Mr. Boston (in his letter ‘What is the reality of save our town,’ Sept. 13) has not done his homework and some of what he presents as fact is simply false.
The appeal of Preliminary Plat 1A was not dismissed — indeed it resulted in 96 mandatory conditions being added to this project. The Hearing Examiner goes to great length in his decision to say the citizen’s efforts in bringing about these conditions have “greatly improved the project.” These are condition that the Mayor’s staff were not requiring the developer to assume responsibility or pay for prior to the appeal.
In addition, Mr. Boston states that this is a “done deal.” Again, unless he is psychic that is not a known fact. Throughout the legal proceedings both YarrowBay and the city have maintained that the Environmental Impact Statement on these projects was performed as a “programatic EIS.” This type of EIS has a much lower level of detail and analysis than a project level EIS. Before the Washington state Appellate Court Division I Sept. 11, Justice Gross says, “This is not a case about whether the city council had the authority to approve this project, but whether they had adequate information on the impacts to base that decision on and so the EIS is foundational to the issue.”
When Nancy Rogers, attorney for YarrowBay speaking for both the developer and the city in this hearing, was asked whether the EIS was programmatic or project specific she replies that is is both … and that it is a “hybrid.”
The facts in the matter have not changed so one must ask for what reason the story from that side suddenly has. Another justice is heard to say that there is no such thing as a hybrid.
Again, listen and learn for yourself. Click on the TRD vs City of Black Diamond.
That decision will be months in coming but as you can hear recent finding in the Washington State Appellate Court Division III maintain that failure to address environmental impacts in an EIS can not be glossed over with reference to any other document, especially if they have not been incorporated into the EIS.
The Hearing Examiner’s findings on the EIS said, “vital information” was left out regarding the impacts to Lake Sawyer by this massive development. The city and YarrowBay have attempted to say that any shortcomings would be addressed by the Lake Sawyer Management Plan. Not only does the Hearing Examiner state that the Lake Sawyer Management Plan has its own errors and shortcomings, neither the city nor YarrowBay incorporated this document into their faulty EIS.
Growth is not paying for growth. YarrowBay is not being made to pay for the seven schools that will be required for this development, that expense has been dumped on the taxpayers of the Enumclaw School District via the tri-party agreement that Mr. Boston — who resides in the Kent School District — approved. It is unlikely ESD taxpayers will ever approve levies for the estimated $270 million those schools will cost to build. The appeal of Preliminary Plat 1A by citizens is the only reason the expense of the Rock Creek Bridge — 100 years old — being brought into a usable condition for the traffic and pedestrian traffic that will be created by their “walkable schools” will be borne by the developer and not the citizens. As for the water, here is the true history of that humongous expense.
The problem that is causing water rate increases came about in 2007. The Tacoma agreement provided that the city could purchase the rights to an additional 500,000 gallons per day. The city did so in May 2007 at a cost of $3,407,063. See attached Resolution 07-024. This purchase was pure speculation on the part of the city. They erroneously assumed that growth would be so great as to require more water than our springs could provide. And council members Mike Cline, Geoff Bowie and Rebecca Olness voted for a contract that obligated the city to pay for this water, not the developer who would bring the growth. So much for their actions adhering to the promise that growth will pay for growth. Then Councilwoman Olness seconded the motion to authorize the additional purchase even though there does not appear to have been any need for the additional capacity nor any rational reason to incur such a large debt.
Since incurring the $3 million debt previous City Councils and the City Administrations did not increase rates sufficient to service the debt. The current City Council must now take the unpopular but necessary steps to keep the water fund solvent.
It is clear that our past administrations have failed to represent the majority of the taxpayers in a fiscally responsible manner in regard to this “planned growth” which does not appear “planned” and has not resulted in growth of anything but debt and division to date.
Vote Dave Gordon, Carol Benson, Janie Edelman and Erika Morgan for informed and responsible choices for our future.
Cindy Wheeler
Black Diamond
