Letters to the editor for Nov. 17

No SeaTac in Thurston County

The fight over the mega-airport location pits nature lovers and profit mongers in a battle we could all lose. Even the language used is an onslaught against the location’s current inhabitants and a clue into the final decision. “Greenfield sites” assumes the land is currently unoccupied and available. The problem is, it’s not.

Thurston County’s farmlands, the best in the state, cannot be moved. Ignoring issues of endangered wildlife, water and air pollution, farmers live in the targeted area. Farmers live and work on their property, often working land held generationally. Their generational wealth, income potential and home could all be stripped away with this single decision.

If you think this is as easy as moving to a new neighborhood, it’s not. This is like stripping someone of their job, their home and their retirement accounts in one fell swoop. This is not justice, it’s theft. Once again, vulnerable people become human collateral in the pursuit of progress.

The CACC keeps suggesting “this is an ‘airport of the future’ where space and pollution are not an issue.” If that is truly the case, they should look at SeaTac and Paine Field first. Make them airports of the future. Demonstrate the value of new technology so our Evergreen State can be both a place that values the environment and one that drives the transportation industry. Maybe then a new airport won’t be necessary.

But if it is, only then might my children consider selling our land.

Catherine Carmel, Olympia

Bravo Olympia School District

According to statistics the NAACP examined, although Black people make up 13.4 percent of the population, they make up:

▪ 22 percent of fatal police shootings,

▪ 47 percent of wrongful conviction and exonerations, and

▪ 35 percent of individuals executed by the death penalty.

Black people are also five times more likely to be incarcerated than white people.

The justice system has been used to further marginalize and silence people of color since emancipation. Calling into question the merits of a Black school board member based on an inherently racist injustice system in order to silence their voice and contributions is exactly the kind of inequitable act that the Olympia School District appointed her to help root out to begin with.

I was dismayed and disheartened at the racism on display at the Olympia School Board meeting on Oct. 27. However, I was equally inspired by the courage of those who showed up in support of the newest board member.

Talauna Reed has been making positive contributions to the Olympia community for years, in both her anti-racist work as well as toy drives for impoverished youth. She has a lived experience and a voice Olympia sorely needs.

As an Olympia High School alumni and parent of three students currently attending Olympia schools, I applaud the school board for their appointment of Talauna Reed and look forward to the contributions she will make for our community’s most vulnerable and marginalized students and their families. Go Bears!

Shawn McDonald, Olympia

Here’s to a certain and muddy future

It took me awhile to get my head around it, but I think I’ve got it now. After re-reading the article “Officials outline Capitol Lake estuary project funding” from Sept. 6, I realized all those responsible, farsighted “state and local leaders” who “have voiced their support for turning Capitol Lake back into an estuary” apparently do have something going.

After all, who would have thought that for only $37.7 million, “the total cost for construction and long-term maintenance through 2050,” we would be able to have entities as diverse as the city of Olympia, the Port of Olympia, Tumwater, the Squaxin Island Tribe, the state of Washington, and the Olympia Yacht Club combine their collective good will to deliver increased sediment to Budd Inlet and “reduce uncertainty about downtown Olympia’s appearance.” Why hadn’t I thought of that?

To get another perspective I went to the library and borrowed a book that was delightfully informative but depressing in its depiction, entitled “The River Remembers, A History Of Tumwater, 1845-1995” by Gayle L. Palmer and read with great interest the history I knew so little about. One of the chapters, authored by Shanna Stevenson, is entitled “A Freeway Runs Through It: Tumwater, A City Shaped by Transportation.” Towards the end of this piece on the decimation of authentic Tumwater, she writes, “The siltation of Capitol Lake by the Deschutes River has provided the once muddy tideland with a rich collection of riverine plants and habitat.” I get it now. We want mud. That’s certainty.

Thomas Weissenberger, Lacey