Community Meet-Up

Tonight was the community meeting with two members of the County Council wherein we were to learn more about the septic inspection system that has been inaugurated for us by the County and the State.  Alas, everything was not illuminated, although much was described.  The Council Members described what they had done and the community members described how they thought and felt about the implementation of the Council's work.  There was some meeting of the minds.  At least it did not become a libertarian shout fest in which people expressed beliefs about how the County had no right to make them do anything, although there was one impassioned claim about the whole program being unconstitutional because it was a 'referendum tax' instead of an 'initiative tax.'  About this, I will say no more.

Over a hundred people from Point Roberts showed up on a truly unpleasant weather evening: the rain was pouring down, the winds were blowing, and there are reports of bigger winds, bigger tides, and flooding by morning.  So people might reasonably have had something else on their mind than showing up at this meeting.  Lots of part-time residents were there, explaining their particular problems with this system.  What was most notable, however, was that most everyone, and in fact perhaps actually everyone, agreed with the impetus for the system.  That is, they did not disagree that research showed increasing coliform problems in shoreline waters and that human and agricultural sources both contribute to that problem.  We need clean water.  The issue was about how to get from here to there.

Unlike the Border Control meeting that was held last spring, the meeting (which lasted two full hours) did not end with a sense of hope that something had been heard that hadn't been heard before, and that, as a result, there was a distinct prospect of change.  The border issues definitely improved subsequent to that meeting.  But nothing is going to change as a result of this meeting, I think.  Yes, there are many distinct problems with the implementation of the inspection system, but these problems are not a surprise to the Council members for the most part (although they did admit that they had not thought about houses occupied only on a part-time basis).  But there you are: that's the system that the Council voted for, and that's how the system is being implemented by the Health Department, which is not a department that the Council controls.  You got problems with that?  Talk to Pete Kremens who is the County Executive.

The issue of conflict of interest captured most of the conversation.  One suggestion that seemed to be accepted for immediate action was providing people with information about what an inspector should be doing when he comes to do an inspection.  That information could be provided pretty quickly.  If it's not at least in the All Points Bulletin's December issue, I'm going to be pretty disappointed.  It was the one thing the Council members agreed could and should be done.  And if they don't do it, they've lost their bona fides with me.

There is a proposed amendment to the inspection enforcement legislation coming before the Council at the end of January.  It was introduced by Barbara Brenner (who was one of the two Council persons who drove the roads for us tonight--the other, Carl Weimer).  The first hearings on that will be at the end of January.  But nothing is going to change the problems that we already have before the deadline for inspections passes us by in early December.

There were lots of interesting details in the meeting, but I'll postpone that illustrative material until the next post, on Wednesday, since this is already long enough.