February 2001

Your Planning Commission and City Council are in the process of making that decision. They're rewriting the Lake Forest Park Comprehensive Plan, the guide the City uses to shape its future. Whatever your ideas are, we hope you'll make them known--forcefully, in person and in writing-- to the Commission and Council. We can be sure of one thing: There will be more people and more density than we have now. The Washington Growth Management Act and local planning policies seek to spare the countryside from urban sprawl by housing more people in urban growth areas.

Countywide planning policies agreed to by all cities in King County assign growth targets to each city. Lake Forest Park’s goal is to provide for 345 to 412 more households between 1999 and 2012. That's more difficult for our city than for some, for a couple of reasons. First, we’re pretty nearly built out--that is, there's very little undeveloped buildable land left in Lake Forest Park, even with the recently annexed neighborhoods. Second, we're blessed with hills and streams, bluffs and wetlands--great assets, but not easy to fill with homes. Some intensely creative work is needed to write a plan that will increase density without scarring LFP’s extraordinary environment. Proposals for meeting growth targets will range from encouraging "granny flats" on existing home sites to rezoning for apartments and condominiums.

However, it's important to know that the growth targets are just that—targets. They’re not laws. They’re not ordinances. They’re not even regulations. They're just guidelines which planners would like us to follow--nothing more.

Stewardship Foundation Board members urge planning commissioners and councilmembers to envision the city as its citizens want it to be, then decide how many new households fit that vision. We should not be stampeded into accepting an arbitrary growth target as our planning goal, then trying to fit our future around that target.

From the President…

We have a broad range of news to share with you in this issue of our Lake Forest Park Stewardship Foundation Newsletter.

We continue to challenge development proposals in the City's sensitive areas.

We received our first significant financial grant.

We have updates on salmon in our streams and on new laws now in effect to protect them.

We're announcing our annual auction and fundraiser.

There is information about the City's new Comprehensive Plan, in which we heartily encourage you to get involved.

There is a wonderful list of new members who have signed up since our last Newsletter.

We hope you find this Newsletter to be informative and useful. Thanks for your generous support.

Their numbers may be a tiny fraction of the runs of just a few decades ago, but salmon still spawn in McAleer Creek.

From October through December 2000, salmon were observed at various sites along McAleer Creek. This winter, the first for making observations in Animal Acres Park, as many as a dozen spawning salmon were observed there on a single day. The easiest place to view them was at the culvert where the creek passes under Northeast 178th Street into the park. On several days in October, five fish were visible just below the sidewalk. Spawners were seen farther upstream in the Creek, along Perkins Way, and also downstream at Blue Heron Park. Observations are taken and reported to the State Department of Fish and Wildlife. Species identified were sockeye, chinook and coho.

Also observed and reported are the "redds" or nests which female salmon build in the bottom gravel. Into this mound of gravel, the eggs are deposited and quickly fertilized by the male. Both adults will remain near the nest for several days until they die. Their carcasses then become food for animals, or decay and add to the nutrients of the stream, and nourish their offspring. The fertilized eggs will hatch in the Spring. Hatchlings will remain in the creek for up to a year, until they are big enough to swim to the lake, and ultimately on out to salt water, where they'll grow to adulthood and return to spawn in McAleer Creek.

Only a tiny fraction of the thousands of salmon that hatch actually return to spawn. They face many natural perils: being eaten by birds, other fish and marine mammals or people; being washed out of the creek prematurely by heavy rains; or being smothered by sand or silt deposits in the stream.

Though some salmon are thought to be coming to Lyon Creek, observations made at the mouth of the creek during the recent spawning season were inconclusive. A sand bar blocked the mouth until heavy rains flushed it out. Carcasses found near the mouth may have been those of spawned-out salmon that had washed down the Sammamish River.

Regular observations by homeowners along the creek would help us evaluate this population. Training is available each Fall for salmon spotters. Contact the Stewardship Foundation.

Tributaries of McAleer Creek are known to have served as spawning grounds prior to placement of man-made barriers during development in
the 1960s. Efforts are under way to remove these barriers on Brookside Creek, through the cooperation of StreamKeepers, Trout Unlimited and the Stewardship Foundation.

Changes in the living conditions of salmon can have a devastating effect. These changes can include altered ocean temperature, resulting in a change in the food supply; removal of vegetation from beaches, estuaries or wetlands; changes in spawning streams, which could be the result of too much runoff; too much sand and silt covering the gravel beds where eggs are deposited; warming of streams due to lack of streamside vegetation; placing streams in dark, long culverts; or introduction of toxic substances which destroy food sources or kill the fish outright. Most of these habitat degradations are man-made.

New laws implementing the Endangered Species Act should protect salmon and their habitat to some degree. Our responsibility is to know these laws and be sure they are enforced.

Culminating a year-long struggle over the future of bluffs and wetlands on 30th Avenue Northeast, the Stewardship Foundation won a critical court case recently. King County Superior Court Judge Mary Yu ruled that the City of Lake Forest Park had erred in allowing development at the headwaters of Brookside Creek.

