Is Trust being critical or hypocritical?

Published 12:49 am Friday, October 3, 2008

In the March 14 issue of the Record, Maryanne Tagney Jones of Preston wrote, “The Greenway Trust is a group of local people trying to put together a vision that benefits everyone who lives along I-90, not just now, but for generations to come. Whether we live in Preston [as I do] or North Bend, or Issaquah, or Seattle, we are pledged to look at the whole picture and not just our piece of it.”

Is this the same Ms. Jones who wrote a letter to DDES attacking a permit for a gravel processing site that had been proposed in Preston? She was concerned about such things as “… the health and safety of the community … water quality … noise … truck traffic …” and she ended her three-page letter of concerns saying, “This is obviously only a preliminary list of necessary conditions, and it will be expanded as other concerns surface within the community and affected organizations and agencies.”

Excuse me, but why can Ms. Jones, a director of MST, voice concerns about a project in her town but criticize us when we voice our concerns about a project in our town? Could it be because the project proposed for Preston did not have the prior blessing of MTS?

And, by the way, another complainant about the Preston project was Ken Konigsmark, president of the Issaquah Alps Trails Club. Mr. Konigsmark, who is Boeing loaned executive and director of special projects for Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust, wrote, “We believe that it is inappropriate, whether allowed or not technically, to approve a gravel crushing and hauling operation in the midst of a small community, and on a site which has many environmental sensitivities, such as bordering on the Raging River.”

Is the Preston area more environmentally sensitive than the lower site of the proposed North Bend project where Cadman plans to scrape to within 5 feet of the aquifer and then build its crushing and processing plants? Maybe pure water supplies and our children are not as important as the Raging River and the children of Preston.

And, finally, Nancy Keith, executive director of Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust, as a guest columnist in the March 7 issue of the Record, talked about MTS’s communications with the Snoqualmie Tribe and the Tribe’s plans for a casino. She lauded the Tribe for working with MTS and taking a lengthy time to ” … find a site that works well for them and the community.”

Why is it that MTS is willing to work with the Tribe but not with the citizens of North Bend? MTS signed a memorandum of understanding committing the organization “… to actively support permitting and development efforts for the sand and gravel mine as contemplated by the conceptual mining plan, including support during public comment periods and as an amicus in any litigation pertaining to the permitting of the sand and gravel mine …” Even though the plan is being developed in more detail and the issues – such as the potential hazards to the aquifer, the increased traffic in an already congested interchange and the increased dust and sound pollution – are becoming more apparent, MTS is still unwilling to meet with the local community although there is an alternative that gets to 95 percent of the gravel and eliminates those dangers most unacceptable to the community.

Do we not deserve good communications? Is Mountains to Sound Greenway being critical of local citizens who “don’t appreciate the bigger picture or the greater good,” or, because the mine is not close to any of their communities, is MTS just being hypocritical?

Ken Hall

North Bend

(Editor’s note: Ken Hall is the vice president of the Cascade Gateway Foundation, which opposes construction of the lower site of Cadman Inc.’s Grouse Ridge gravel mine.)