Olympia residents should stand up for Capitol Lake

On Feb. 18, the Capitol Campus Design Advisory Committee will meet. One issue before them is the future of Capitol Lake and whether it will be a managed lake or turned into some sort of urban estuary.

It is amazing to me that a deviation from our managed lake is even being considered.

On the local campaign trail in 2009, I heard Olympia City Council member Joe Hyer speak to a theme that I heartily agree with – that our local Puget Sound culture has much in common with Renaissance Italy in that we value the finer accomplishments of art, academia, architecture, and those signs of refinement that indicate an advanced, civilized society.

Our Capitol is the clearest symbol of that reality in Washington. It is the finest capitol in the United States, and the fourth-largest structure of its kind on Earth.

What was once Little Hollywood, the slum of old Olympia, is now Heritage Park and a beautiful terrace skirting Capitol Lake, which itself was once a stinking mudhole, according to my friend’s grandmother.

Along part of the shore we now have the Arc of Statehood, and Heritage Park and Capitol Lake are now the site of Lakefair, the Olympia Hemp, Love and Freedom Rally, and a plethora of other community events which deserve mention.

Our elders have made that place a far cry from the shanties, coal smoke, and stench of the past. The Capitol Campus, with the Deschutes Parkway, Capitol Lake and its surrounding parks are a testament to the capability of our people for beauty, craft, ingenuity and cooperation.

They are a shining symbol of the ability of our people to come together and solve a common problem – the way our community has as this vision became reality over decades through the toil and treasure of our people.

Capitol Lake is now an intrinsic, indispensable part of our local culture.

Those who wish to get active to support Capitol Lake still have time. I spoke with Sen. Karen Fraser, D-Thurston County, our 22nd District state senator and member of the advisory committee. She is not in favor of bringing a decision on the lake/estuary debate at this time.

“I don’t think we are ready to bring this question forward for a vote at this time,” Fraser said. “We have lots of questions. There’s a need for further analysis and more financial, environmental, cultural and recreational information is needed.”

Fraser also raised the question of whether a decision for the estuary might endanger federal funding for our port in the future. She said, “If we went to an estuary option and wanted to keep our port open to ocean shipping, would we be able to get the additional necessary financing required to keep the turning basin and shipping channel open?”

Besides being a great offense to our local culture, the plan for an estuary also offends our environmental values.

The plan for an estuary involves dredging the pollution of Budd Inlet and exporting it to another community as close as Portland or Tacoma. Not only would we be saying, “Not in my backyard,” we also would be pitching our trash right over our neighbor’s fence. Let me just suggest that this is beneath us as a community.

The bottom line is that our Capitol Lake needs the people of greater Olympia to stand up for it and the rest of our Capitol Campus. The notion that we will tolerate a stinking mud flat next to downtown is the pipe dream of so-called environmentalists who do not know better than our elders who were there to smell the filth of old Olympia.

Contact Sen. Fraser and the other Capitol Campus Design Advisory Committee members and let them know we expect a decision to dredge, clean and keep Capitol Lake.

Justin Kover, a citizen activist, opinion columnist and legislative representative for the Olympia Patient Resource Center, is a member of The Olympian’s Board of Contributors. He can be reached at justinkover@hotmail.com.