The Foundation had appealed the granting of a reasonable use exemption (RUE) from Lake Forest Park Sensitive Areas ordinances. Those laws require 50-foot buffers between wetlands and building sites.

The city's Board of Adjustment awarded owner-developer Rob Hill an exemption that would have allowed Hill to build houses directly adjacent to wetland ponds in the Hillside neighborhood, near the Lake Forest Park-Shoreline boundary.

Because no city-level appeal is available, the Stewardship Foundation contested the Board's action in court. Judge Yu not only set aside the RUE, but also found that the City had violated its own procedures when it excused the developer from providing an environmental impact statement. In overturning the RUE, the judge noted that such exemptions may be granted only with specific proof that the property owner could make no other reasonable use of the land. In the absence of such proof, Judge Yu sent the case back to the city.

Springs and ponds on the property give rise to Brookside Creek, a small tributary to McAleer Creek, known habitat for three salmon species. Brookside joins McAleer in the new Animal Acres Park. State Fish and Wildlife biologists have described portions of Brookside Creek as “classic coho water” ideal for rearing young salmon. The Stewardship Foundation argued that grading and building in the headwaters would damage salmon habitat, not only in Brookside Creek but also downstream in McAleer Creek.

“Judge Yu's ruling serves as a warning that our city and others must pay attention, at every step, to the impact their decisions will have on local streams and wetlands,” said Doug Mitchell, LFPSF president.

“Nearly a hundred local citizens--members and non-members of the Foundation--wrote letters or testified in person during the City’s hearings on the Brookside Creek exemption. We extend our profound thanks to them, and also to experts of the Environmental Quality Commission, the Washington Departments of Ecology and Fish and Wildlife, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Trout Unlimited, Washington Trout, and others who steadfastly supported our position.”

An added benefit of the Rob Hill case ruling was that the Foundation is to be reimbursed by the City and by Hill for court costs. This reimbursement will amount to more than $1,300. This is a small portion of the entire cost to the Foundation in this case; the majority of the Foundation’s expense was for the attorney.

“The Foundation intends to turn this money around and put it right back into the community in the form of an improvement for one of the City's parks,” Mitchell said. “We're still investigating possible projects for this money. If you have any ideas, pass them along.”

The Lake Forest Park Stewardship Foundation has won its first-ever monetary grant, for helping preserve natural assets of Lake Forest Park.

The $9,919 grant, from the Northwest Fund for the Environment, will help to pay legal costs the Foundation incurred in a year-long effort to protect the headwaters of Brookside Creek. It will also pay for publishing a guide to the natural treasures of Lake Forest Park that will locate and describe Lake Forest Park's network of streams, wetlands, parks and other natural areas; the guide will also explain the City's policies on the use of environmentally sensitive areas.

Election 2000 in Lake Forest Park was the first year residents voted on a city initiative for a bond to purchase open space. An initiative such as this requires 60 percent voter approval. Although we were short of that on individual votes, in 62 percent of the precincts (13 of 21), a majority of voters supported the bond for parks and open space.

Of the 21 precincts in Lake Forest Park one voted 60 percent or more in favor, 12 voted by 50 percent or more in favor. Only eight precincts voted less than 50 percent in favor of the proposal.

There were many folks who participated in the campaign for the "Parks for the Park" bond. Volunteers from all over the City devoted hours to canvassing, phoning, and helping inform neighbors on the issues involved.

Regardless of the success or failure of specific measures such as this bond, we will continue our efforts to preserve Lake Forest Park's natural environment.

A hearing was held in December before John Galt, LFP's hearing examiner, to decide whether to grant George and Alyssa Petrie a reasonable use exemption (RUE). This RUE would grant the Petries exemptions from the City's sensitive area ordinances and allow them to build a house that encroaches on steep-slope and landslide hazard areas on their property on 30th Avenue Northeast. The Petries sought to regrade as much as 19,000 square feet of steep- slope areas and to build a house with a footprint as large as 6,000 square feet.

The LFP Stewardship Foundation opposed the RUE on legal grounds and because of serious deficiencies in the geotechnical report.

The legal argument was straightforward. LFP Municipal Code covering the granting of a RUE sets down five necessary criteria. Two specify that the size of the project, and the extent of its impact on the sensitive area, must be the minimum necessary for reasonable use of the property. The Foundation argued that regrading 19,000 square feet, and the construction of a house with a 6,000 square-foot footprint, was by no means the minimum necessary. In fact we argued that four out of the five criteria specified by the code were not met. We also showed flaws in the geotechnical report, including grading contours that had no connection to the site plan. The report was written before any site plan was prepared.

The hearing examiner denied the RUE. He agreed that four of the five criteria had not been met, and that the geotechnical report was insufficient.

Because the Petries’ proposal was so flawed, the Foundation prevailed against it without having to pay for research or legal counsel. In light of this, we find it remarkable that the City of LFP had fully endorsed the proposal and recommended that the RUE be granted. The Foundation's report to the hearing examiner and the final decision are on our website at www.lfpsf.org.

