The Destination Management Plan is a massive 89-page tome of government overreach, environmental hysteria, unlimited spending and economic misery. That is how I read it anyway. Good ideas are lost in this tangle of convoluted, nonsensical doublespeak that sounds, at times, more like something out of a communist re-education camp. This is no surprise when your core definition of “Sustainable Tourism” comes from the United Nations, one of the most corrupt, ineffectual organizations in existence.

Why this issue could not have been addressed with a simple plan by our own local County and Town Councils with resident and business representatives is a big question. I cannot imagine the amount of money spent on consultants and surveys to create this cumbersome report. The costs of the action items are outrageous. Even if many are fine ideas, the price tag is excessive as government programs usually are. They feel far too free to spend our hard earned money.

They make suggestions such as having all of the public transportation convert to electric or businesses to go solar but who is going to pay for that? Are they putting the onus of expensive new technology on small, often struggling businesses that provide these services?

Resident requirements for permits to ride a bike, use a boat or park in town shows a total disregard for locals. It takes a lot of nerve to impose this on a citizenry that already pays the taxes that run this county. This idea is contemptuous.

The feeling of being overrun in the summer months is real and I would guess that there is not one islands resident that does not want our natural beauty and resources protected from being loved to death. Yet every year, without fail, summer passes and calm prevails in our lovely home. This plan is a disproportionate politicized response. County leadership has failed to mitigate the two most pressing issues facing our communit: a collapsing ferry system and a lack of workforce housing. Shifting our focus to “sustainable tourism” seems to me a pretense to deflect attention from those failures that profoundly affect the day to day lives of all.

Lauren Cohen,

San Juan Island