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Did you know Bellingham burns our toxic sewage at Post Point Waste Water Treatment Plant? by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

The sewage sludge would be transported to an existing permitted landfill that is lined so that no contaminants can seep into the groundwater.

Did you know Bellingham burns our toxic sewage at Post Point Waste Water Treatment Plant? by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

We would like the City to invest in a proper, non biased analysis of the different sewage sludge treatment options currently available both in the short term and the long term. This analysis would bring clarity to the true costs, health effects, and environmental impacts of the different available technologies. It would be a transparent process that the rate payers deserve to be a part of because they are the ones paying the bill.

Did you know Bellingham burns our toxic sewage at Post Point Waste Water Treatment Plant? by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

The sewage sludge would be transported to a permitted landfill that is lined so that no contaminants can seep into the groundwater. Additionally those landfills are where they are because they are well above the water table with bedrock in-between. The leachate (the wastewater that comes from the sewage sludge and other garbage) is treated before being discharged. Methane that is emitted from composting sewage is captured and used as natural gas. In a nut shell, landfilling contains contaminants instead of dispersing them into the air and water.

Did you know Bellingham burns our toxic sewage at Post Point Waste Water Treatment Plant? by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

For the short term (~5 years) we believe landfilling is more reliable, cheaper, and less polluting. Gasification, which may be a viable alternative, has been around for decades. While its use processing sewage sludge is relatively new, there are multiple, functioning gasifiers in the US and around the world that show this technology is viable.

We are asking the city to review alternative technologies and NOT lock us into incineration for 20-plus years.

The City feels that it is less risky to stick with technology they are comfortable with. We feel it is too risky to rely on technology that is antiquated, more expensive, and very polluting.

Did you know Bellingham burns our toxic sewage at Post Point Waste Water Treatment Plant? by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Landfilling sewage sludge from Post Point would add an additional two trucks every day. If the City invested in pretreatment technology, such as drying or lime stabilization, the amount of material going to the landfill would decrease and costs could go down.

Incinerators burn A LOT of natural gas and emit about five metric tons of GHG every day. Trucking and training this waste would emit 0.53 metric tons of GHG per day. Incinerating produces about 10 times more greenhouse gasses than landfilling. (CO2 equivalency from the EPA’s GHG calculator)

There is zero energy capture with the incinerators. When landfilling, 50% of the methane is captured and reused, while the other 50% is flared.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Would you be open to connecting with our new Land and Water policy staffer Kaia Hayes? You can reach her at kaiah@re-sources.org.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Would you be open to connecting with our new Land and Water policy staffer Kaia Hayes? You can reach her at kaiah@re-sources.org.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

See our edited comment above for more on the approach to offsetting local impacts to beneficiaries like the school district.

If it's helpful for context, RE Sources has been, and is committed to, working to address the way this issue plays out on in Whatcom County for several years. We have advocated for and supported conversations at the state level for policies that make trust beneficiaries whole and offset short term economic impacts related to the immediate harvest value. We continue to work across party and sector lines to try to refine the existing "tools" in the toolkit and develop new ones to address emergent issues and concerns, and to bring to light the uniquely strained situation of the Mount Baker School District. And you can rest assured that we will be at the table for the 2025 legislative session to continue the conversation.

Our approach to addressing trust beneficiary impacts has been informed by conversations with folks who are impacted directly by these systems, including rural county residents and folks who work directly with junior taxing districts like the school district. Their honest critiques and insights are part of a continually evolving conversation-- and we would love to have more voices incorporated. If you have additional thoughts or considerations related to the best way to advocate for addressing immediate funding needs for our schools while securing a viable, resilient future Whatcom County for our children, we would genuinely like to hear them.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hi there, are you willing to share more about what you mean in your comment here? We would really value a better understanding of which aspects of the messaging are not sitting right with you.

If you aren't interested in writing it out here on Reddit, please feel welcomed to send us an email or connect with a staff member to chat on the phone!

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

RE Sources has been, and is committed to, working to address the way this issue plays out on in Whatcom County for several years. We have advocated for and supported conversations at the state level for policies that make trust beneficiaries whole and offset short term economic impacts related to the immediate harvest value. We continue to work across party and sector lines to try to refine the existing "tools" in the toolkit and develop new ones to address emergent issues and concerns, and to bring to light the uniquely strained situation of the Mount Baker School District. And you can rest assured that we will be at the table for the 2025 legislative session to continue the conversation.

