescreen.

Mr. Friedman is apparently unwilling to address the point of my comments, and insists on denying that anything but forestry regulations are available to control the activities in the commercial forest zone.

That, I think, is the real smokescreen.  He is a partisan, I am a critic.  I am not married to my criticism, but do expect such questioning to receive a better response than his.

First, with regards regulating logging, RCW 90.48.425 says that the forest practices act, chapter 76.09, and the forest practices regulations adopted thereunder relating to water quality protection shall be utilized to satisfy the planning and program requirements of the federal Water Pollution Control Act.  That is law now coming into play as a result of the listing of Lake Whatcom as impaired.

But the tools available are not limited, as Mr. Friedman represents, to the regulation of logging.  He wants us to believe this because he really needs some rationale to convert this land to a use other than commercial forestry.  And a park will do just fine.

Again, my point is that the county has the authority, and a mandate, under WCC 17.04.030 to prohibit land uses that result in damaging increases in erosion. And WCC 17.04.080 requires that no land shall be converted or altered without full compliance with the terms of this title and other applicable regulations.

The county need not look for authority over logging, when it has authority over land use.

What is there to stop the county from enforcing its laws to control flooding and erosion?

Whatever Mr. Friedman believes, again, “It’s all about landslides.” 

If he would put aside his partisanship and consider that there might be ways he hasn’t thought of to prevent landslides and erosion, he might be able to admit that a park is not the only way to control landslides.

The laws intended to control flooding seem the obvious tool.

I don’t have a huge amount of time to respond to Mitch’s posts above, however, I would like to point out a couple of things:

First, if we could stop all forestry in the watershed that would be great in my opinion, but the “park” won’t do it. In fact, even if NO forest practices are conducted on the land proposed for the park, this will only reduce the level of forest practices in the watershed by about 10%. Most folks don’t realize that the DNR forest practices don’t amount to a whole lot when weighed against all others in the watershed. This “park”, contrary to what proponents say, will do next to nothing with regard to “reforming” forest practices in the Lake Whatcom watershed.

Now, isn’t 10% better than nothing at all? Sure, it might be, but the next issue is that this “park” will soak up considerable county funds - these funds could be used for real water quality related projects. Contrary to what Mitch says, the county road fund, which benefits from timber revenues, is part of the public works budget that also funds water resource projects. The road fund has a projected deficit - do you really think that we will help fund more water quality projects by taking even more money out of it? From the TMDL it is clear that Whatcom County will need to spend mightily to clean up the stormwater runoff from existing development; either that, or buy up the developed land and turn it back into what it once was.

Second, there is much misinformation regarding the 1983 event that is mentioned above; this event is often used by park proponents as an indication of what will be prevented by the “park”. If anyone reading this is actually interested in finding out the facts as they were determined at the time, I highly recommend reading a report put out by Whatcom County Public Works in September 1983 (approx 9 months following the event). This report is entitled “Alluvial Fans and Deltas Flood Hazard Areas”. In that report, the culprit is fingered as logging debris from long past forest practices - where roads were built on extremely steep slopes and much more slash was left than is today.

There is still a danger that more events could be triggered from those long past forest practices, and this is one thing that kept folks in 1993, when the land was originally transferred, from demanding reconveyance at that time (which they easily could have). Note that converting the land into a park - even neglecting the potential negative effects - will not alleviate the danger of past forest practices and Whatcom County will then assume all liability for them.

Finally, a note regarding Mitch’s mention of the Bellingham Bay cleanup (not sure how that ended up in this discussion) - any chemist knows that you don’t get rid of mercury by burying it in an area that should be returned to aquatic habitat. Obviously Mitch is not a chemist, so I tried to point that out to him at the time but all I got were a few nonsensical tirades left on my voice mail. I could see clearly then that he was not interested in the facts, but merely in whether everyone agrees with him or not. I would rather not have a marina in place of the ASB, but I think that is better than using it as a dumping ground for contaminated sediment.

Tom Pratum

Tom says that reconveyance will only reduce logging in the watershed by 10%. This statistic obscures that these are the steepest, most slide-prone acres in the watershed, so it’s the most efficient 10% to address.

While the proximal cause of the ‘83 slide was old logging debris, I don’t see Tom countering that the slopes of Lookout and Stewart aren’t prone to slide, and increasingly so with logging and logging roads. Dave Wallin and others are making this case clearly within the county’s advisory board.

