Concerned Citizens of Park Ridge Play Waiting Game

Michael Frome, Ph.D., began his writing career as a reporter for the Washington Post. He has been a columnist in Field & Stream, Los Angeles Times, American Forests, and Defenders of Wildlife and has written sixteen books, including his latest, “Green Ink.” He has served as professor of environmental studies at the universities of Idaho and Vermont, Western Washington University, and Northland College.

Bellingham professes to be a progressive community. But that is sheer illusion and delusion. In every respect, including air quality, water quality, soil stability, green space, and open space, the environment is daily degraded by galloping commercialism, approved and encouraged by the city government.

Bellingham is not unique, I’m sure; it likely represents the story of cities everywhere. Citizens complain, plead and protest, to no avail. One reader wrote to The Bellingham Herald: “Our city and county councils seem to get elected by vowing good intentions for the people and then allow the destruction of our neighborhoods by developers and their bulldozers.”

Another wrote of “planning that goes against all logic and experience, planning that cannot pass the common sense test, planning that defies the public wishes.”

Last spring the city chopped down beautiful trees in Fairhaven and people mourned. One fellow said, “They’re taking all the historic value, all the charm out of Fairhaven piece by piece.”

Another wrote, “The push to make our city and county another ugly mess of blacktop and shopping malls and gridlocked streets goes on ad nauseum. Commercialization has become more important than anything else.”

And someone else, “Decisions are made in our name but without our consent. The low voter turnout in recent elections is not hard to understand. People have become disenchanted with the system.”

City planners and city government brush off the private citizen as though he or she is a problem and a pest. I know from my own experience in the neighborhood where I live. In 1998, my neighbors and I in the Park Ridge area (see map) were confronted by a proposal for a massive 172-unit subdivision in a heavily forested area covering 89 acres.

It was clear at the very beginning that the site is fraught with obstacles to development, including two streams running through the full length of the property, numerous extreme slopes and ridges, and limited traffic capacity.

Many in the neighborhood pointed this out repeatedly in letters and at countless hearings, hoping to insure that any development in the area would safeguard the quality of life.

The planning commission, as a matter of record, identified major issues: public safety, site access, traffic volumes, neighborhood circulation, street standards, utility corridors, wetland and stream preservation, buffers, wildlife impacts, stormwater management, trails and access, housing density, minimum lot size, impact on abutting properties, school impacts, emergency response, preservation of neighborhood character.

Nevertheless, our concerns were ignored. To add abuse to injury, when the city council approved the project in late 1999, at the last minute the developer was allowed to recalculate average lot size based on buildable plus non-buildable land without any public input at a council meeting.

Consequently, we neighbors as the Concerned Citizens of Park Ridge were obliged to bring legal action with our own money against the very government we underwrite. At first it appeared like a very local neighborhood issue. But we found the same thing going on throughout the city.

Consider that of fifty-two residential developments proposed for construction in 1999 every one of them was determined by the city to have no significant environmental impact. That doesn’t make sense except as a way to circumvent SEPA, the state environmental policy act, and give developers what they want.

We undertook a program of fundraising, knocking on doors, holding a public auction, and successfully raising more than $25,000. Unfortunately, the local judge ruled against us, holding that the city had adequately addressed determination of environmental impacts of the proposed development.

However, the judge recommended further judicial consideration, declaring, “It needs review by an appeals court.”

The appeals court also turned us down. It overlooked, or misconstrued, blatant violations of state environmental policy act (SEPA) procedures by the City of Bellingham. It declared the actual consideration of environmental impacts to be an unwieldy burden on the city.

I think this renders a basic state law virtually useless and denies citizens the right to participate fully in the process of decision-making, as that law is meant to provide for us.

The Appellate Court rejected our appeal last fall (2001). At that point we learned of a similar case in Vancouver, Washington, by a citizens’ group, Stop the Amphitheater Today, or STAT. Both Concerned Citizens of Park Ridge and Stop the Amphitheater Today have petitioned the Supreme Court of Washington to review the legality of the use, or misuse, of the state environmental policy act (SEPA) process by our respective cities and we are awaiting word from the court.

It hasn’t been easy, but I believe that it’s never over until it’s over. Many years ago I was involved in the historic Overton Park case, when that lovely forest park in the middle of Memphis was threatened by a main-stem Interstate highway through the middle of it.

The case ultimately went before Congress and the United States Supreme Court. Because good people who cared never gave up, and never gave up hope, the natural treasure of their city is preserved and intact to this day.

In Bellingham, we sought the cooperation, support and expertise of various environmental organizations, but were generously ignored, rebuffed and reminded that ours was “only a small local neighborhood issue,” while they were preoccupied with much larger, more important things like “the fragile central Cascades ecosystem … and critical habitat for gray wolf, grizzly bear, pine marten, endangered salmon runs, and other wildlife.”

Maybe so, but all types of animals exist in all types of places. Raccoons, squirrels, mice, opossums, pigeons and skunks make urban areas incredibly wild and natural in their own right. Our 79-acre Park Ridge embraces lush vegetation, wetlands and a thriving, diverse wildlife population, remarkably within the city limits.

Park Ridge provides a growing community with green lungs, opportunities for outdoor recreation and environmental education to complement classroom studies. It should be preserved for present and future generations.

The entrenched political bureaucracy disdains the voice of the people, that is true, but eventually the people will be heard.