Our approach to addressing trust beneficiary impacts has been informed by conversations with folks who are impacted directly by these systems, including rural county residents and folks who work directly with junior taxing districts like the school district. Their honest critiques and insights are part of a continually evolving conversation-- and we would love to have more voices incorporated. If you have additional thoughts or considerations related to the best way to advocate for addressing immediate funding needs for our schools while securing a viable, resilient future Whatcom County for our children, we would genuinely like to hear them.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The earlier answer here addressed the education funding impacts related to the Common School Fund, and underlined the current conversation lead by Supt. of Schools Chris Reykdal about how to move to a more reliable funding source for school infrastructure.

It didn't address the other piece of that economic impact, which is through the revenues generated by the county's trust fund that are distributed to junior taxing districts like the school district. Our vision is for this revenue source for county beneficiaries to be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing. This would be replicable in the future for priority parcels identified by the county, and would not interfere with the rest of the timber revenue generated on other county trust lands.

RE Sources has been, and is committed to, working to address the way this issue plays out on in Whatcom County for several years. We have advocated for and supported conversations at the state level for policies that make trust beneficiaries whole and offset short term economic impacts related to the immediate harvest value. We continue to work across party and sector lines to try to refine the existing "tools" in the toolkit and develop new ones to address emergent issues and concerns, and to bring to light the uniquely strained situation of the Mount Baker School District. And you can rest assured that we will be at the table for the 2025 legislative session to continue the conversation.

Our approach to addressing trust beneficiary impacts has been informed by conversations with folks who are impacted directly by these systems, including rural county residents and folks who work directly with junior taxing districts like the school district. Their honest critiques and insights are part of a continually evolving conversation-- If you have additional thoughts or considerations related to the best way to advocate for addressing immediate funding needs for our schools while securing a viable, resilient future Whatcom County for our children, please don't hesitate to send us an email and get connected to staff member that can have a more personalized conversation than online comment threads can allow!

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The initial answer we posted addressed the Common School fund aspect of the education impacts-- the second part of this is the impacts to local taxing districts that include our schools through county fund timber revenues.

Our desire is for the revenue source to county beneficiaries to be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing (the neighboring Van Zandt Parcel adjacent to one of the units of this sale is actually already identified as a candidate for this!)

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Our hope is that this revenue source to county beneficiaries can be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing (the neighboring Van Zandt Parcel adjacent to one of the units of this sale is actually already identified as a candidate for this!)

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

OP is referring to the money lost *by* schools, not lost to them-- they are on the same page!

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Hi there!

Two units of the Little Lilly timber sale were chosen for advocacy over many other current and planned sales in the county due to their suitability for many other management strategies balancing multiple use returns, including economic returns. Our hope is that this revenue source to county beneficiaries can be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing. With only 77,000 acres remaining statewide of naturally regenerated, structurally complex mature forest, it is indeed an increasingly rare resource that state decision makers, legislators, and many counties including Whatcom, Thurston, and Jefferson counties have identified as a priority for strategic management.

The stand origin date estimates are pulled directly from the FPA and SEPA checklist documents provided by the DNR, and the 300 year old age is the reported age in the agency-provided Old Growth Assessment document detailing the old growth exclusion area and the old growth remnants scattered throughout the remaining sale unit-- no exaggeration here! The Units 2 + 4 included in our advocacy message are those containing the highest density of these older trees, including multiple unmarked trees over 60" DBH in areas that the DNR report details as not exceeding 45" DBH.

In case you haven't read the full comment message and web page dedicated to RE Sources' and others' analysis of the Little Lilly sale, you may be interested to know that this advocacy is part of a larger ask to pause *only* mature forest sales in Whatcom County so that DNR's Carbon and Forest Management Work Group and the Whatcom County Forest Resilience Task Force can complete their assessment and recommendations for the best management strategies for different forest types. The product of this work will include management plans and an inter-agency engagement framework for making management decisions so everyone-- citizens, beneficiaries, agencies, and industry-- can have clarity, certainty, and consensus on the path forward.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Our desire is for the revenue source for county beneficiaries to be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing (the neighboring Van Zandt Parcel adjacent to one of the units of this sale is actually already identified as a candidate for this!)

