Running on a platform of no special interests, financial transparency and environmental stewardship, Krag Unsoeld and Jerry Toompas were elected Port of Olympia Commissioners on November 4. Their election could prove to be a major turning point for the Port, how it operates, what projects it pursues and how downtown Olympia will develop.
Several residents have been following the politics at the Port for years, some for decades. We asked those contributors what they thought of current Port policies and what they hoped a new Port Commission could accomplish. Here are their responses.
Harry Branch
It is definitely time for a change at the Port. The latest example…
Built in 2021, the Westman Mill complex on 5th Avenue was the subject of a legal challenge. The decision was that the appellants lacked standing. The case has become the poster child for rights of nature movements.
Now the Port of Olympia is offering Urban Olympia who built Westman Mill exclusive rights to develop three neighboring parcels and kicked in $50,000. The Port’s perspective is presented by the “East Bay Real Estate District”. When asked what this is, port staff replied that it’s referenced in the 1988 and 2017 Comp Plans. No such references could be found. Is there a corresponding East Bay Restoration District? Nope.
Here in Budd Inlet there has been, in the past 40 years, a well-documented loss of bird and fish species due to persistent contamination and loss of habitat. Puget Sound is a liquid environment. What happens in Budd Inlet spreads. These things could be fixed, but the term restoration is not part of our lexicon. It’s all about mitigation, stewardship and sustainability.
There have been countless full color glossy representations of proposed developments such as the Waterfront Center. There have been no graphic representations of proposed restoration. Time for a new generation.
Jim Lazar
Everything the Port of Olympia touches turns to … guano.
When the accounting is done correctly, the Port loses money on every one of its major business areas: the marine terminal, marina, airport, and office buildings. But they hide that by treating depreciation and interest as though they are not associated with the business units for which they are incurred.
Here’s a few things the Port could do better:
1) Commit to reducing the property tax by 10% per year until it is at or below the average of other Port districts. Currently, the Port property tax (what we pay) is more than half of its operating revenues (what Weyerhaeuser and the other tenants pay); other Port districts have MUCH lower reliance on property tax. Do as the Thurston County PUD does: ONLY use property taxes for the countywide election costs and Commissioner salaries, not for the business operations.
2) Start keeping honest books, with all of the Port debt assigned to the business unit for which it is incurred. Actually show the net income after operation and maintenance expense, depreciation, administrative costs, and debt interest for each unit.
3) DO NOT invest OUR money in things like the marina or marine terminal. If a private operator wants to lease the real estate, invest their own capital in facilities, and collect rent from yacht owners and shipping companies, that’s fine. But don’t invest MY money in these operations.
4) Let the private sector handle the fueling dock. If no operator is willing to pay the Port its cost for interest and depreciation, plus a return to the Port, then close it down. We should not be using public funds to subsidize yacht owners.
5) Do like the school districts do, and let the taxpayers VOTE on future bond issues.
Bob Jacobs
Troubling Observations About the Port of Olympia
I have been observing Port of Olympia operations and policy-making for over 35 years. During that time I have attended Port meetings, testified at meetings and hearings, read newspaper coverage, and written papers about Port issues.
I am writing to WIP to lay out some of the Port issues/situations that I have found troubling. In doing so, I am calling on many years of experience as a state budget analyst, state policy analyst, and local government elected official, and also on my academic training (MBA Stanford and MPA U. of Alaska).
(1) “Port of Olympia” is a misnomer. The Port District’s jurisdiction is Thurston County-wide and it levies property taxes county-wide. This inaccurate naming invites over 80% of Thurston County residents who live outside of Olympia to ignore it. This is not conducive to democratic functioning because District residents outside Olympia are less likely to pay attention and perform their duties of oversight.
(2) The Port controls publicly-owned real estate valued at over $500 million (one-half billion dollars). This represents a public subsidy to its operations worth at least $20 million per year. It also levies an annual property tax of over $8 million.
(3) The Port operates four businesses – marine terminal, airport, marina/boatworks, and real estate. They lose money every year. It seems obvious, given the subsidies the Port District receives from local and federal sources, that Port businesses should reasonably turn a profit or at least break even.
(4) The Port staff and commission have for years made repeated attempts to hide their business losses by excluding some of their costs from their financial reports to the public. This includes general administration (executive, personnel, legal, etc.), bond interest, and deprecation. And they have made untrue statements to the public regarding those losses.
(5) The Port’s financial reports do not include federal subsidies in the form of services paid directly by the federal government, such as the airport control tower and dredging at the marine terminal. This results in an understatement of the Port’s losses.
(6) The Port’s behavior vis-a-vis environmental laws has been unsatisfactory, resulting in large state fines. It has refused to do appropriate SEPA reviews and has relied on ancient environmental analyses rather than producing new ones. At the airport it has failed to properly care for endangered species and to protect the Deschutes River from the effects of its operations.
(7) The Port has routinely misstated federal laws under which it operates its airport and its Budd Inlet businesses.
(8) The Port has not taken seriously the concerns of homeowners affected by air traffic. This includes noise, fine particulates and leaded fuel.
Dave Toler
Hopefully, the 2025 election will be a watershed moment for the Port of Olympia. It certainly sends a clear message to the Port: the people want a new direction for our Port. We want a Port that no longer subsidizes a global corporation with a marine terminal that provides few jobs, virtually no economic benefit to the people of Olympia, and pollutes our precious Budd Bay.
We must work for a Port that:
– prioritizes economic benefits for a much wider Olympia and Thurston County community
– returns the immediate waterfront to its natural state
– looks at a variety of economic strategies including a green-electrified Port, marine research, affordable housing production, limited residential development that includes substantial affordable options, and green space for the community.
Sharron Coontz
What the port could do differently:
1. They could treat ordinary citizens as “stakeholders” when they do their meetings or surveys. Instead, they ignore regular neighbors of a proposed project, but include the Chamber of Commerce, developers, etc.
2. They could do county-wide surveys about what people want from their port and why, and what they don’t want and why.
3. Prior to planning or even considering spending any money on a project, the port could involve groups such as South Sound Bird Alliance (formerly Audubon) and other local citizen groups and individuals interested in protecting the environment. These individuals and groups could help decide which projects are appropriate to put forward and offer their expertise on where and what problems could arise from said projects and possible ways to avoid such problems.
3. Before starting a project the Port should do a FULL environmental investigation so that concerns could be addressed regarding potential pollution, dangers to endangered species, etc. This should be seen/performed as a joint project with the port and concerned citizens, thus helping build back trust that is lost when all citizen comments are considered adversarial.
4. Last but not least, the Port must stop piecemealing projects the way they have historically and instead do Environmental Impact Statements, and take other steps to ensure that cumulative impacts are examined and mitigated.
Esther Kronenberg
Both Krag Unsoeld and Jerry Toompas are educators. I hope that they will use their positions to educate and engage the wider Thurston County community to discuss and analyze the many beneficial opportunities the Port offers to restore the environment and invigorate downtown.
Ronda Larson Kramer also responded to the question of how the new Port Commission could improve. Her analysis can be found in a separate article in this issue of WIP—”A Better Vision for the Port of Olympia: Prosperity Through Public Space”.
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