Comments from the HCEC Board regarding the position of Puget Sound Restoration Fund and  the U.S. Navy to the Fred Hill Materials Pit-To-Pier Project:
 

      The Puget Sound Restoration Fund, under its Executive Director Betsy Peabody, is responsible for a number of fine projects, which HCEC approves---Olympic Oyster restoration and monitoring for invasive green crabs are examples.  We regret, however, their formation of a subsidiary Puget Sound Beach Restoration Project, which, in our estimation, is a front for Fred Hill Materials (FHM), and its infamous pit-to-pier project.    

     FHM has promised this new entity a large supply of free gravel to “nourish” a number of depleted Puget Sound beaches.  Quite apart from the fact that it is an open question whether putting new gravel on depleted beaches will do any good without dealing with the conditions that depleted them, there is the question of whether gravel can be considered “free” if it is obtained at the cost of major damage to Hood Canal. 

     Long before FHM had made its plans public, Betsy Peabody accompanied its representative Dan Basins to Olympia to sell the Governor and various key legislators on the project’s benefits.  When we learned of this from legislators with whom she had spoken, we were sufficiently concerned to invite Betsy Peabody to come and discuss the situation with our Board, which she most kindly did.

      She told us that her interest was in beach restoration and that she was most grateful for the offer of free gravel.  When we pointed out the damaging cost of that “free” gravel, a point on which all other regional environmental groups agree, she said that was none of her business:  her mission was beach restoration; our mission was raising constraints. We should each follow our own missions.  She also stated more than once that the Puget Sound Restoration Fund has taken no stand on the pit-to-pier project, being neither for nor against it.  Their only interest is the free gravel, and that, she said, was behind her visit to Olympia.  We considered this, at best, naïve, and it is certainly not the impression left in Olympia.  We asked her permission to publicize her statement that she was neutral on the pit-to-pier project and she did not object. 

     In a not-unrelated situation, we have heard FHM supporters state more than once that the Navy has approved their project.  This is not true.  The Navy has not taken a stand.  Anyone who knows how the Navy works will know that it much prefers not to get involved in public debates if it thinks the issue may be settled satisfactorily without it.  If concerned citizens can  defeat the pit-to-pier project on their own, why should the Navy say anything?  Think about it, however.  How likely is the Navy to welcome a constant stream of foreign vessels coming in so close to Bangor? 

     We mention the “neutrality” of these two alleged proponents in an attempt to keep the record clear.  Our own opposition to the pit-to-pier project is unwavering and is entirely based on the possibly fatal threat to an already ailing Hood Canal.