Last week, this paper reported some of the first good news in a few years about the long, hard, Quixote-like struggle to keep Glacier Northwest at bay. Preserve Our Islands, the grassroots group opposing Glacier, had successfully convinced state regulators to hold the sand and gravel company to the highest standard possible under the state’s voter-approved toxic cleanup law.
It means more work for the company. It means more public involvement in the process. It means the company may have to transport its arsenic-laced soil off-site. But the victory — sweet though it was — did not drive a stake through the heart of this ill-advised project.
Now, due to a decision last week by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Glacier is on the threshold of achieving the victory that has eluded it for 11 years. Even with many questions still up in the air — questions such as just what Glacier will do with its toxic soils — the company holds in its figurative hands the permit to begin building a dock.
Like the old adage that possession is 90 percent of the law, Glacier, it seems, is determined to keep marching forward, doing all that it can to make its project, ultimately, a fait accompli. Will it build with huge questions still hanging over its head? You bet. And if you think it’s been hard for state officials, federal regulators and the judiciary to stand up to this well-financed corporation, think how much harder it will be after Glacier has spent millions of dollars on a gleaming new structure extending some 400 feet into Puget Sound.
POI is doing what it can and must to keep the fight alive. The group plans to take the issue to federal court. It plans to seek an injunction. It plans to work hard in the one arena where the issue is not yet resolved — the state Department of Natural Resources, which must award the company a lease to the state-owned submerged lands around Maury before Glacier can begin to build.
So no, it’s not completely over. But make no mistake. Last Wednesday was a very dark day for this Island. Despite the tireless efforts of countless Islanders, Glacier is closer than it’s ever been to shaving off a huge chunk of Maury Island to feed our region’s hunger for new roads, new development and growth.
Our Island leadership must continue to do all it can to work with the state’s political leaders in an effort to craft a solution to what amounts to a disaster for Vashon. And hard as it may be for some to swallow, that solution may ultimately look like a compromise. “Not now, not ever” has been a great rallying cry in this David vs. Goliath struggle. Tragically, “now” is nearly upon us.
