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01/28/2005: "Will Taxpayers pay for the Permitting of Private Barge Landings??"

Charlie Meyer testifies while Stephanie O'Day observes

A public meeting raised some concerns about who pays for environmental studies that will benefit private land owners.

The County's decision to conduct a scoping meeting open to the public for comment on what, and how much, should be included in an EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) on the non-conforming barge landing sites in San Juan county, showed just how useful it can be to the County to include the public in its decision making process. While very few citizens showed up for the meeting, and even fewer testified, the meeting generated useful input from the public that should be helpful in to the writing of the EIS. It also raised a number of important questions that have yet to be fully responded to.

While the ongoing efforts of the BOCC to elevate existing barge landing sites to a fully legal status, and to allow the expansion of barge landings in some areas that do not now allow them is one of the stated goals of the proposed changes contemplated by the BOCC, there may be more at stake in the proposed changes to the Comprehensive. Plan and the regulations that enforce the goals and policies of the Plan, than just barge landings. The changes have the potential to place industrial type development in what are, as this date, areas deemed inappropriate for such uses.


The Wednesday 'Scoping' hearing was held to present a draft list of what the staff felt were the areas that would have to be addressed in the EIS on EPS (Essential Public Facilities). Francine Shaw of Planning started the presentation by going over what the law required in terms of categories, and the depth of information that must be researched as a part of the EIS process, then went over the Draft Scoping list that staff felt included the necessary items relevant to doing an EIS for an EPF. After her presentation the floor was opened for public comment. Unlike many county hearings and meetings, the response from the public was on-point, and helpful in raising issues -and asking questions- that appeared to impress the County Staff.

One of the most startling aspects of the proposed scope of the EIS was brought out by Stephanie O'Day, who stated she felt that the burden of producing the studies required by the scoping proposal was going to be punitively expensive, and on the one hand she seemed relieved, but on the other hand dismayed that the County taxpayer would be footing the bill to do the environment studies necessary to prove that an existing barge landing site would not have negative impacts on the environment. It is a matter of record that private studies for projects of the magnitude of barge landings routinely now cost from $5,000.00 or more, and can easily run to $20,000, and up for large projects.

The response from staff was that since the EIS was being done by the County as a part of their proposal to fully legalize existing barge landing sites, it would be up to the taxpayer to foot the bills. This caused the Guardian to ask if it was not true that the subject of the Scoping was 96 sites, all of which were legally non-conforming, and the point of the proposed changes in the comp plan, maps and regulations was to make them legally conforming; but even if they did not qualify to become legally conforming to current regulations due to the findings of an EIS, they could still continue to operate at the same historical level that they had operated at in the past, IF the owner could prove the past use had in fact occurred. Staff agreed this was true. The question not asked, and hanging in the air was: why then is the taxpayer paying for a study to prove an individual property owner has the right to change a non-conforming aspect of a property to a conforming use? A change that if allowed would in many cases increase the property value for the owner of the property; a gain subsidized by the county taxpayer.

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