Office of Governor Gary Locke
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - June 22, 2000
Contact:  Governor's Communications Office, 360-902-4136

Proposed new shoreline guidelines will protect lives, clean water and property, Locke says

BURIEN - Proposed updated statewide shoreline regulations that will protect lives and property as well as water quality and salmon would mark a return to important, common sense values, Gov. Gary Locke said today.

Making his remarks at Seahurst Park, Locke said, "Clearly, the citizens of our state need to embrace a new way of thinking about shorelines.

"This common sense approach will help us keep our water clean, enhance our quality of life, protect our property from floods and erosion and take a big step toward restoring wild salmon," he explained.

The governor said the Shorelines Management Act passed by voters in 1972 has slowed damage to Washington's shorelines, not minimized or prevented it.

"Quite simply, we should not build homes and businesses in flood plains or too close to the banks of streams, rivers, lakes or salt water," Locke said.

Earlier generations knew that and built their homes out of harm's way, he noted.

"But our generation seems to think the solutions are more dikes, more dams, and lots of concrete bulkheads-solutions that merely channel the problems somewhere else," Locke said.

Washington has suffered five floods that were declared national disasters in the past six years. They have killed five people and caused more than $1 billion in property damage.

"Certainly, not all of the floods, slides and erosion are the result of development practices. But adding two and a half million more people to the state in the past 30 years has had an effect," Locke said.

With the Washington Department of Ecology's (DOE) proposed new shorelines guidelines, Locke said the state can continue to accommodate growth.

"But we have to give our rivers and streams a little breathing room-and let them work for us, not against us," the governor noted.

He emphasized the proposed new regulations won't require people to tear out existing bulkheads and docks or affect farming practices. The new rules wouldn't mean people have to remove existing buildings or development.

"These proposed rules look forward to a more enlightened way of protecting one of our most precious commodities-water," Locke said.

The new guidelines would offer local communities flexibility as they achieve the protection standards required by the Shoreline Management Act. One of the "paths" offered by the rules would give cities and towns certainty that their regulations meet the requirements of the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA), which protects several salmon and steelhead stocks in Washington. Communities electing to take the other path would have to convince federal agencies that their shoreline plans meet ESA standards.

"The Legislature has failed to fund implementation of any new rules for two years running. I will continue the effort to help these jurisdictions by bringing a funding measure before it next session," Locke said.

"The law also requires local governments to implement revised rules within two years of adoption. I believe local jurisdictions need more time, and I will push for that in the next legislative session," he said.

DOE is in the middle of a 60-day comment period that will include eight public hearings across the state beginning next week.

More information about the guidelines is available at http://www.wa.gov/ecology/sea/SMA/guidelines/newguid.htm.

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