Seattle’s Chester Morse lake and 91,000 acre watershed at the headwaters of Cedar River is off-limits to visitors, ensuring pristine drinking water for Seattle customers.  Photo credit: City of Seattle

An asphalt plant has been approved by King County upstream of Renton’s municipal water wells. The asphalt plant will disperse treated surface water into a dry well in the ground, above Renton’s aquifer.

Washington State has granted cities unique power to buy land outside their jurisdictions to protect their municipal water supplies, even from unwilling sellers through use of eminent domain.  Renton should consider using this authority to buy the proposed Lakeside Industries Asphalt Plant site, in order to protect both the Cedar Valley Aquifer and the Cedar River.  If Seattle was in our shoes, they would have already done this.

Seattle has purchased 91,000 acres in their Chester Morse Lake watershed in the uplands of the Cedar River to protect their water supply. Seattle won’t even let hikers on this property, as they feel the risk of contamination is too high.

Renton’s water comes from wells in the Cedar river basin, downhill from Seattle’s water supply.  Renton draws water from the Cedar Valley Aquifer, which is about 100-300 feet beneath the earth’s surface.  The aquifer is refilled continuously by groundwater seeping in through the valley’s uplands.  A layer of silt and clay generally prevent the Cedar River water and the Cedar Valley aquifer water from mixing, although no one can know exactly what is happening underground.

With King County’s decision to allow an asphalt plant in the Cedar River basin, just a mile or so upstream of Renton’s municipal wells, Renton should take a page from Seattle’s playbook and exercise our land-purchase authority to protect our water supply.

There have been studies and discussion about whether runoff from the asphalt plant can get into the Cedar River;  Lakeside Industries consultants says it won’t happen because they are capturing and treating runoff (potentially containing tar, gas, oil, and other industrial contaminants), and then purposefully infiltrating the treated water into the ground through a new dispersion system. i.e. they will intentionally inject their treated run-off into the ground above our aquifer.

While this system generally keeps the treated water out of the Cedar River, there’s no way to be completely certain that it won’t get into the Cedar Valley Aquifer.  In fact, for many years, Water District 90, the water purveyor serving East Renton and regions east of our city limits, has been very concerned about this exact piece of property introducing contamination into the aquifer.  This report from 2014 (section 4.2.2, page 15) describes the concerns regarding the  former “Sunset Materials” site, which is the now site of the proposed asphalt plant.

Ask yourself;  Would Seattle allow Lakeside Industries Asphalt plant to be placed in their Chester Morse watershed, where they won’t even allow hikers today?  If they would not allow it, why does Renton need to allow an asphalt plant to inject industrial runoff water into the ground upstream of our drinking water wells?

For perspective, Irvine California is going to spend $360 million dollars to buy an existing asphalt plant, just so the city can close it down and improve the air quality in their community.  Lakeside Industries paid around $12 million for their site on the Cedar Valley Aquifer.  Renton’s purchase of this site would be a bargain compared to Irvine’s, about 1/30 the cost that Irvine is going to pay.  And Renton’s purchase would help protect our water supply, a fundamental need for safety of our city.

After a purchase, the city could seek full or partial reimbursement via a Water Quality Grant from the Washington State Department of Ecology, which gives out between $100 Million and $200 Million every year for projects that protect rivers and streams.  Several streams traverse the site in question before entering the salmon-bearing Cedar River;  this project should be a top contender for funding.  There are many other grant sources of income as well.

Too often, Renton finds itself pleading in court for fair treatment, when we could have used power already granted to us to protect our vital interests.  This is one of those cases.  Email your council and encourage them to pursue the purchase of the Lakeside Industries Asphalt Plant site, to protect our water supply.  Send email to council@rentonwa.gov

Thanks to Renton resident Ben Johnson for working with me to develop this approach.  Please see Ben’s comments on my previous blog entry for more of his thoughts on this topic.

Renton’s former Econo Lodge, now “Inn at Lake Washington,” just off Exit 7 in Kennydale.

Note: Updated on 8/21 to include commentary by Mayor Pavone, who reinforced that he has been working to prevent this hotel from becoming a shelter for Burien’s use (new paragraph 4)

Burien City leaders have been in the news as they work to find shelter for residents experiencing homelessness who are camped in their downtown not far from city hall.  A letter from King County Regional Homelessness Authority, along with blog sources, refers to discussion of Burien seeking shelter space in Renton for these residents.

