An example of what happens when power is tipped too far | Letter
Published 9:54 am Monday, September 28, 2015
When I was young and found reasons to complain about life, my cowboy father-in-law would say, simply, “If you survive this you’re going to grow old.” Now I’m old, he’s gone and I’ve grown older in the clutches of our city subarea, unable to sell our land.
It is almost 19 years since we applied to the city to be heard regarding rezoning our property in what is now called The Critical Species Habitat, Fitzgerald subarea in Bothell. Our application was never heard in the years that followed and we were subsequently forced into the new experimental designation, above, with a loss of 60 percent of our property, put by ordinance to other purposes.
We questioned the inclusion for proof that we belonged in the experiment. At the same time, we had a certified right of way for a highway called the Bothell Connector split our property in two. This was to run the thoroughfare through the now labelled “sensitive and environmental,” an untested experiment.
When we asked about all of that, which made no sense, we were told in a blanket statement by the then director of community development, “You have to accept this because it is for the greater good.”
Obviously, we personally were not part of the greater good, the coalition, and had yet not met the self selected entities, the self proclaimed “Greater Good.”
No studies or tests were performed on our properties, Zone 1 – Fitzgerald, to prove up on claims but finally the city sent a representative, a planner from the outfit that performed impact studies elsewhere in the subarea, and while walking through our fruit orchard told us that we would have to “assume” ground water flow, other sensitivities. The term “Greater Good” rang out, assumed in my mind.
In the years that followed, still unable to sell, we asked the city for help and staff generously offered to do that. Details of LID code, low impact development, were changed to allow the properties in Zone 1 to become feasible for development. Those code changes were appealed to the Washington Growth Management Board and efforts by staff were reversed in favor of “The Greater Good.”
I don’t know if you can imagine being asked to give up your retirement for someone else’s compulsions or dreams. Our long investment in our property was meant for our children and for possible retirement. We’ve worked here for nearly 45 years, producing apples and pears for the local community, raising our family, putting the kids through college and taking care of elderly parents when they needed support. And now when we need it, it is taken away from us without any act on our part. This is all fantastic, a nightmare.
If I survive this I’ll grow older. But I’m already quite old and it behooves me to ask the citizens of Bothell for reasoning in our demise. We have now had studies performed on the properties of Zone 1 and the claims of “The Greater Good” have been shown to be false. Yet here we are still unable to sell our properties in this lively housing market.
We are the example of what happens when power is tipped too far. We need balance in Bothell, not more of the same rights shake down based on over zealous assumptions. Please vote very wisely.
Tom Berry, Bothell
