Dear Mayor Rosen:
I have brought up to you before about the attempts that the volunteer group Edmonds Stream Team have made to restore stream channels for salmon recovery within the Edmonds marsh. The leader is Joe Scordino; he tells me that there has not been any communication from your office to allow the group to continue the work there. This is quite sad, especially after touting the “volunteer secret sauce” in your mayoral campaign.
Please let me know if there can be some breakthrough since almost two years ago, to allow us access to the marsh property again.
I wrote a very similar letter June 15, 2023 to then-Mayor Mike Nelson (see link here), which includes a comment from then-mayoral candidate Mike Rosen that included the following:
“I believe that volunteerism is the secret sauce in our country and even more so here in Edmonds. It bogles my mind that people wanting to serve need to beg the city to offer their time, talent and sweat equity to improve our community.
As a city we should be working as hard as possible to unleash the human potential we have in Edmonds and make it easy for volunteers to sign up for projects and opportunities. Surely a creative solution can be found. Perhaps a small group of volunteers could help find a solution?”
It would seem that a creative solution is beyond the grasp of this administration so far.
Respectfully,
William Alexander
When it comes to volunteerism at the marsh, currently the secret sauce for Mayor Rosen apparently is hypocrisy.
Many many many thanks to all of the Marsh volunteers. I am reminded of a recent speech that mentioned a public servant: “He loved America when America did not love him.” I can imagine it could feel the same way for the Marsh volunteers.
I don’t know what the City’s delay is about. Maybe it’s concern about costs of liability. If so, say so. Volunteers can get insurance and sign waivers. Insurance to cover the risks of mucking about in a stream is not expensive. Fly fishers walk around in streams all the time. Gardeners pull weeds and chop down blackberries all the time.
I worry that there is some idea that we can’t have volunteers improving things without our being in charge. I worry that the thinking is that it’s better for the stream to get covered over and choked with invasive species so 104 gets flooded than to let a group headed by a retired NOAA ecological scientist make decisions for themselves. I hope that’s not the issue.
The political types in Edmonds are all for the environment until one of their favorite developer types wants to defile it some more to make another fast buck or two. Or, they want to protect a couple houses that were built in a stream flood plain and destroy salmon habitat in the process. No problem spending our tax money to pay attorneys to keep the degradation of our critical areas going strong with the help of an often city management friendly Hearings Board Examiner. We’ve reached the point of having new legislation on development that attempts to counteract the old SEPA and Critical Areas legislation meant to protect and renew our already devastated natural environment. It’s all a lawyers’ dream come true and a paradise for environmental hypocrites.
I hope Mr. Rosen knows I have removed 109 invasive species from the Marsh. I’d like to remove them all.