Tom points out that reconveyance does have a cost in foregone revenue to the roads fund. That’s just a portion of the total, and unlikely to be a huge number.

Greg asserts untesting legal theory on alternate ways the county could address slide threat without a park. If he’s correct, would not these ways (which must of course involve restrictions on logging and logging roads) have the same costs in foregone timber revenue as reconveyance? If so, isn’t reconveyance the more certain and efficient means to that end?

Further to the unrelated matter of the Bay cleanup. My compliments to the almighty chemist. Tom is of course right that the ideal would be to return the ASB to shoreline and ship all the mercury to hell, rather than to landfill the mercury in the ASB. As was obvious at the time, and is proving out with events, that was too costly to ever be a real option. Instead we’re stuck with almost all the mercury being left int he sediment of the open waters of the Bay, which is the worst scenario. Would have been nice to chat about it and at least try to agree on objectives and strategy. But we don’t do that in Bellingham any more. Conspiracy theories get in the way.

Debates on this subject are always good, but before locking into any position a few questions still need to be answered. So far, I haven’t heard credible answers to most of the example questions listed below:

1. Conceding that Parks are certainly fun, won’t a large Lake Whatcom Park attract people from all around?
Would the impacts of more visitors, their vehicles, boats, horses and dogs be positive for the health of the Reservoir? Just look at what happens with boat trailers every year at Bloedel-Donovan and tell me how that is beneficial.
Also, wouldn’t some clearing, logging and creation of impervious surfaces be directly associated with development of Park facilities?
How about more restroom facilities, garbage receptacles and re-fueling stations?
Development by any name is still development, isn’t it?

2. Is the fact that the DNR continues to chafe at and resist the more stringent ‘harvesting’ of timber requirements of the Landscape Plan that was so painstakenly worked out over several years -at the UNANIMOUS direction of our State Legislature- sufficient reason for eliminating it?
Is this a matter to be simply administratively dismissed and forgotten?
Does the secrecy and surprise introduction of the so-called ‘Reconveyance’ Plan suggest complicity with local officials?
Wouldn’t private forestry owners and managers also be glad to see the DNR Landscape Plan gone?

3. Can the significant revenues from DNR ‘harvesting’ [logging] be permanently lost, without the income streams for Schools and other State trusts coming from some other source?
Is the County willing and able to make up these funds -in perpetuity? If so, what method is intended, and in what amount?

4. In addition to replacing the anticipated LOST revenue from DNR ‘harvests’, won’t the creation, development, operation and maintenance of a large new Park require ADDITIONAL public funding?
How much will be needed and for what purpose?
From where will the County obtain such funding?
Will this funding be stable and long-term in nature?
To what priority would these new funds be assigned?
Would new Park funds subtract from the funding needed or available for other purposes, like Lake Whatcom water quality protection?
Can future County Administrations and Councils be expected to continue supporting the Park Plan far into the future?

5. What other ‘unintended consequences’ might occur as a result of the Park Plan moving ahead?
Which properties would be traded and who might gain or lose from such trades? What about adjacent properties?
If the Park Plan were to fail for any reason, what would be the fate of the lands involved?
Would they revert to DNR, and if so, would the Landscape Plan again apply?
Would they become private forest lands, which are restricted by the Landscape Plan?
————————
Of course, the answers to all of these questions -and there are likely more to ask- cannot now be known with quantitative certainty.
But many of them are known qualitatively!
Before embarking on a costly, poorly planned and thought out scheme like this, wouldn’t it be prudent to consider getting the best answers possible to these questions?
Like old Ben Franklin said, ‘a stitch in time saves nine’.

Since it seems that I?ve been quoted by Mr. Kirsch on this site, I suppose that I?d best weigh in on this topic.  He quotes me as saying that: ?It?s all about landslides carrying sediments into the lake.?  I?m not quite sure where the quote he attributed to me came from, but it sounds like something that I probably said.  I?m a forest ecologist, not a lawyer and one of my goals in life is to minimize my need to interact with lawyers on a professional level.  Dealing with lawyers is a bit like mud-wrestling pigs.  The pigs love it but it?s messy and rarely very satisfying.  I have no idea if existing county laws provide the county with the authority to regulate DNR forest practices.  Since DNR is the state-level entity with the authority and responsibility ? and presumably, the expertise ? to regulate forest practices, my uninformed guess is that the courts would be inclined to defer to DNR rather than to the county.  At any rate, taking this to court would probably cost the county lots of money.  I?ll leave the legal mud-wrestling to those in our community who actually enjoy it.

