Before the Harping on Roads Re-Commences Here: Kudos from B. Hammer to the Bellingham City Council (motto: “Big on process before process was cool!”) for having the common sense God gave a goat on at least one occasion last week. After sifting through a raft of har-har public suggestions, the council wound up with a truly profound name for the refurbished city pier at Little Squalicum Park: Little Squalicum Pier. So let it be written.
Also Good to See: Some experts dispensing advice on how people should behave in the rare occurrence of making eye contact with a cougar. Hammer has been there, done that, prefers not to sweat/lather/rinse/repeat.
Just Saying Though: In a previous life as a guidebook author, Hammer recalls getting into an argument with a publisher over a book passage about wildlife encounters. All he did was note the propensity for cougars, on the extremely rare occasion they do attack people, to home in on smaller adults or children. This, Hammer matter-of-factly noted, was why it’s always a good idea for hikers to carry a few extras.
Sorry, But: Standing by that.
About That “Sulfur-Like Smell” Earlier This Week: The refuse can in the CDN newsroom kitchenette says it has an alibi. Seems sketchy.
This Just In: A couple valued readers have mailed the Hammer to note that their reported street issues indeed got fixed quickly via Bellingham’s See/Click/Forget app. Not surprising, given what they had in common: Paint striping and simple pothole filling.
In Keeping With His Obsession for Fairness: Hammer of course knows this to be the case. That is the app’s purpose. It’s the low-hanging infrastructure fruit. A tuber of the genre, if you will.
Which is Why: It’s disingenuous, on its face, for city officials to steer complaints about decades-old neglect of entire blocks of roadway to a phone app literally designed to pinpoint a single pothole or missing paint stripe.
The Deeper, Spendier Problem: For which no app exists: The city’s Transportation Improvement Plan is not keeping up with bigger-city, higher-traffic, longer-deferred, heavy construction needs. The streets don’t lie. At least not in that way.
And We’re Still Waiting: For council member Michael Lilliquist’s assessment of some of the major wagon-train ruts sent his way a few weeks ago. Simple question: Does the council find these conditions to be acceptable in the modern, with-it municipality in which we all like to pretend we live?
Asphalt Upset: In a feisty CDN letter to the editor this week, Bellingham City Council member Michael Lilliquist, noting that he “enjoy(s) clever, tongue-in-cheek writing as much as anyone,” chastised The Hammer for taking “… a cheap shot at the Bellingham Public Works Department” (see below) for suggesting the city rarely gets around to fixing crumbling streets and other decaying civic infrastructure.
As He Points Out: The city spends a lot of money doing just that. (Absolutely no doubt.)
And Then Goes on to Suggest: City residents will get great results in these instances by reporting “potholes or growing cracks” on the Bellingham See/Click/Fix app.
Oh Boy Oh Boy: Please email B. Hammer at the address below and copy the city council at ccmail@cob.org — to report your own successful results with that handy tool, popularly known in the Hammer’s household as the See/Click/Forget app.
Beyond That: Seizing the open invite for further discussion, Hammer invited Lilliquist to please take a quick spin, via vehicle or bicycle, in the web of roads around the Samish Way Interstate 5 interchange, where gaping cracks have been growing for the past — no exaggeration — two decades, in spite of countless reports of same on the fabled phone app, with zero results.
It’s Not Unique: That embarrassing Samish interchange, a gateway to Our Fair City to many visitors, is just one example of many major stretches of city street showing wagon-train-vintage ruts in the past few years. (Choose your own favorite crumble zone: Chestnut and Cornwall, anyone?)
Big Pic: It’s evident to many city residents that the current Transportation Improvement Program, even backed by what Lilliquist says is $6 million to $7 million per year in repairs, is not keeping pace with increasing traffic flows OR pedestrian/cycling needs. At all.
Bottom Line: Hammer would be pleased to escort city council folks on a real-world tour of The Land That the App Forgot. Seat belts and neck braces required.
OK, This is Almost Too Easy: (And we waited a week because of additional Port of Bellingham shenanigans last week.) Will the last person working at Bellingham Intergalactic Airport please turn out the lights?
More On That: Sezhere that Emily Phillipe, apparently second in the line of fire after already fired Aviation Director Kip Turner, got axed from her job (deputy director of aviation) shortly after giving notice of her own impending nonstop takeoff to points unknown.
Have to Wonder: Did she not see the memo on how the Port of Bellingham — the now firmly established Clown Car organization in charge of the airport (and alas, a lot of other local infrastructure) — is about to (vividly) reimagine itself as an effective, forward-thinking steward of public tax dollars?
Next Week: Port exec director Rob Fix pens a memo to board members suggesting spending an additional $1.5 million in public funds to hire a hypnotist to create a mass illusion that his board did not just authorize the spending of $100,000 in public funds to counter the impression that the Port often wastes public funds.
Week After That: Fix pressures himself into resigning after being relegated to unloading large duffel bags in wee hours of the morning from a half-empty Allegiant Airlines flight.
Two Weeks Later: Port board triples down on PR contract, going with initial suggestion from PR firm proprietor Peter Frazier that the yawning crater that is the port’s credibility hole will require at least three years worth of climbing, due to the rapidly increasing depth of ooze.
Speaking of Bellingham Intergalactic: Sezhere in the Seattle Times that one of the state’s largest radio-controlled aircraft clubs has been booted from its facility in east of Auburn, and is searching for a new home. Can we interest you in a little fixer-upper airstrip north of Bellingham with only a single operating commercial airline? Ninety-eight percent turbulence free!
