Weekly Update, my ass. 😀 Sorry. I took a few days to get on the water for a change. And then I come back and the sky has turned orange and the power went out and my computer broke and…
Cats and Dogs! Living together! 😀
Anyhoo, I appreciate all the people who actually notice when I don’t do these. Thanks for following along.
PSA #1: Now that the Federal Way light rail construction is really beginning in earnest, you may want to sign up for email updates from Sound Transit. There will be many road closures over the next year or so.
PSA #2: Dude: you really gotta sign up for the Census. We’re getting down to the wire and DM is currently only at about 71% participation (Washington State is actually second best in the nation) BUT STILL NOT ENOUGH! 😀 We need every living body counted. Each person counted represents about $30,000 in State and Local funding!
PSA #3: If you have a business in Des Moines, you should fill out a G.R.O. application, the City’s new business grant program. The deadline for applications is Today, Monday September 14th! If you need help filling out forms–especially if you need a translator, please give me a call (206) 878-0578.
This Week
Action packed!
Tuesday: SCAtbd Meeting all that ‘transportation’ stuff–like
Tuesday: Burien Airport Committee (Agenda).
Wednesday: Reach Out Des Moines. Let’s see where we’re at with kids as they get back to school (sort of? 😀 )
Wednesday: come have lunch with me at the Senior Center. Get an EATS voucher!
Thursday: Transportation Meeting 3:00pm (Agenda) Please go here if you wish to attend.
Thursday: Environment Committee 4:00pm (Agenda) Please go here if you wish to attend.
Thursday: City Council General Meeting (Agenda) Please go here if you wish to attend.
Saturday: Marina/Beach Cleanup organised by SR3 and Seattle Dive Tours. Now they say they’re all booked up for volunteers. But you just know some people are going to punk out at the last minute so why not just show up and help make our coastline even nicer. 🙂
Last Week
Tuesday: Port Of Seattle Meeting. (Watch/Agenda) Item 8b. So… this is a long story. If you care about airporty stuff, I strongly recommend you go to SeatacNoise.Info and subscribe to their mailing list. Basically, the Port Of Seattle operates 24 Noise Monitors, which are supposed to give us a detailed picture of not just the noise, but also the number/altitude of flights over each neighborhood. So the thing is: they’ve never exactly worked properly. Which is bad. Because, as I always say, if you don’t have data, you can’t get help. This has been a long-running issue. In fact the Port spent $2M to replace them back in 2015. And the wild thing? In 2016 I started bitching that the replacements weren’t working right! And no one paid much attention. Which was sad for me. 🙁 😀 But the good news is that, the Port Commissioners (finally) took complaints from residents like Vashon Island Fair Skies, my colleagues in SeaTac and moi and decided to do something about it. So apparently, their will be an audit and the Port will start releasing data from each Noise Monitor to the public so we can easily double-check that these things actually work. Yay. 🙂
Wednesday: Lunch at the Senior Center. Occasionally people ask why I show up there so often. Well, first off, the food is usually pretty good. Second, there are those EATS vouchers, which I’m always pushing to get residents to try all our local restaurants! But mainly it’s for the intelligence. 😀 A lot of times, these people know stuff that’s going on–you have no idea. 🙂
Wednesday I had a meeting with the MRSC and phone calls with colleagues in a couple of different Cities to discuss, my favorite subject: Exhaust Systems. 😀 A lot of residents want something done about ‘motorists’ who make a lot of noise on the streets–particularly in Redondo. The thing I know is infuriating to residents is how long it seems to take to get relief on things like this. But one part of that ‘process’ is that you kinda have to do some research whenever you propose any sort of policy. More soon.
Wednesday: Des Moines Marina Association meeting. Most of the discussion was about the dreaded Paid Parking. I have three observations:
- They did a great job of mobilizing their membership on the whole paid parking thing. I mention that because that is the way to get what you want from City Council.
- While I’m belaboring the parking thing, I mentioned a question I have on the issue, which I hope we pursue. When the discussion was put on an earlier City Council Agenda, the City stated that it wanted to work out a system that would be used by both the Marina and Redondo. And I really want to understand why that’s a priority. I mean: what’s the advantage to a shared system?