I?m far more interested in discussing the environmental benefits associated with the reconveyance proposal that we now have on the table.  Mr. Kirsch?s contention that there would be no environmental benefits to reconveyance is completely wrong and it flies in the face of thirty years of well established research on this topic.  It is been widely recognized that timber harvest operations (including both the logging roads and the clearcuts themselves) dramatically increase the risk of landslides and increase the sediment loads in streams.  Most studies show anywhere from a doubling to over a hundredfold increase in the rate of landslides and sediment loads in streams for watersheds with logging vs. control watersheds.  So, it is really pretty darned simple.  We take 8000 acres of land in the watershed that is currently managed for timber production and we create a park.  Creating a park means we don?t clearcut the forest and we don?t build logging roads.  Based on published studies, this should decrease the sediment loads in the streams coming out of these lands by anywhere from 50% to 99%.  Obviously, this will not solve all of our problems in Lake Whatcom, but it sure will help.

As for the draft TMDL study, it has some serious problems that I feel certain will be addressed in the final version of the study.  For starters, their measurements of ?baseline? phosphorous inputs to the lake came from basins in the lake that are severely degraded as a result of past logging practices.  For the reasons outlined above, this means that their baseline is too high.  The bad news is that this means that the reductions in phosphorous inputs to the lake from the developed areas will need to be much greater than those described in the draft report.  The good news is that things like the reconveyance ? by ending logging on 8000 acres ? can contribute to reducing phosphorous inputs to the lake.  Clearly, most of the phosphorous reductions will need to take place in the developed portions of the watershed, but reductions in logging on the DNR lands can play a role.

We need to clarify the economic costs associated with the reconveyance proposal.  I suspect that the lost revenue from timber harvesting will be smaller than most people expect.  It is also important to put the acquisition costs in perspective.  The stated acquisition costs for the 8000 acres are about $300,000.  This comes to about $37 per acre.  In contrast, the county has spent about $16,000,000 over the past few years to buy about 1100 acres of developable land in the watershed.  This is land that was purchased to prevent residential development.  This comes to about $14,500 per acre.  At this rate, our $300,000 might buy us about 20 acres of developable land in the watershed.  So the reconveyance seems like a pretty good deal to me.  Yes, I realize that there are continued maintenance and liability costs for the new park just as there are for the 1100 acres of other lands that have been recently purchased.  It also seems likely that most or all of the funds that will go to acquisition and maintenance of the new park will come from sources like Greenways funds that are not available for watershed protection or for buying up residential land in the watershed.

Here are a couple of websites that back up my numbers on landslide risks:
LANDSLIDES AND CLEARCUTS:  What does the science really say? 4/6/97 (USFS report that includes a table summarizing the results from over 20 studies; a full list of references is included) http://www.umpqua-watersheds.org/local/landslides/slide_studies.html

PNW Science Findings Newsletter summarizing recent work on this topic (published March 2008).  It includes citations for 4 papers published in 2007 and 2008.  The focus is on the impacts of fish habitat rather than water quality but the conclusions are consistent with my statements above.  http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/sciencef/scifi101.pdf

David Wallin

Quick response to John Watts’ questions, though rhetorical I suspect they be.

Contrary to John’s description, there’s is no great rush to ram something through. The process has been outlined, it will take a year or two, and the County Exec appointed a diverse advisory committee to explore these very sorts of questions.

But I do have to say that John’s first question, regarding impacts of recreation, is pretty easy to address. There’s lots of recreation going on on these lands now, and it’s not all good. The county will be better able to enforce off road vehicle restrictions, for instance, than is DNR. As for impermeable surface, bathrooms, trailer hook-ups, etc., I see none of those on the county’s parkland at Pike and Cedar Lakes. That is clearly not the kind of recreation that is being envisioned or is at all likely to end up in the plan.

Mr. Friedman complains, ?Greg asserts untesting [sic] legal theory on alternate ways the county could address slide threat without a park.? and goes on to ask, ?If he?s correct, would not these ways (which must of course involve restrictions on logging and logging roads) have the same costs in foregone timber revenue as reconveyance? If so, isn?t reconveyance the more certain and efficient means to that end??

We assume that Mr. Friedman’s reconveyance plan entails no logging in the proposed park.  It doesn’t follow that eliminating logging where it posed a threat of slides and/or erosion would mean that no logging would be possible.  Presumably some logging could continue where it did not pose a threat of landslides.

