I am frustrated that, in the year 2015, we can have a person in charge of land use planning at the county who apparently does not recognize that there are connections between land and sea.

The Friday Harbor Labs expressed alarm about proposed changes to the SMP uplands designations around its biological preserves at Argyle and False Bay; Linda Kuller was reported to have responded that because the university owns and protects the tidelands, “no significant impacts to the environment are anticipated with the proposed change”.

If land use had no effects on marine shorelines and water quality, the Salish Sea and other estuaries around the world would probably be in fine shape. Will the council listen to this “everything is fine” opinion, or to the buckets of science that say otherwise?

Megan Dethier

Friday Harbor