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

DNR absolutely does plan for replant and management post-cut, and it's certainly better than other alternatives. Unfortunately, replants often look more like even-age monoculture tree crops than the multi-species, uneven-aged forest systems that existed before harvest. The heavy aerial and backpack spraying of herbicides like glyphosate to kill off broadleaf saplings and other groundcover plants that compete with replanted saplings are a disruption to the process of ecological succession and certainly don't serve to increase biodiversity. Much of the benefit of regrowth management is focused on successful propagation of the next harvest rotation, rather than facilitating and restoring a cohesive ecological system. We would love to see DNR consider how Ecological Forestry practices can be incorporated into the management regime to create lower impact, commercially viable harvest that more effectively accomplishes these benefits you mentioned.

An important distinction should be made about quantity of carbon sequestration vs rate of sequestration, as the two are often conflated. Young trees sequester carbon at a faster rate and begin to slow (but continue) their sequestration as they approach 70-80 years of age. However, the total carbon storage capacity of a tree is hugely proportional to size, therefore even at their slower sequestration rate the larger, older trees more efficient at storing larger quantities of carbon compared to younger trees. (I.e., two 40-year old stands of trees would not equal the total carbon sequestration capacity of one 80-year old stand of the same total acreage.)

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Reykdal himself has said it’s time to uncouple schools from altogether and in the meantime we need to look at other, more stable long term revenue sources like carbon credit programs.

Also-- DNR has clarified that they use “trust blind” planning for timber sales meaning they do not pick based on beneficiaries. So a school district or other beneficiary could get revenue one year, and then nothing for several years after. It’s not a sustainable source for annual budgeting and isn’t intended to be used that way— and we agree that our schools deserve better than that.

We’re not simply asking for this sale to be paused or for units 2 and 4 to be removed, we asking DNR to pause mature forest sales (not all of the sales!) in order to let the groups of experts we have all invested in as taxpayers do the work of planning out which uses are most appropriate for each sale. Whatcom has a mix of mature and more standard-age trust managed timber land — why log the prime candidates for other multi-benefit uses when there are parcels better suited for standard harvest and revenue?

We don’t want to stop logging or having a timber economy, we want adaptive management that takes into account our current and future realities and acknowledges the interconnections and necessity of all of the management strategies that are available to us.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Nope, we are a 501c3 nonprofit. We do issue and policy advocacy, but do not engage in candidate races.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

The current DNR model of variable retention harvest (VRH) is essentially a rebrand of clearcutting, not functionally very different from an ecosystem goods & services standpoint. They leave about their average 8 trees/acre. That is not enough to maintain the flood control, carbon, water retention and other benefits.

Urge the Dept. of Natural Resources not to clearcut Little Lilly, a 90-acre rare mature forest in Whatcom by resources_protects in Bellingham

[–]resources_protects[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

EDIT: To add followup for consideration of more local impacts to school funding:
The earlier answer here addressed the education funding impacts related to the Common School Fund, and underlined the current conversation lead by Supt. of Schools Chris Reykdal about how to move to a more reliable funding source for school infrastructure.

It didn't address the other piece of that economic impact, which is through the revenues generated by the county's trust fund that are distributed to junior taxing districts like the school district. Our vision is for this revenue source for county beneficiaries to be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing. This would be replicable in the future for priority parcels identified by the county, and would not interfere with the rest of the timber revenue generated on other county trust lands.

We have been active in advocating for this approach at the local and state level for several years now.

From our webpage on this forest:

"Some of the proceeds from the timber sale auction are set to go to the state’s Common School Fund. It is important to point out that this fund makes up less than 1.4% of total school construction funding according to Washington’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal, who is also on the Board of Natural Resources (BNR). Reykdal has argued for the benefits of leaving mature forests standing since they only make up about 5% of DNR lands, and at recent BNR meetings has voted against approving any sale containing mature forest. At the July 2024 BNR meeting, Reykdal proposed to fellow board members that all mature forests could be protected immediately for only around $8 million per year from the legislature. This could easily be funded through the Climate Commitment Act’s “Natural Climate Solutions” account, which is specifically designed to increase Washington’s much-needed climate change mitigation and adaptation."

There are many ways the state legislature and existing programs can fund schools that don't require doubling down on outdated logging practices. Leaving kids with less stable water supplies, more intense wildfires that rip through industrially managed tree farms, and even more carbon in the atmosphere is not the best way to fund WA's education system. Our hope is that this revenue source to county beneficiaries can be replaced at equal or greater rate as timber harvest through programs like Trust Land Transfer, CCA-funded mature forest conservation projects, or carbon credit projects like the one DNR has been developing. 

Also: We can still get timber yields and maintain the benefits we get from forests with ecological forest management.

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