Puget Sound Reflections

For those of you not living in the Northwest, the Puget Sound, located in Western Washington, is an amazing saltwater estuarine system of waterways brimming with life (human and non-human).  It’s tidally influenced by the Pacific Ocean and is fed freshwater from numerous streams and rivers flowing from the Olympic and Cascade Mountains.  The total basin is over 12,000 square miles.

Puget Sound is vitally important to the geoducks (clams), orcas, sandpipers, salmon, and 3.5 million people who live there (or migrate through).  Riding the ferry from Seattle to Bainbridge Island on a surprise sunny winter day with snow-capped mountains in every direction gives the illusion that all is beautiful in the world.  But looks can sometimes be deceiving.  Last year, 4,000 acres of shellfish beds were downgraded in health status and harvesting from shellfish beds was closed for nearly 40 days.  Pollution indicators, such as these, is why Washington’s Governor and Legislature created the Puget Sound Partnership – to not only figure out how the Sound is being polluted but to also fix the problems through an Action Agenda.

And this is where we circle back to roads and Forest Service lands.  The Forest Service manages a lot of the land associated with the snow-capped mountains seen from the ferry. Over 60% of the land in the basin is forested – much of it public lands.  The forested streams are a source of drinking water for millions of people and are a source of cool and clear water to the Sound.  Salmonids pass through the urban gauntlet to travel up these streams to spawn and rear.  Yet roads continue to fall apart and pour excess sediment into these critical headwaters. 

The Puget Sound Partnership, however, can help.  In Section C4 of the latest draft Action Agenda, surface runoff from forested lands is recognized as one of the key sources of pollution to the Sound. This section briefly describes the progress made to date by highlighting accomplishments achieved from the Legacy Roads and Trails Remediation Program and describes the national requirements for rightsizing the road system by 2015.  Challenges are briefly described including the following:

“With 2010 marking the greatest commitment of [LRT] funding in a decade, it appears that Congress will have to substantially increase funding in order to ensure road systems on federal lands do not contribute to poor water quality for salmon and people in the Puget Sound Basin.”

But when it comes to fixes, the draft Action Agenda misses an opportunity. There are no near-term actions identified beyond implementing ongoing programs.  There are no suggestions for fixing the funding shortfall.  However, this is a draft.  We can work to engage more with the Puget Sound Partnership and encourage the implementation of actions that will result in a reduction of water quality impacts from roads.   We’d like for that view from the ferry to reflect an accurate picture sooner rather than too much later.