Last year’s listing of the chinook salmon on the endangered species list could have a significant impact on our community. This listing, and the laws implemented by city, county, state and federal governments to enforce it, could affect development near salmon habitat (including McAleer and Lyon creeks), the use of pesticides and herbicides, and storm-water management.

First Step: The first step in the enforcement of the listing of the chinook is the 4(d) rule, which was issued by National Marine Fisheries Service effective Jan. 8, 2001. This rule prohibits a "take" under the Endangered Species Act, meaning it is illegal to harm chinook salmon or their habitat. It was designed specifically to protect Pacific Northwest salmon and steelhead.

Second Step: The Tri-County Model of the 4(d) rule is being developed to meet the NMFS criteria, and to create a proposal which can "meet local needs." A voluntary partnership of Snohomish, King and Pierce Counties is seeking the approval of NMFS and United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) for their proposal, which embodies much of the original NMFS rule. It is based upon watershed planning. Everyone who lives where the raindrops end up in Lake Washington lives in the Lake Washington/Cedar River Watershed, also called Water Resource Inventory Area 8 (WRIA8, pronounced "wyra eight").

Third Step: Lake Forest Park is joining with other cities in WRIA8, and specifically with jurisdictions which share the McAleer and Lyon Creek watersheds, to study how to enact the Tri-County Model to preserve chinook and other salmon and to administer the program from a local base. Jurisdictions, including LFP, will submit implementing ordinances to the federal government requesting "take limits." These "take limits" define the degree to which a given jurisdiction needs to enforce the law. If the Tri-County Rule is accepted by NMFS and USFWS, cities and jurisdictions following it will be afforded a measure of federal legal protection.

An advantage of handling administration of the law on a local level is that it will be more expeditious. A disadvantage seems to be that it leaves a lot of discretion to local planning departments.

There are six elements to the Tri-County Proposal. Three early-action elements, which are established by regulation or through programs, are being explored by jurisdictions. They are:

Land Management has a planning element, to ensure that impacts of land-use practices on salmon habitat are considered by local government in making land-use decisions; and a regulatory element, requiring local government to give more intense scrutiny to development proposals located adjacent to water bodies which support salmon.

Stormwater Management is to better protect and restore salmon habitat from impacts of existing and future development. It is designed to improve regulations for urban and rural areas.

Road Maintenance establishes a set of best management practices to protect salmon habitat in road maintenance. It requires road crews to have extensive training, updated to assure state-of-the-art techniques for protecting salmon habitat.

In the December issue of Town Crier the Lake Forest Park city administration states it is "evaluating the risk we currently have regarding protection of salmon." Because no major urban region has ever dealt with the listing of threatened salmon, all elements of the program will require monitoring and updating over time, as scientific understanding evolves, according to the summary fact sheet "Citizen's Guide to the 4(d) Rule for Threatened Salmon and Steelhead on the West Coast." To see this fact sheet on the Tri-County 4(d) Rule and to receive a list of sources, log on to www.nwr.noaa.gov.

---Mamie Bolender

The LFP Stewardship Foundation invites you to its Third Annual Benefit Dinner and Auction from 5 to 9:30 p.m. at the Lake Forest Park Civic Club.

Enjoy an evening of live music, Pacific Northwest wines, Spring buffet, and heavenly desserts. In the live and silent auctions, bid on weekend trips, original art, restaurant dinners, tickets to entertainment events, sports equipment, treasures for home and garden, theme baskets and other one-of-a-kind Items.

Tickets are $40 a person. Reserve a table for eight. You’ll enjoy a memorable evening with friends, and help the Foundation preserve our environment through its stream preservation and restoration fund.

A heartfelt Thank You to all who renewed their membership! And Welcome to these new members:

Terry & Jackie Backen, John & Phyllis Chambers, Mitch Cleveland, Erich & Shirley Gauglitz, Peter & Cher Gunby, Marianne & Gordon Gutteridge, David Hadden & Family, Dick & Ann Hetherington, Jesse Horton, Isler Family, Lisa Leinbaugh & David Bailey,
Daniel Pensak & Caitlin Strand, Elizabeth Reyes,
Sandy Roth, St.John Family, Jim & Nancy Small,

And thanks very much to those who have volunteered
their expertise in various areas. We will be e-mailing or calling you about opportunities to participate.

Volunteers are needed for this year's Benefit Dinner and Auction. You'll have fun while aiding a great community cause. We need your help in these areas:

Members and friends are encouraged to donate items to the upcoming Live and Silent Auction. Past best-selling items have been art, animals, antiques, auto and marine, theme baskets, dinner certificates, holiday items, home entertainment, house and garden, tickets to entertainment events, tools, sports equipment, travel--nearly anything of value.

To help, call the auction chairpersons, Mamie Bolender or Carol Dahl, at (206) 361-7076.