- Have you seen the DMMA’s new web site? Great job! I encourage all local groups to up their game in terms of on-line presence.
Thursday: Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC) Transportation Board Meeting. This was a biggee, with discussion about the 2021-2024 Draft Transportation Improvement Program (TIP). The PSRC wants your input. Please do it! More below.
Last Last Week
On Monday I attended the Des Moines Police Advisory Committee meeting, hosted by Chief Ken Thomas.
Wednesday was Lunch at the Senior Center. 🙂
Friday I was joined by Councilmembers from SeaTac and Burien in a meeting with the local FAA. This was something of a special event. And it shouldn’t be. Among the many issues that have made life next to Sea-Tac Airport so fraught has been a uniquely poor relationship with the local FAA. All airport communities have a difficult relationship with the FAA. The law makes it that way. And in fact, the technical language of the Federal code says that all our interactions with the FAA should go through ‘the operator of the airport’ (The Port Of Seattle). Get that? The Port is supposed to be our advocate, if we have problems with all the noise and pollution. You can’t make this stuff up. 😀 However at some airports, the FAA does engage with the local community in a constructive fashion. And we need to try to get to that form of dialogue because: newsflash: simply yelling all the time does no good.
Snap out of it, dude.
Just between us: I’ve been driving around with expired tabs. (I know! 😀 ) The State forgot to send me the annual renewal and I never noticed it. For some reason that seems significant. It’s autumn and there should be a TON of boat stuff or house stuff and so on… but somewhere during the past few months I slowly shifted into what I thought was ‘pandemic mode’ but which is actually more like ‘mañana mode’. Nothing seems as urgent these days.
I guess we’re all waiting for ‘a turning point’, maybe the election, maybe a vaccine to ‘swing boldly into action!’ But in the meantime, at the risk of sounding all ‘Puritan’, I can’t help but feel like we’re getting used to being stuck in second gear. Every day there seems to be a ramping down of expectations (and that includes government.)
My point is this: I don’t think there is going to be a ‘turning point’. These challenges aren’t going away. In fact, I think we’re just getting warmed up (unintentional pun.) We’re at a point now where we’re (OK, I’m) tired and in this sort of half-speed mode. But unfortunately, now is the time for governments to actually work harder, because the challenges are only going to keep coming faster with each passing year.
Our City has been under an emergency proclamation since March. Does it feel like an emergency to you now? Me either. So I’m wondering when we make up all the time we’ve lost or what that even means given the overall financial uncertainty.
As I write this, the City has just suffered its second water main break of the year in the south end of town. And Pier 58 down town just collapsed! This is probably not a coincidence. A lot of our basic infrastructure is at the end of its useful life and/or is in geologically sensitive spots. Couple that with the wildfires, the pandemic, and when you look at the big picture, they’re all climate change-related. Not to sound all New-Agey, but the Universe is sending us a message about planning for the future. And we’re just not acting like it’s all that serious.
A couple of quick examples:
- Your State Representative Tina Orwall has been working on legislation for two years now to put air filters in local schools under the flight paths. Something that sure would’ve come in handy this past week. But even getting $50,000 to get a tiny project off the ground has been like pulling teeth.
- As I wrote above, I spent hundreds of hours over the past four years working on this Noise Monitor jazz–something that should’ve worked properly fifteen years ago.
That’s just two examples out of hundreds of things large and small that all sorts of people in Des Moines are working on stupid hard to protect our environment and plan for the future. But it shouldn’t be this hard. We’ve been waaaaaaaaay too slow to take issues of environment and health seriously. We have to recognize that what we’re experiencing now is not some aberration, but ‘the future’. And we have to do it now. Because this is the new normal.
I’m not saying I have some big ‘plan’. And I’m certainly not the boss of anything. But for me, and for government in general, something needs to happen. Maybe like five Red Bulls. Or maybe just an attitude adjustment. Whatever. It’s time to find a new gear.