HyleBlog - Friends of the Hylebos

Office Closed For New Year's

The Friends' office is closed for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. Have a safe and happy New Year's and  we'll look forward to seeing you out in the Hylebos in 2009!

Just Happy To Be Here Today!

It is great to be back in the office and back at work. After time off for surgery/recovery, vacation, Christmas and snow, it feels like a month has gotten by me. I'm excited about all the plans for 2009: we have some incredible restoration projects coming up, more forest health work at the West Hylebos, as well as the East Hylebos if we can put the funds together. We have a habitat purchase that we're working on that will protect a very beautiful area in Spring Valley. And much, much more!

What's That Sound?

As we Puget Sounders contemplate saving our inland sea, a look eastward to the quarter of a century gone Chesapeake Bay Clean-up may prove instructive. Things aren't going well.

Despite 25 years and almost $6 billion, the government campaign to clean up the Chesapeake Bay has failed to meet its deadlines.

A tour of the Chesapeake and its watershed shows what happened: Solutions to the pollution problems were often obvious. But governments struggled to implement them on a large scale, unable to overcome budget shortages, bureaucratic inertia and political opposition from farmers, builders, watermen and other groups.

Money shortages. Bureacracy. Political opposition. Throw into the mix a growing population and you have the big challenges facing Puget Sound.

De-Icing Controversy. Yawn.

Down there in the Silly City, the debate over which ice treatment to use has hotted up. City officials say salt is bad for creeks and the Sound, so they use sand . Meanwhile, scientists say that sand is worse for the aquatic environment (while reporters report that another one of sand's side-effects is that it sucks at removing snow & ice)

What is used in the Hylebos? Federal Way uses sand, I believe; or possibly one of those sand/salt mixtures - which has worked pretty well in my neighborhood. I don't know about the rest of the cities in the watershed.

Now, the State DOT is getting all mad scientist on us and mixing up its own de-icing solution (no truth to the rumour that DOT employees call it Hammond's Home Brew for DOT Director Paula Hammond) for use In some parts of the state. Has this stuff been tested for its impact on the aquatic environment?

I do know that as far as impacts, we're talking about such an infrequent occurrence that I'm not terrifically concerned. There are far other larger issues to tackle...however, if local cities do any sort of sustainability assessment, this would be an area of operations to look at...

In Salmon News..
The Smithsonian Natural History Museum is featuring the Nisqually Tribe's efforts to restore Chinook salmon to the Nisqually Delta as part of its new Sant Ocean Hall.

Transmissions From My Winter Palace

I was out early this morning to deliver my wife to a carpool and the side roads are still compact snow/ice, but it was trouble for our trusty Outback. Fortunately, the Starbucks was open and I was able to fortify myself with hot coffee for my troubles.

The snow has been quite enjoyable for me, having previously taken the week off for the holidays. I've been relaxing, getting my strength back from the surgery with a demanding physical regimen of snowball fights, watching soccer, and Christmas shopping (the latter being the most demanding, of all).

One of my favorite moments was Monday, when my youngest daughter and I took my clueless dog Pedro on a walk down to the Metropolitan Market. We got some hot sandwiches and hot drinks and sat on the outdoor patio with the overhead gas heater on. The heater made it so warm, I had to take my jacket off. It was just a beautiful winter moment to be eating outdoors, looking at the white, snow-covered parking lot, sharing time with my daughter (and Pedro, of course!).

Here's a pic of me and Pedro on one of our walks.

I've been thinking all week long about what will happen when the snow melts. It sounds from the forecasts that we'll get additional rain/snow through the week. That is a recipe for flooding in the Hylebos. And of course, whatever salt, de-icing chemicals, car exhaust, etc. that is in the snow, will end up in the Hylebos, or other local waterways, and ultimately, in Puget Sound.

Seattle apparently does not use salt on its roads, in part, because of concern about its effects on local streams and Puget Sound.

