By SHARON NELSON

When I entered the Washington State Legislature last November, I believed I was joining a Democratic caucus in the House of Representatives that strongly supported protecting the environment and Puget Sound. Disappointingly, I found that for approximately a third of our caucus their consideration for the environment and Puget Sound does not extend to the sensitive and ecologically important shorelines of Maury Island.

Having studied the significance of the Maury Island Aquatic Reserve during the past decade, I found it puzzling that 25 of my fellow Democrats would be willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to restore the Sound while supporting Glacier Northwest’s destructive plans for Maury. Regretfully, it became clear as we worked on other environmental legislation that Maury Island is really the “canary in the coal mine” as to how these legislators wish to stand up for the environment.

The environmental community puts forth four priority bills every year. During my first session I watched as the “enviros” worked diligently to get these priorities passed without having their intent gutted. Even with a supermajority of Democrats in the House, the votes are not there for key environmental legislation — unless it is dissected and watered down.

One of the priorities this year was known as the “Local Farms/Healthy Kids” bill. The goal of the legislation is to direct fresh farm produce to our schools, improving the quality of the food our children eat, while supporting our local farms. We ended up involved in a debate with the food processing industry as to whether we should include processed foods as a part of the bill. I was astounded as I watched this discussion unfold and heard fellow Democrats express their concern about accommodating industry in this legislation. Ultimately, this bill passed the House relatively intact, but that was not the fate of other environmental legislation.

Audubon Washington came in to session with a great bill to increase the forest cover in our cities. As a freshman legislator and strong environmentalist, I considered it completely reasonable. Yet in the end, the bill does not mandate any local government to take action as originally intended. Instead, we have guidelines and information for increasing the number of trees in our cities and towns. It was difficult to watch as this bill was carefully dissected to meet the needs of stakeholder after stakeholder and to realize that we did not have a strong enough “environmental majority” in the Democratic caucus to prevent such action.

When we tackled another environmental priority, addressing climate change through the Growth Management Act, the legislation almost died as two Democrats sided with Republicans to kill the bill in committee. While climate change is the number one environmental priority for citizens in the Northwest, the House had difficulty passing legislation which plans for that change. Those members who preferred to allow local governments to address the problem on their own time, in their own way, rather than requiring such planning, were the members who had helped to weaken other environmental priorities.

Efforts by Glacier Northwest’s spin doctors and lobbyists should have been thwarted with a supermajority of Democrats last year and this year. Yet that did not happen. The House will have to revisit how we protect Maury Island, just as we will have to revisit how we address climate change — since in both instances we stopped short of passing legislation that would have really protected the environment.

Perhaps next session the 38 Democrats in the House of Representatives who are determined to have an environmental legacy and who worked to protect Maury Island will be joined by the rest of our caucus on environmental issues. Our children and our grandchildren deserve to have us protect their quality of life and their future, and with a supermajority in the House that is what we should expect.

— State Rep. Sharon Nelson represents the 34th Legislative District, which includes Burien,

North Highline, West Seattle,

Vashon and Maury Island.