Help Preserve Squalicum Mountain

Virginia Watson has been a resident of the Squalicum Valley since 1982. She’s a board member of the Squalicum Valley Community Association.

City of Bellingham and Whatcom County residents have an exciting opportunity to work together and achieve a result that will be mutually beneficial for Squalicum Mountain. The success of this joint effort will benefit those of us living today as well as future generations.

Bill Sygitowicz, owner of Vineyard Development LLC, represents Carole and Gordon Iverson, owners of 700 acres of rural forestland on Squalicum Mountain, mostly deeded to them by the Trillium Corporation. The Iversons are proposing a cluster subdivision that would place up to 66 homes in and near the Lake Whatcom watershed. According to the watershed boundary map, 95 percent of this development will be in the Lake Whatcom watershed. So clustering means more, not less, development in the watershed.

If state law is circumvented and the cluster is allowed, the number of residences in the watershed will immediately be double what they might otherwise be able to develop. The illegal extension of water and sewer (urban services) planned by the developer for this project will inevitably lead to the development of some 700 additional residences on adjacent land. The current county code will not protect the so-called “reserve tract” from future development. The pressure to develop in and around the reserve will be unstoppable.

This gated subdivision will generate hundreds of trips up and down the mountain for car-dependent homeowners, straining the roadways around the lake and through Bellingham’s neighborhoods. This development will destroy the buffer between urban Bellingham and rural Whatcom County, and set a precedent that will open all our rural forest zones to development and urban sprawl. Similar “mountaintop” communities are being considered for Sumas Mountain, Lookout Mountain and Stewart Mountain, threatening the rural character of Whatcom County.

Building some 60 residences in a gated suburban community in the forest atop Squalicum Mountain will do more harm to the forest (which is designated resource land), the mountain ecosystem and the Lake Whatcom watershed than holding the developer to the current zoning, and properly enforcing the existing restrictions on building in the rural forest zone.

The current zoning of this land allows one dwelling per 20 acres on the mountain. However, at more than one County Council meeting Sygitowicz has posed this legal use of the land as a threat by stating if the illegal cluster is not allowed to go forward, then he and the landowners will be forced to go forward in the environmentally unfriendly legal fashion of developing at a density of one dwelling per 20 acres where each parcel would require a well and a septic system.

Geologists, hydrologists and others familiar with the mountain believe that very limited development can actually take place, because the natural environment just won’t support it. Wells have been largely unsuccessful, and large areas of the mountain consist of steep unstable slopes that can’t be built upon. Sygitowicz claims he wants to do what’s best for the environment. Why is he concerned about the impacts of a possible 34 houses spread across the mountain and not the impacts of a definite 66 houses in the watershed?

It’s critical to remember that development contributes to nutrient loading and sediment, which are the main causes of low dissolved oxygen levels in Lake Whatcom. Low dissolved oxygen levels from nutrients like phosphorus is the problem with Lake Whatcom, not pathogens from septic systems. Also, properly designed, sited, installed and maintained septic systems are just as effective as sewers. Sewers can and do fail. All development in the watershed clustered or not, results in the further degradation of Lake Whatcom.

There are problems with this cluster proposal: The Growth Management Act RCW 36.70A.110(4) prohibits urban services (water and sewer) outside of Urban Growth Areas (UGA) as does the County Comprehensive Plan. This cluster development requires these services and is outside of a UGA. Clustering is prohibited in rural resource (forest) lands. There are no instances where it has been allowed despite legal challenges.

Clustering is for Urban Growth Areas, not resource lands. Clustering allows development to occur at higher densities than otherwise allowed. Clustering hastens the development of rural areas and increases urban sprawl. County code is supposed to be consistent with preserving rural character and maintaining viable resource lands. The cluster does neither.

The County Comprehensive Plan identifies the east side of Squalicum Mountain as a landslide hazard area. According to Whatcom County Code, areas with greater than 20 percent slope are not buildable. Squalicum Mountain is a highly significant recharge area for Lake Whatcom according to the Critical Areas Ordinance map of significant aquifer recharge areas. Of the three areas identified on this map, the Y Road-Squalicum Valley is the largest. Early county hydrology maps identify the top of Squalicum Mountain as a critical area.

The County Council has passed a six-month interim ordinance to remove the cluster provision in designated rural forestlands. During this time, they will work to correct the zoning code by permanently removing the clustering option on forest resource lands and bring the zoning code into compliance with state law and numerous court rulings that generally recognize that counties may create ordinances that are more restrictive than state law, but not less.

The Squalicum Valley Community Association (SqVCA) was formed in July of 2006 in response to the proposed development on Squalicum Mountain. The SqVCA wants to work with other rural community associations and the residents of Bellingham to conserve our rural landscapes. The SqVCA’s Board met with Mr. Iverson, and in discussions with him, has developed a plan that would compensate him, protect Bellingham’s watershed, the Squalicum Valley’s aquifer, fish and wildlife habitat, conserve the forestland and maintain the green belt between Bellingham and rural Whatcom County.

Mr. Iverson is a forester who is willing to sell his development rights. He will retain and manage his land as a sustainable forest. This idea has received initial support from the county executive, the mayor, both city and county council members and citizen groups.

As the cost of land near the city and in Urban Growth Areas reaches astronomical levels, securing development rights before development pressures make it financially impossible will enable our community to conserve and protect the forests and other critical areas around our urban center.

The 700 acres at risk would augment the conservation easements on 330 acres already owned by the city, conservation easements held on adjoining property by the Whatcom Land Trust and an approximately 100-acre conservation easement given by a member of the SqVCA to establish a greenbelt in Bellingham’s watershed of over 1,100 acres.

Keeping Squalicum Mountain rural will protect Lake Whatcom’s significant recharge area and Bellingham’s water supply. Contact Pete Kremen, Tim Douglas and members of the city and county councils to express your support for the acquisition of these 700 acres in the Lake Whatcom Watershed.

In your communication with the County Executive and County Councilmembers, urge them to uphold the GMA and protect our resource lands by making the removal of the lot clustering provision in rural forestlands permanent. Let them know you want Whatcom County to retain its rural and agricultural character. Let them know you want to see your mountains covered with forests, not houses. §