Hence, the lost revenues could be less.  Further, with the lands still in state ownership, the Landscape Plan would not be terminated. The ongoing costs of administering and maintaining a park would be avoided.  And of course the initial expenses of reconveyance would not be incurred.

The expressed concern that my reading of the code is “untested” and “theoretical” is again consistent with Mr. Friedman’s partisanship and denial that anything but a park will do.  One would think that while waiting some years to learn if reconveyance was in fact to be, his organization would champion an effort to get the county to exercise their current authority to prevent landslides and protect the lake; or at least not disparage the idea.

This could include identifying existing threats from past activities and requiring they be removed by current landowners (DNR, Trillium or whoever) before they become county liabilities.  Though I understand the difficulty in criticizing the master of the manor when your feet are under his table.

Mr. Wallin acknowledges, ?I have no idea if existing county laws provide the county with the authority to regulate DNR forest practices.?  He would have done well to stop after this admission.  But he goes on, ?Since DNR is the state-level entity with the authority and responsibility ? and presumably, the expertise ? to regulate forest practices, my uninformed guess is that the courts would be inclined to defer to DNR rather than to the county.  At any rate, taking this to court would probably cost the county lots of money.?

The point of the original post is not that we should go to court, but that the county now has the authority to regulate activities that destabilize lands that then become sources of erosion disaffecting the lake.  I think this is evidenced by their ability to seasonally regulate land disturbances in the watershed now. 

And of course it is valuable to prevent the county from spending lots of money on legal actions, but the costs of the park would likely far exceed the costs of fighting off a legal challenge of its authority to regulate land uses in the watershed.  No one seems to be challenging their authority to prevent landowners from clearing now.

Wallin conveniently mis characterizes my position when he writes, ?Mr. Kirsch?s contention that there would be no environmental benefits to reconveyance is completely wrong and it flies in the face of thirty years of well established research on this topic.?

Of course this is not my contention.  I only repeat what Mr. Hood of Ecology has stated, that the benefits provided by the proposed park to protection or improvement of water quality in Lake Whatcom would be insignificant.  What is the purpose of spending substantial amounts of taxpayer money on an inconsequential effort when we are faced with extraordinary expense to fix the significant problems.

And Mr. Wallin exaggerates the acreage that will be removed from logging.  In actuality, given the current Landscape Plan in place, only about 3,000, not 8,000, acres are potentially harvestable.

Wallin says, ?It is also important to put the acquisition costs in perspective.  The stated acquisition costs for the 8000 acres are about $300,000.  So the reconveyance seems like a pretty good deal to me.?

Another perspective is that there will be no real change in ownership, only a change in management.  These are state lands, and we are all citizens of the state.  The state has a mandate to manage the lands for multiple uses, including public recreation.  Transfer of management to the county will not suddenly open these lands up for recreation.  They are open now.  All Mr. Wallin’s financial calculus is a pointless exercise. 

We as county residents will basically spend $300,000, incur ongoing expense and liability, while completely eliminating the revenue we now enjoy from the state’s management.  For this we hope to gain some nominal control over activities on this land which we probably have already.

Methinks Mitch Friedman’s quick ‘response’ to the questions I posed earlier seemed a little too quick as well as light on substance or any new information -only his own ossified opinions.

His assertion that my questions were ‘rhetorical’ caused me to look up that phrase in Wikipedia:

‘A rhetorical question is a figure of speech in the form of a question posed for rhetorical effect rather than to receive an answer, through statement.’  ‘....it is a device used by the speaker to assert or deny something.’

By that definition, I suppose all questions have a measure of rhetoric, either expressed or implied, in them.
In fact, why ask a question on any subject at all unless the answer is important and germane to a discussion?
Does the mere audacity to ask indicate anything other than the desire for more factual knowledge on which to base a considered decision?

Rather than trying to label the questions asked, why not just answer them to the best of his ability?
And, if he suspects the questions are too rhetorical, than why not rephrase them -to his satisfaction- to obtain those answers that are clearly being sought?

I can assure Mr Friedman that I do wish to have these factual answers generated, and preferably well before any final decisions are made on this proposal!
I also believe many others desire this information as well.

For example:

1. What is the estimated average range of lost DNR Trust revenues, if the full amount of proposed reconveyance acreage is approved?

2. How would these funds be made up, and by what mechanism?

Can I be any clearer than that?

If Mr Friedman has no such answers or is disinclined to share them, then may I suggest his own ‘quick’ response was the one that most might consider as ‘rhetorical’.