A BIG BACKROOM DEAL is the only conceivable explanation for Council’s hyper-liberalized approach to slaughter. They have eschewed and disdained heaping research and evidence of potential harm, but hew to unsubstantiated claims of their whacky friends. Plus they keep trying to hide what they are doing, making new words with new meanings to cloud their intent.

They want small-scale slaughter but hope to approve an unlimited number of 50 million lb/year facilities anywhere on 88,000 acres of rural Whatcom County. So Small now means Large.

They started out wanting slaughterhouses, but didn’t like the reputation of industrial animal slaughterhouses.  So they changed the name to agricultural slaughterhouses. So Agriculture now means Industrial.

They didn’t like the reception they were getting with slaughterhouses, so they adopted Ben Ellenbaas’ suggestion to call them packinghouses instead. So Packing now means Slaughter.

They want them everywhere so they changed the definition of ‘accessory use’ to allow them everywhere.  So Accessory now means Permitted.

This should rightly be a defining issue in the upcoming elections for these demonically-possessed, slaughter-crazed propertarian nutjob ideologues so willing to rashly adopt such careless policy that could wreck the character of rural Whatcom County.

Council,

One of the frequent complaints among conservatives in this community, and the nation at large, is that liberals over-reach with their rules and agendas. This, as you know, is typically an argument against the burdens imposed by the EPA or, more locally, by documents such as the Growth Management Act which restricts the ability of property owners to do whatever they want, whenever they want, on their land.

I would suggest that the current example of your proposal allowing slaughterhouses – anywhere and everywhere in Ag lands – is exactly the sort of extreme over-reach, and outright intrusion, that conservatives typically rail against. Perhaps the polar equivalent would be if the County were, instead, proposing that every household must grow and eat organic foods, or install green roofs, or, perhaps, build abortion clinics in their driveways.

Has there been any consideration of how this proposal will impact neighbors’ property values or, for that matter, the water quality and air quality (smell and dust) that may impact abutting farms or residences? Do the tax revenues go up for the County when nobody can sell their home anymore due to the stench of rotting animal flesh that will blanket their property … or could, someday, any day in the future, anywhere near or downwind of these thousands and thousands of acres effected by this rezone?

The extremists that this Council is currying favor to in this scheme – which seems entirely reminiscent of the gravel pit scams and scandals of prior years – are the only ones who will benefit from it. You are threatening to impose a long-lasting and negative impact on 88,000 acres of the only Agricultural Land that we have left which, once we have eaten every delicious Canadian cow, may prove to be a valuable resource to future generations in this county.

Why is it so impossible for this Council to reign in this massive, broad-stroke proposal? What is the Hell-fire emergency that demands you open the floodgates for large-scale, industrial, slaughter facilities on every damn inch of these 88,000 acres? Is it too much to ask to simply limit these uses to Industrial Areas or, in some sanely negotiated manner, to consider a much more narrow and targeted area which, hopefully, would have the least impact to both the surrounding farms and the most sensitive environmental features? Given a small nail to adjust, center, and pound home, it seems like the County Council first reached for a 9-lb. sledgehammer then, feeling even that blunt instrument was too dainty, they decided to lob a million-ton bollard of steel upon the challenge to provide the solution.

This proposal is really, really dumb. It is confusing a lot of people who, whatever their politics, expected at a bare minimum that our elected County officials would act with some moderation and care before making such bold, and potentially dangerous, decisions on the public’s behalf.

Please rethink your position on the upcoming slaughterhouse vote and, yes, by all means apologize to whichever landowner you are doing this favor for; he or she can surely visit Ellensburg, literally sniff out a good site, and set up their chop shop there.

Thanks, in advance, for your consideration

Alex McLean
Bellingham

“Demonically Possessed Slaughter Crazed Ideologues Wrecking Rural Whatcom”

“hew to unsubstantiated claims of their whacky friends”

“that demands you open the floodgates for large-scale, industrial, slaughter facilities on every damn inch of these 88,000 acres?”

Like from the John Steinbeck novel “Of mice and men”. Tell me again about the chickens George (Tip) All of this hyperventilating would be more believable and credible if it were not for the gut feeling that most of the complaints were really from people who are against eating meat. It would also be more credible if this did not look like a bunch of City folk, telling County folk how to farm. If we left farming to the few City folks who feel like experts armed with a Google button on their computer, we would likely starve to death.

Leave the farming to experts, please. Feeding people is too important to be left to non-farmers.

How come there is not an uprising of County folks against this proposal, if it were so bad for them? Good question, seeings as how they will actually be the people living next to these purported massive invasion of slaughterhouses. Why is it that only the people who don’t have to live next to them are complaining. Usually it is the neighbors. What gives?

Heck, there is a packing house right in downtown Lynden, and it doesn’t seem to bother anybody, except those living 30 miles away in Bellingham, which didn’t even know it is there until they read this.

A billion chickens, a million hogs, and at least a million french speaking cows coming to Whatcom County.

Are we really supposed to take this seriously.

Tell us about the billion chickens again, Tip.

Doug, great stuff!  For the record: I am a meat eater, though mostly as a condiment rather than a course.  And I prefer local product. Hence, I generally support adequate, sensible infrastructure for local producers. A district-wide rezone is just not necessary, prudent or even slightly amenable to the Council’s supposed aim.