Another article in the Times caught my eye; this one about the efforts to create animal crossings along I-90. The Hylebos has its own animal crossing project its waiting on, the S. 356th St. bridge. When that is built, it will include sufficient room beneath the roadway, not only for water flow, but also for animals. It will in effect, reconnect the majority of the West Hylebos Wetlands with its downstream sector.

I'll be back with more later...

Snow Drifts

Not much to report today. My vision continues to improve! With that and the improved roads, I got into the office this afternoon. I also had lunch with advisory board member and super-engineer Steve Lee.

I'll be on vacation next week, but you can expect me to blog as my fingers just can't shut up! Unless, of course, this idea gets off the ground. I would be first in line to apply for this program.

The first time I visited this website I just stared at it for minutes, awe-stricken by what it represents. There is something magical, eerie and a bit scary about The Breathing Planet. And yes, I know it's just a simulation of the CO2 breaths and births and deaths rates around our little blue ball of water and mud, but STILL...WOW!

Snow!

I couldn't think of another title. What else do you need to know, other than it's snowy out there?!

The office was mostly closed today. Hillary and I both worked remotely, while Tamera, who lives within walking distance of the office, held up the fort. Tamera, by the way, is a real unsung hero of the Hylebos, keeping the office humming and keeping me on task and on track.

Hopefully, road conditions will improve Friday, but current predictions are not encouraging. Oh, well. At least my daughters are enjoying the extra time off from school and the rare opportunity to play in the snow. I did get out for a brief walk to the nearby Metropolitan Market. It's been exactly a week to the day since my surgery and man, it was nice to take a walk with my daughters and 1 of my pooches in the snow! Life is good!

Puget Soundings
Anyhow, while the snow looks so beautiful on the ground, it will eventually melt and become surface water runoff, flowing ultimately to Puget Sound. As it travels, some of it - too much of it, in fact - will pick up pollutants from our roads and parking lots and deliver that into our already beleaguered inland sea.

Scientists who've been studying core samples of Sound sediments have begun to paint a picture of the history of toxic pollution of the Sound. The analysis shows that while past environmental regulations reversed pollution trends for specific chemicals, non-point pollution runoff from our ever-growing population began outstripping other sources in the 1980s and now poses the largest pollution threat to the Sound.

The bad news, Brandenberger said, is that the sediments indicate that these dramatic gains started to slow down in the late 1980s -- and, in some cases, appear to have even started to worsen -- the result of "nonpoint" pollution from the region's population growth, development and consequent increases in contaminated stormwater runoff.

"If we continue on with what we're doing now, it is likely Puget Sound will never recover," Brandenberger said.

Here's a thought. Is the Puget Sound our region's analogue of the global climate crisis? What I mean is that the scale of change needed in our region - from our transportation system to the way we manage stormwater, to the way we manage growth - is on a par with the scale of change needed on a global level to address the crisis of global warming.

The analogy isn't watertight, I know. The consequences of global warming are much less forgiving. While we can probably ruin the Sound ecologically and still continue living much the way we do today, changes in the global climate would fundamentally alter the conditions of life and society.

OK. But...the scale of ecological changes we will experience with a ruined Sound are beyond anything in our regional experience. And the geographic scope of the impacts unites us in a way that few other regional environmental issues do.

Global warming is a good approximation of the type of ecological crisis at hand. And, an indicator of the scale of human response needed to bring the needle out of the red zone. I'm thinking the $599 million considered by the Puget Sound Partnership may be just the beginning.

But Puget Sound recovery can't just be about spending money. You can't spend your way out of an ecological crisis! Behavior has to change. That means enforcing environmental laws that are on the books, and creating positive incentives for doing things the right way.

Yes, there is a crisis here, but there's opportunity in crisis. Much like the stores making money today selling tire chains, or the uptick in the towing business.

Knuckles of Evil??

My slow road to recovery took a stop on the Hylebos today as I dropped by the office to show off my battle scars. I was greeted with much heartfelt enthusiasm - which may have been due to today being payday! And no, the double vision did not produce double the paychecks...I think...

