On Saturday, February 23, RE Sources will lead a public tour of a cleanup site that once housed a lumber mill and rock-crushing plant. The tour will begin at 2:00 PM at 28 Bellwether Way, Bellingham, and conclude at 3:30 PM. Staff from the Department of Ecology and the Port of Bellingham will be present until 4:00 to answer questions and encourage public comments on the cleanup plan released by Ecology.
“It’s important to stay engaged with the waterfront cleanup process and have a say in what happens to our shoreline. This is our opportunity to clean up one toxic site for the community to enjoy a working waterfront, free of contaminants that allows salmon and orca to thrive,” said Eleanor Hines, North Sound Baykeeper and Lead Scientist for RE Sources.
The tour offers the community a chance to learn about and give input on the future of the site, which holds potential for business and public park space, as well as endangered Chinook salmon habitat restoration.
Ecology is accepting comments on its cleanup action plan for the site, called the I & J Waterway site, from February 19 to March 20, to hear the community’s input on possible paths forward.
This is part of an ongoing tour series of the 12 Bellingham waterfront cleanup sites listed under Washington’s Model Toxics Control Act, which contain contaminants like heavy metals and petroleum byproducts left from over 100 years of heavy industry — an era which ended with the closure of the Georgia-Pacific pulp mill in 2007.
For more information or to RSVP (encouraged but not required), contact Eleanor Hines at EleanorH@re-sources.org or 360-733-8307 x213.
To send Ecology a comment and see details on the cleanup site, visit their webpage: https://fortress.wa.gov/ecy/gsp/Sitepage.aspx?csid=2012
To RSVP on Facebook, visit www.facebook.com/events/375554269843699/