Last week, County Council members Gene Knapp and Howie Rosenfeld presented the latest pricing options for funding a stormwater utility to a small gathering at the Senior Center on Oct. 9. Earlier in the week, they’d made a similar presentation on Lopez Island. The meetings were held to obtain public input on the three funding alternatives the council’s stormwater subcommittee have devised.
And while Knapp said that the people who attended the meeting on Lopez seemed to support the stormwater utility, and be in agreement about the manner it was funded, some of the Orcas attendees raised an oft-repeated question: “What is the need for a stormwater utility at all?”
County Auditor Milene Henley explained the basic assumptions of the funding structure to pay for the $3.36 million cost of constructing stormwater projects (most in Eastsound in the near future.) Over a five-year period, that amounts to about $671,000 per year.
Property owners across the county will likely be assessed a fee of roughly $23, a so-called base rate, to cover yearly expenses of Public Works’ stormwater utility. That base rate, according to county officials, should generate about $380,000 a year and pay for planning, engineering, administration, education, billing and collection, among other items.
The three options to come before the council to pay for the remaining costs are to share the costs equally throughout the county, to have each island pay for programs on its own island, or a 50-25-25 breakdown, whereby all in the county pay 50 percent of the costs, all on the specific island pay 25 percent of the cost for that island’s projects, and 25 percent of the Urban Growth Area (UGA) pay for projects within the UGA.
For example, a property owner within the Eastsound UGA would pay 100 percent share of the cost for the Eastsound swale project, whereas a Deer Harbor resident would pay 75 percent share, and a Lopez property holder would pay the 50 percent share for the Eastsound UGA project.
Henley explained that the county road fund will “continue to handle stormwater generated on public roads, outside of the stormwater utility.” The subcommittee proposes that a citizen advisory committee will establish a fair way to assess costs.
Following Henley’s presentation, several members of the public asked “What is the problem we’re seeking to solve?”
Rosenfeld explained the pressure of meeting an Oct. 30 deadline for presenting a funding plan to pay for the $3.3 million costs outlined in the 2005 “Rasmussen plan.” The Oct. 30 date has been set by the Growth Management Hearings Board (GMHB) as the deadline for the county to comply with the state Growth Management Act, which the county “bought into” in 1990. If they don’t comply, the county stands to have building permits frozen, and lose state grant funding to pay for projects.
However, Rosenfeld added, the Rasmussen plan is based on Department of Ecology regulations, and “There is a good possibility we can change how we do the project … The priority is how we’ll fund the $3.3 million.”
Richard Fralick suggested the overview: “We don’t know what the problem is but the plan’s been accepted by GMA. If we get into compliance, then we’ll change the plan to be more germane to the present situation.”
County stormwater expert Ed Hale said the purpose of the GMA was to have the infrastructure to support development, including the contaminated stormwater that is expected with growth. Knapp emphasized that protection is less expensive than restoration, and that the contaminated stormwater affects the Eastsound aquifer, which supplies 50 percent of Eastsound’s drinking water.
Walt Corbin suggested that property owners should pay for the costs of stormwater mitigation on their own property, and, in the case of retail businesses and agencies, pass those costs on to their customers. Patty Miller, Orcas businesswoman and member of Eastsound Planning Review Committee and the county Critical Areas Ordinance Review committee, countered that she doesn’t use the library, or the county docks and advised against going down the route of “I don’t use it so I won’t pay for it.”
She advised the council representatives to support the Orcas community, saying, “I’d rather be in it together as a community.”
John Evans agreed with Miller and said he supported “the decision the original committee made not to balkanize the community.”
Evans urged the county to “use local resources to figure out the problem instead of taking local money.”
Knapp warned, “We’re up against a hard deadline for compliance … if the GMHB shuts down building, it would turn a bad economy really bad.
“In Eastsound there’s a double-edged problem – we can’t let the aquifer dry up and we can’t let dirty water fill the aquifer.”
A straw poll was taken at the Orcas meeting, and five people voted for the cost of the funding to be divided throughout the county, while three people voted that each island should bear the costs of its projects. On Lopez Island 17 people voted for the second alternative.
County Reporter Scott Rasmussen contributed to this story.