In the meantime, global warming continues to crack its knuckles of evil - despite the outside temperature being a very un-Puget Sound-like 1,000 degrees below zero.

Andrew Revkin blogs about the dip in global hotness (which could also be caused by the latest Adam Sandler movie) during the past year. Despite which, 2008 was still somewhere between 7th and 12th hottest year on record! And, a whole lot of ice cubes are missing.

Thank God, Dean Martin didn't live to see this day.

To quote the Guvvernator, I'll be back...

Who Beat up Chris?

I look like I got the smack knocked out of me.

I'm taking a few days off for medical leave. I've written in the past about my fun with my rare sinus condition (the condition's rare, that is, not the sinus. Though, I am fond of my sinuses...I digress). The end game of the sinus issue was reconstructive surgery on Thursday to get my left eye back in proper alignment with the right eye.

Interestingly, the procedure was basic carpentry. The surgeon shimmed up my eye by placing semi-hard silicon implants under the eye to bring it level with the other eye.

I'm still working through how I feel about being shimmed up like a recalcitrant door in an old house. But, if you're interested, this is how I look the day after. The immediate recovery includes enduring some nasty double vision as my brain works out how to make a single, good image out of two that are now - quite suddenly - aligned, after two or more years of slow, progressive disalignment.

The double vision should correct itself after a time. In the meantime, I'm working my eyes out reading all sorts of things. I also caught the Chelsea-West Ham match this morning and the Man. U.-Tottenham game yesterday.

Carol Ostrom writes about density, space and our personal senses of space in the Pacific Northwest magazine. How are we going to go about increasing the density of our urban communities and how will we accommodate the needed changes in our comfort with density? (and I learned a new word: Proxemics).

The suburban cities of the Hylebos (FDub, Fife, Milton, Edgewood) all have pretty significant economic development needs. How will those be affected by the current (and yet to come) economic challenges? And how the heck did Bothell get so lucky?

Escape From The Office!

I got out of the office today. Started off the day meeting with Rep. Mark Miloscia to talk about the upcoming Legislative session. Then, it was off to Seattle to meet with former Stream Team Coordinator Katie Akyuz (nee Moller) to talk about urban forest health issues. Katie, of course, remains a very special friend of the Hylebos and it's always a treat to spend time with her. (plus, I always learn a lot!)

Other Things On My Mind
The PI had a good editorial on the Puget Sound Action Agenda and the need to see some funding for the plan. I'm not quite convinced the PSAA is the entire solution the Sound needs, but it contains some very important actions for reversing the decline of Puget Sound.

Also, Andrew C. Revkin of the NYT blogs about what a "moon shot for energy independence" might look like. Interesting stuff there.

Nice to see a huge, heartless bank show some real progressiveness on a nasty environmental issue like mountaintop mining. You go, BOA!

Has the Mainstream Media grown tired of The End of the World As We Know It (aka, global warming)?

In today's papes (that's papers for those of you not fully versed in HyleSpeak), I read mention of a possible "Car Czar" for the federal auto industry assistance and a Cybersecurity Czar for a federal computer security initiative. A quick Google search also showed "School Czar," "Anti-Corruption Czar," "Czar Power," "Energy Czar" (presumably the Secretary of the Dept. of Energy?), and Isn't it about time we just drop-kicked czar from our government policies? I think so. First off, we're celebrating a 19th century tyrant in a democratic system of governance. I say dissonace. But more practically, if our czars keep proliferating, we'll need to adopt a position of Czar Czar just to manage them all.

(BTW, I am still available for the position of Hylebos Czar, if that one comes open. Call me.)

Hylebos 25th Anniversary Video

We are fortunate to have a talented individual named Mary Longhurst doing some video work with us this year. Mary produced a clip for us for the Ruby Dance this year, which I've posted to our YouTube channel.

Here it is for your viewing pleasure. (BTW, I'm not an idiot wearing sunglasses on a cloudy day. I've been suffering an eye condition that had me covering up. Next time you see me on tape, I promise to be sans shades)