Did you ever meet a tourist who was visiting the San Juan Islands in order to see the latest commercial developments? No? Me neither!

Tourists come here for the natural unspoiled beauty of our islands. When here, they buy from our local merchants, moor at our marinas, dine at our many fine restaurants, and often shop for property or a house.

Suppose that we vote to stop the land bank. When this becomes common knowledge among the potential tourists, will they think that we natives no longer care about preserving our heritage?

Would they then decide not to visit us? Would they lose interest in looking for property here? Would they want to live in a community that apparently prefers development over preservation? Would they want to be a participant in the degradation of beautiful San Juan County?

I believe that if we stop funding the land bank, we are only hurting our merchants, our marinas, our restaurants, and particularly our real estate agencies and our construction industry. We will only be shooting ourselves in the foot.

The resulting publicity could be devastating. Why would anyone want to do that? This lost income would, in my opinion, far exceed the nominal costs of continuing the land bank. Also note that these costs are mostly borne by these same tourists who do decide to buy or build here!

Vote yes on the land bank continuation. It’s in our own best commercial interests!

Ed Carlberg

More Sounder/Journal coverage of the Land Bank excise tax renewal issue is online here.