Concern is growing among rural residents and farmers, but they are very busy in season and it’s difficult to understand what’s going on with all the wildly changing proposals and the Council’s made up words and meanings.  For instance, the “packing house” you reference in Lynden has no relation to the “packinghouse” Ben Ellenbaas convinced the Council to adopt. Remember? Small now means large.

You ask how many animals and you are not the first. It is telling that no Councilmember will ask that question on their constituency’s behalf.  The issues extend from mobile slaughter to animal composting to water rights to critical areas, BOD, COD, and salmon recovery.  Geez, Doug, you’re not against salmon, are you?

Now, as regards the French-speaking cows… Doug, you are a self-professed economist.  You must know that it will not be cost effective to import cattle from eastern Canada.  You are trying to fool me! Shame on you.

But should we take this seriously?  The environmental, community, social and health risks of slaughter are so well documented over so many centuries that not taking them seriously may be an indication of either ideological extremism or organic brain damage.  Which is it, Doug?

As for the chickens, I earlier did the math for you using conservative industry standards. You’re a math whiz.  Why don’t you prove them wrong instead of casting aspersions?

I love meat—especially Hempler’s.

I’ve no gripe with slaughterhouses, carefully located and in due recognition of the fact that they are more factory (rendering plant) than farm (stuff growing in the ground or live animals eating that stuff, or some combination of the two).

I’ve been to Ellensburg, Washington, and only worry that this overly broad zoning change could—potentially—make Lynden, Ferndale, or any of the other quaint burgs this city slicker enjoys visiting, just like that fetid hellhole. 

I’ve no illusion where meat comes from and how it gets to my table, Doug. And, from the sound of your expertise and farming affiliation, you likely don’t, either.

Why, then, can’t we agree that a large-scale facility—such as this proposal certifiably invites and allows—is somewhat of a “different animal” than the mom-n-pop sausage shops that can comfortably work in a downtown commercial zone. Hemplers was based in Bellingham for many years, after all, but that is a far site removed from semi trucks motoring in 50,000 head of cattle, on unlimited site locations, virtually anywhere within the entire zoning overlay of the Agricultural Land designated in this county.

I’ll happily “leave farming to the experts” but feel I am well within bounds, as a 23-year resident in this county, to care about radical and knee-jerk zoning changes that could negatively impact all of us who call this region home. If County folk now wish to begrudge my mettlesome concern in their affairs, I can live with that: Perhaps they will later thank me, and other dipshit liberals like me, if we succeed in implanting one fertile braincell of moderation in the County Council and planners heads by, just maybe, getting them to limit this zoning and these rendering factories to only one—carefully considered—location. As there are currently no such facilities around it may be the case that, given a small taste of this half-baked proposal, rural residents will find further expanded zoning puts, literally, too much at steak.

It can only be labelled thoughtful planning if there is either A) some thought, or B) some plan.

Seeing neither of these elements in this current proposal, I will go ahead and happily rail against its stupidity and dangers even if, as you correctly note, “there is not an uprising of County folks against this proposal.” I don’t have to live on Ag Lands or work the soil up there to still care about the people who do.

As for Tip, well, he’s clearly insane. But, like me, I think it is safe to say that his passionate concern over this issue is not based on a zero-tolerance, flat-earth, denial of all icky, poopy, slaughterhouses. I can’t speak for the man, but if I had to guess I would bet that he has no problem with “endorsing” both jobs and delicious meat creation in Whatcom County. Kicking open the floodgates, however, by vesting every tract of Ag Land with sudden rights to this expansive new property use is a very valid argument for restraint and, even if you want to laugh at his (or my own) examples of worst-case scenarios, they should still resonate sensibly in rural residents’ ears since one can presume the agrarian’s chosen lifestyle—just as much as a hippie in urban Bellingham—puts some value in preserving what they have, what they have worked hard to create. At it’s roots this is a truly “conservative” notion and too bedrock to be laughed aside by imagined ideological rimshots; Future generations should not suffer for the brief spasm of insanity that our planners and elected officials are afflicted with today.

We deserve better and, sadly, it is now our imperative to have to ask these clowns—who we pay—to give a damn about the long-term effects of their actions.

Alex,

You can rest easy, Ferndale, Lynden and other rural communities will never become like Ellensburg even if the slaugher rules are passed.  You can raise lots of cows in Eastern Washington very efficiently.  However, you cannot raise cows efficiently in Whatcom County because of the weather.  It is too wet in the winter time that any cows have to be kept in barns or on paddocks.  Hay that is grown here is less efficient and more costly. 

I have said this repeatedly and will continue to say it, it does not matter what the county council passes, it will not impact slaughter houses in Whatcom County. At best one additional small slaughter facility may be built in Whatcom County, the very kind that you and everyone else is very comfortable with.  There is no economic justification to build any large scale facilility in the county, we do not have the weather, the geography, or the economics to support it.  Everyone can stand down on this issue, there are more important issues to deal with in this county.

If what Craig says is true, then why wouldn’t the County work with producers, consumers and retailers to find the best place and adopt the highest standards to create a premium local brand?  That’s the way other places approach the problem.

What Craig says generally makes sense, unless the Council has a backroom deal in the wings for a large processor of imported animals.  There is no other rational explanation for their proposal. Otherwise, it could be a categorical ideological statement that farmers should not be regulated, but that is not particularly rational when farming is one of the largest sources of pollution in Whatcom County.

In any case, there is every reason NOT to “stand down” for any 88,000 acre district-wide industrial rezone of agricultural lands.