In the City of Burien’s most recent public statement on this issue, they said “City personnel have identified several potential sites, including a facility operated by REBLX, a partner agency of KCRHA” Other documents make clear the REBLX site is a hotel in Renton.  As a result, I’ve had several Renton residents ask me “are they talking about Renton’s Extended Stay, Clarion Inn, Red Lion, or what?”

The answer is they are discussing the former Econo Lodge, now called the “Inn at Lake Washington”, at Exit 7, in Kennydale.   When I did an analysis in April of Renton Hotels being used for King County Homeless shelters, the Econo Lodge was not on the shelter list.  At that time, I pointed out that 22  percent of Renton’s hotel rooms had been converted from traveler use to shelter use, while county-wide (including 38 other cities) only 4% of hotel rooms have been converted to shelter use.  With the Econo Lodge, Renton’s percentage of converted hotels would reach 29%.

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Renton’s latest official survey results are in, and concerns about crime are the highest I’ve ever seen– after decades of reviewing Renton survey results.  The results were officially presented to Renton Council’s Committee of the Whole at their August 7 meeting.

Only one out of ten residents feels safe in downtown Renton after dark.  Only four out of ten feel safe in their own neighborhood after dark.  This is completely unacceptable, especially for our northwest city where wintertime sunsets happen as early as 4:25 PM.

When residents were asked to rate the MOST important thing the city should be working on out of fifteen choices,  “safe and secure community” far-and-away  topped the list, with 70% saying it was most important.  The next highest category came in only one-tenth as high, with 7% saying “quality housing choices” was the most important.

As I covered in  a May blog entry,  Renton needs to refocus on Priority 1 police response times (for the most urgent threats), and add the officers needed to get these response times back to 60-90 seconds.  We must not go the way of Seattle, which now has ten-minute priority one response times.  We also must insist the legislature give more authority back to our police officers, so they may once again reasonably pursue burglars, drug dealers, stolen cars, and dangerous reckless drivers when conditions allow for it.

We also need additional detectives to help work down the backlog of unsolved crimes.  We can’t let some council members’ fears of police,  and fear of “over-policing,” prevent us from hiring the officers and detectives needed to make residents feel safe again in their neighborhoods. And we need to have a safe downtown, that generates commerce in the evening and makes us feel like visiting our businesses there.  Our downtown not only entertains and serves us, but it also generates the tax revenues needed to fund vital city services.  Downtown is like our living room, and  9 out of 10 of us are afraid to go there.

Beyond adding the officers needed to maintain lightning fast response times, there’s other steps we need to take as a community; I’ll cover them in future blog entries.

Survey results showed that Renton residents still find much to love about Renton, so the results are not all bad. Many of the positives, like our parks, amenities, and overall sense of community, have been an important focus for our city for decades.  But the crime trends must be brought under control to preserve those qualities we like so much about our city.  The full survey results can be found here.

I was shocked and saddened to learn of the emailed bomb threats and death threats against the Brewmaster’s Taproom and its owner. The Taproom is a family and dog-friendly venue that embraces diversity in our community.

Per the Renton Reporter, “The bomb threats were sent to Brewmaster’s owner Marley Rall via email and included an extreme homophobic rant against the storytime event as well as death threats toward several named individuals and the Renton Police Department. The email also claimed that the surrounding area needed to be evacuated because there were “enough fertilizer bombs there to make the Oklahoma City bombings look like a firecracker.”

I served as a public official in Renton for 28 years, and I know these felonious, frightening and cruel threats are antitheses to the widespread feelings and values of our loving, caring Renton community. I’m hoping our Renton Police are successful in tracking down the source of the threats, and I’m also hoping the threats did not originate from within our city.

Marley Rall deserves our appreciation for her steadfastness and courage as a business owner and caring member of our community, in the face of these malevolent, despicable threats.

I’m very grateful to Nancy, Steven, and Camila for their endorsements in my campaign for Renton City Council Position 7.  They all ran excellent campaigns, and Renton would do well to put them all in public office soon.