Sound Politics: Want to save Puget Sound?

September 03, 2007

Want to save Puget Sound?

...Do the science first.

So writes Daniel Jack Chasan in Crosscut:

Inadequate data to measure results have undercut restorations of other large bodies of water, like Chesapeake Bay. Leaders of the new Puget Sound Partnership know this, but whether they can avoid that mistake here remains to be seen. Bureaucracies have a tendency to keep throwing money at projects that aren't working.

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 03, 2007 08:41 AM | Email This

Comments

1. Well none of this will matter if the Federal courts continue to hand down decisions like the one last week on culverts. You will not need to plan for 2020 + 20 or the Million new residents.

When the Tribes gain complete control of water resources in Washington State ( surface and ground) Nothing will be built here without a tribe being "compensated". Christine Gregiore has not defended the rights of the State of Washington to exercise authority over water use and planning and by judical edict it may be lost forever.

Posted by: Huh? on September 3, 2007 08:59 AM

2. The culvert case aside, all too often the money put into these projects goes to activists and their pet projects.

Look at who is getting the contracts for projects in Chasen's own backyard on Vashon. You will find some interesting connections.

Posted by: deadwood on September 3, 2007 09:06 AM

3. I'm sure norm dicks son is all about financial accountability when it comes to saving the Sound. That's why Gregoire chose him and not as a political favor.

Posted by: Andy on September 3, 2007 09:26 AM

4. In other cases, the government keeps receiving money from projects that aren't working. Now that Seattle has installed red light cameras at four intersections, I wanted to find out the results in other states. In Wash DC, Maryland, Georgia and Virginia, the promised reduction in accident rates never happened. In fact, the accident rates went up. Yet the cities kept the systems in place, because they make a steady stream of money from them. I haven't found a single instance in which a red light camera actually reduced the accident rate. Typically they reduce the rate of angle accidents, but increase the rate of rear end accidents. Why don't cities remove them when they've failed to produce the promised results? Clearly they are addicted to the cash flow that results.

Posted by: Alan on September 3, 2007 10:12 AM

5. Partnership sounds like a cousin of all the other big gov't overlapping groups. (why have sound transit when you already have metro?)

I think Dick's son on the payroll is proof its just more Dem party control.

If the sound is worth saving/regulating, then have the gov't buy out everyone living on it and turn it into a park

Posted by: righton on September 3, 2007 11:13 AM

6. Just don't let anybody talk about historic numbers of seals and sea lions, relative to salmon species depletion as measured today. Or bank to bank nets by the protectors of nature, the Indians.

The leftists in charge would never want to deal with the truth.

Posted by: Independent Voter on September 3, 2007 04:43 PM

7. Culverts and artifact killed road projects are the billion dollar "reparations" cost for the sin of taking the tribes out of the idyllic stone age.

Seattle has spent tens of millions of dollars to get two dozen salmon up our creeks over the last eight years. Three years ago we deliverd ONE up as far as Meadowbrook Pond where he suffocated in that slimehole.

13,000 years ago there were NO salmon on any Puget Sound stream. Ice thousands of feet thick. Yet they are back.

When migrating Puget Sound salmon numbers were down five or six years ago, it was feared it might have been from our efforts to clean up the Sound. Fewer nutrients in the food chain.

Study the history of man messing with Yellowstone aspen, elk, grizzlies and wolf to see how hard it is to second guess wildlife and plant ecology.

Posted by: Bart Cannon on September 3, 2007 06:43 PM

8.
Enviros will never learn. Evolution and nature are about change -- not preservation.

They only see two paths: pollution from increased human activity, or onerous social legislration to "restore" something.

A third alternative is establishing dominion over nature and bending it to fit our needs.

For example, to me the problem with the Puget Sound is that it's far too enclosed. I think we should scrape out a huge channel to link it with the Columbia and let more flow through around the peninsula.

Posted by: John Bailo on September 3, 2007 08:48 PM

9. Comparing Puget Sound to Chesapeake Bay is like comparing a tap dancer to Larry Craig.

Posted by: swatter on September 4, 2007 08:12 AM