JP is the man!

Ch-yah Buddy! 

You're right, they should definitely dam it.

Actually if more Snohomish County ratepayers knew about how this was likely to turn out, support would likely be much greater. SnoPUD's exploratory costs have already gone from a projected $1 million to over $5 million, and they're not done with that phase yet. The nearby landslide that their geologist said 2 years ago was unlikely to progress has had frequent movement, including a slide that rearranged a cabin just two months ago. Their projected cost of $230 million (already up $20 million since December) is likely to be vastly underestimated by completion if this goes through. They have determined that their blasting is not likely to release dangerous chemicals from the already arsenic-high Sky water, but do you trust their studies?  The low water fish viability studies were conducted with 'particles that exhibit the same buoyancy and water dynamics as fish', not actual fish.  All this from the same company that told people their overall rates would stay the same when they switched to bi-monthly billing, but instead people ended up with $1,000 power bills and many people are saying that subsequent bills are not making up for the outrageous ones received previously. SnoPUD is now spending a huge amount of money on 'fixing' this problem, both in terms of possibly switching back to monthly meter reading and hiring a large team of new people to deal with their new customer service problems.  Ratepayers are of course the ones who will foot that unexpected bill.  That's how successful SnoPUD is at planning and implementing a switch from simply billing once a month to billing every other month. How competent do you think they are at planning a 50-year dam project? And besides all that, isn't it worth caring about keeping one of Washington's last free-flowing rivers wild, especially this one?

If people are trying to say we are only likely to care about things we can see or touch or that benefit us directly and not because things are right or wrong, or make financial sense or they don't, or are too environmentally damaging or they're not -  then a lot of us will have to stop blabbing about things we supposedly disagree with, like undersea drilling (after all, probably will not ever visit the ocean floor, barring some terrible kayaking accident) or drilling in the National Arctic Refuge (most people have no plans to go and no personal caribou friends).  JP is not griping about the Sunset Falls put-in, which by the way involves a ton of flat water and I doubt many people would actually use very much, he is busting his butt doing the hard stuff, community activism and getting people to actually comment.

JP will you be up on the Sky at all this weekend? I'd be happy to get more postcards from you to pass out!

...because the postcards alone won't stop this beast. Again I encourage everyone to file an eComment on FERC's website. Even if you signed a card. The eComment is an opportunity to comment in greater detail about why you are against blasting a huge tunnel through the bedrock upstream of Sunset falls.

I can help you with this but more of you need to STEP UP. and either file one on your own or contact me I can help you with targeted talking points that are fact based and coherent.

Btw Joe- gonna get that stuff to you today yesterday was really off the hook busy

The goverment has already won, cus you local folks up there allowed the access to be shut down and if people cant get back there, they will not care. Need to start with the local land owners and get them off thier asses. Let people back there like in the old days... I was born here and getting sick of loosing access to everything! Asshole people think they own everything while people like me work thier asses off and pay taxes just to loose in the long run....sick off it!

Any idea what the docket number for the FERC comments is? I got all set up to comment but I need the docket number first.

Thanks! Just submitted my comment to FERC. I heard a really inspiring tale of grass roots conservation against govt and electricity while I was in New Zealand last month. Bring on 4/12!

I haven't been able to make some of the meetings, I am curious if PUD has provided any documentation about the fish passage and the salmonoids (I think that's what they were referring to the baby fish as) yet? The meeting I went to mentioned that the PUD had only provided documentation about adult fish going over the proposed fish ladder/shoot when in fact the fish going over the proposed project would be much smaller and fragile than the adult fish they provided documentation on.
I'm mostly curious if the PUD is continuing to provide non-applicatable information to the project to try to make it sound more positive and less detrimental than it really is.

Thanks!

Just submitted. Thanks for your work on this

Bump.
I changed the thread title because I don't need your help- The Skykomish River does.

Tomorrow, Tuesday 4/12 at 9:00am-noon: SnoPUD HQin Everett
Show your support in Protection of the Skykomish from hydro development. FERC reps will be there, so your attendence could make an impact. Spread the word via facebook. If you can't make it, tell someone so that they might be able to.

Because The River Can't Speak For itself!



Edited by jP - 11 Apr 2016 at 2:47pm