There have been a few comments — online and in letters to the editor — about whether it really makes sense to spend $36 million to purchase the 250-acre Glacier Northwest site on Maury Island.

Some have suggested the money could be better used elsewhere, that there are projects that would deliver more return for the investment. Others have said that King County will suffer financially when the property is taken out of private hands and put into public ones, since we’ll forego the property’s tax receipts.

These are legitimate concerns, voiced by Islanders sincerely worried about the region’s future. But we believe they don’t hold up under scrutiny.

Take the issue of property taxes. Last year, Glacier Northwest paid $67,000 in property taxes, the year before around $50,000 — a fraction of what the county collects each year. At the same time, those houses that surround the site — waterfront parcels, some of which have been lingering on the real estate market for years — will increase in value. Indeed, it’s possible much of Maury Island will see a collective rise in property values now that an industrial mining site is about to be replaced by an expansive park.

Will there be a complete offset? Who knows? But it seems certain that the impact to the county’s bottom line will be negligible.

As for opportunities lost because of the public investment in the project, it’s certainly true that there’s a world of need in our region and that Puget Sound is suffering in myriad ways. Quartermaster Harbor, for instance, is being fouled daily by failing septic systems, an issue that has proven frustratingly difficult for the county to solve.

At the same time, the funds used for this purchase come with strings attached — from pockets of money that can be used for limited purposes, such as habitat protection and arsenic-related pollution mitigation. In other words, for just such a purchase as the one on Maury Island.

Beyond that is an issue that almost defies hard-headed analysis, for it touches upon our values, our aspirations, our hopes for the future. Where else is there a near-mile of shoreline owned by a single entity? Where else can we set aside a beautiful sweep of land for generations to come?

Development is forever. And here in Pugetopolis, its impact weighs heavy on the region — where 70 percent of the shorelines are bulkheaded or hardened; where roads, parking lots, cities and towns are creating impermeable surfaces that add to the Sound’s woes; where habitat is in steep decline.

Would gravel-laden barges crisscrossing the Sound have proven the migrating orcas’ death knell? Would the project be the raindrop that triggers the flood, as a federal judge so eloquently asked in a recent decision over the issue?

These are unanswerable. But it is certainly true that undeveloped shoreline is all but gone in our over-developed region. That eelgrass beds are the nurseries that sustain the Sound. And that this is a gift not just to ourselves but to our children, our grandchildren and our great grandchildren.

We could debate and discuss forever. Or we could step forward to meet a historic opportunity. Thankfully, many are opting for the latter, and the gift of Maury’s protection is nearly at hand.