Plaintiffs John and Mary Ferlin of the Ferlin Family Trust, J & M’s LLC, Brooks Manufacturing and Roosevelt Land Company have filed suit against the city and others over a park district that was designed so mostly low-to-moderate income residents of Happy Valley would pay to correct the city’s corrupt zoning of ridiculous entitlements for their friends on a large tract of mostly wetlands and steep slopes.

Lawsuit: South Bellingham property owners claim Chuckanut Ridge tax illegal

The complaint is not without merit. The statutes were never intended for citizen boards to tax small portions of a city. For instance, what if every neighborhood formed a district with their own citizen board? How about when they start overlapping? How many districts might tax an individual property?

In this district’s case, they even split a precinct to manage the district boundary for electoral approval. That is taking a ‘fine hair’ approach to political science. Perhaps too fine.

The solution is simple and suggested by the statute. The district should be city-wide and the City Council should be the board. Thus, assessments might then be apportioned either city-wide or on a neighborhood basis according to the benefit. Mainly, there would be broader, more generalized assessment policies based on municipal goals and objectives and accepted public standards.

The bogus north/south Greeenways divide promulgated by a former mayor to sustain the ill-fated Chuckanut Ridge development has probably dealt a death blow to the longstanding Greenways funding mechanism. This legal complaint creates an important opportunity for the city to take the park district bull by the horns, to avoid the balkanizing effect of an inevitable proliferation of additional districts, and to unify park and openspace goals under a comprehensive public policy framework.

Meanwhile, adding this property to existing Greenways acquisitions makes expanding Fairhaven Park and creating a Gateway to the Chuckanuts both possible. Those are of citywide and regional significance and it is unfair to burden a small, low-to-moderate income neighborhood with the costs. A citywide park district could replace the discredited Greenways program and help prevent inequitable situations like this district. Keeping the council in control might help the city remember that bad zoning can have costly results.

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