Thoughts on the Election From Laurie

By Laurie Caskey-Schreiber

Now that the dust has settled and there’s time to engage in some reflection it’s important to recognize the areas of success and acknowledge areas of weakness that need to be addressed.

I've given our county council races considerable thought, and I think it's really important to remember that the environmental issues still play strong in voter's minds. The most effective hit piece was the attack by my opponent on my record for protecting farmland and Lake Whatcom. He claimed the 40,000 loss of farmland acres happened under my watch, as well as, Lake Whatcom not improving in water quality.

Both of these were half-truths. The farm land loss was due to our county's huge problem of having farmland zoned for development; that's why I worked so hard to develop our Purchase of Development Rights program, which has protected approximately 1,000 acres of farmland. I personally, have never voted for any loss of farmland.

Regarding Lake Whatcom, if we stopped everything negative that was affecting the lake today, it would still continue to deteriorate due to the continued existence of phosphorous in the Lake. While serving on the council, I was part of a downzone effort that removed approximately 2,500 homes from the watershed, we adopted new development standards, seasonal land clearing restrictions, purchased development rights to eliminate 500 additional homes from being built, and actively pursued a halt to logging in this vulnerable watershed, however in spite of all of these worthy actions the lake is still degrading. My point being that attack ads can be very misleading and damaging.

Two candidates won who have strong environmental records, and two others won portraying themselves as caring about farming, and protecting water quality. So I don't think it's wise to say we should focus less on one area over another.

The county council job is almost 80% related to land use issues, that affect almost everyone at some point in time. What we could do better is work on educating the community as to why our way is better than what the conservatives propose.  A cautious approach to expanding city boundaries makes fiscal, aesthetic, quality of life, and environmental sense, and we need to engage the public to make sure that we aren't moving too far ahead of them. What's at risk is huge...ending up like Snohomish county, where their budget deficits are huge, quality of life down from long commutes and a high crime rate.

I'm not saying social issues aren't important, they are! I’ve championed the mental health sales tax and believe our criminal justice system must move toward reforming people versus the punitive formula. Both will save money in the long run. Marketing this concept to the general public is difficult. I think we are on the right track, and to simplify the results to questioning our issues is a bit like chasing your tail. I believe our opponents handlers have been working on building an atmosphere of discontent for so long that it was almost insurmountable to overcome. That's where the work lies, undoing some of the damage that they have done with their misinformation campaign. I think it's healthy to process where we've been and to chart a course as we move forward.

Thank you all!