Thus Spake Hammer Readers
Reader Bob Has Sludge on His Mind: Bob, responding to the Hammer’s recent call for contributions, noted that the city spent at least $8 mil pursuing a Climate Action Plan-worthy solution to the local poop problem — one that “mandated Pink-unicorn chasing to find a thermal sludge destruction technology that wasn’t thermal.” And they’ve now come full circle, reexamining, under new leadership in Public Works, technology they should have more seriously considered as far back as 2012.
Bob Points Out: “Now that [former Mayor Seth] Fleetwood is gone there are no more sad stories about searching eBay to keep the furnaces running.”
Reader Fred Asks, Earnestly: “Our community has a Port Authority intent upon increasing commercial passenger air flight from the Bellingham International Airport. Airline travel plays a role in worsening climate change. Does our community support the Port’s goal of increasing air travel?”
Short Answer: Yes it does! Because as is well established, talking a good game about climate change is a proposition distinctly separate from walking the walk. Or flying it, as the case might be.
Second Short Answer: Fred. Dude. Are you trying to get the Port to invest in additional expensive public-relations help? Take your foot off the gas, my friend.
Welcome Back, World: Hammer has had a trying summer, but is currently engaged in deep fake-persona therapy in an effort to reboot — assuming he can afford the co-pay. (More on that below.)
Meanwhile, to the top of the steaming pile:
Small Pro Tip: To the folks in charge of finding a new Bellingham Public Works Director. In addition to deep poop-processing knowledge, can we find someone who at least recognizes the smell of freshly laid asphalt? Or, you know, prioritizes infrastructure maintenance, such as city streets and the fabled, top-priority, possibly galaxy-saving bike lanes?
Yeah, Yeah: We know funding is an issue and the city council needs to put the foot down on infrastructure projects, as well — and they have rain garden (and other critical) needs to be met. But the current multi-decade paving cycle for city streets, while great for auto shops doing front-end work and bike wheel changes, isn’t cutting it.
And We Like to Think: That for all their broader virtue signaling, people do vote on these issues. At least B. Hammer and his two (number always in play) friends do.
Speaking of Keeping Up: What in the world is in the water (we can rule out fluoride) at Whatcom County headquarters, where a series of gaffes, missteps and suspiciously duplicitous behavior has created a local reality previously unthinkable:
Namely: That a government body in our midst could prove to be bumbling more often than the Port of Bellingham. The county is not at that level yet, but can see it from where it stands! Moving up swiftly on the outside in the “Gaps in Protocols” lane. Watch your mirrors, Rob Fix.
If You Doubt This: Go to the nifty CDN search engine and type in: “Harassment settlement,” “decomposing bodies” or “22 North funding.” We could go on, and probably will eventually. But you get the point: Pretty loose grip on Your Tax Dollars at Work.
Seriously: The big internal “investigation” that County Exec Satpal Sidhu threw as red meat to the (rightfully) angry wolves in the wake of the Jon Hutchings affair now appears likely to be served up as a big, fat nothingburger — sans fries — given the lack of progress or apparent enthusiasm to turn over anything but the smallest of rocks there.
Blatantly Piling on to That: Add to this the county Medical Examiner’s office imbroglio, sponsored by the ice machine at 7-Eleven (god forbid the county’s human storage challenges achieve Big Gulp status). There’s no way to spin a headline for stories about your ME’s office that include the words “decomposing bodies.”
Further Piling: Add to that the ongoing 22 North spitting match, which, while largely council-driven, is a new level of apparent fecklessness. The outside view is of a panel of fumble-bumbling pols unable to even define what success looks like in emergency housing. Instead, the public gets only a promise to continue a never-ending “conversation” that always concludes with a pledge to have an additional, deeper one. Somewhere else, some other time.
Quoting the Carter Family: “Time’s a Wastin’.”
In Other Words: Talk is cheap. But the list of public payouts from the Whatcom Ineptitude Risk Pool appears to just keep growing.
Speaking of the Port: It takes a special brand of public-relations genius to lose a major airline tenant from your highest-profile endeavor (the airport), summarily fire the airport’s manager, and then declare the matter a “personnel issue” and flat-out refuse to inform the public what, exactly, the plan is for the very expensive little aviation hobby site, Bellingham Intergalactic Airport.
One Thought: In keeping with the Port’s unique waterfront-redevelopment-via-dirt-bike-track theme, how about kicking big-scale aviation to the curb and making BLI the world’s grandest radio-controlled airport facility? It’s about the port’s speed — vacation schedules notwithstanding.
Seriously: When your chief spokesperson chides the local paper for non-responsiveness by reminding them that, “during summertime, Friday is a popular vacation day,” it might be time for some serious role reflection. We’ll leave it there. For now.
Back to the Top: In addition to upping the updates, Hammer is more than willing to open the door for readers to add their ideas for material to appear here. Send those to Hammer’s chief assistant and part-time spokesperson at ronjudd@cascadiadaily.com (who also would like to take off Fridays, but never does.) Subject line: HAMMER. We’ll see how it goes.
The Hammer, posted monthly and updated somewhat regularly, is the alter-ego and collective consciousness of CDN’s executive editor and staff, informed and inspired by the feisty, humor-capable readers of Cascadia Daily News. Don’t take him too seriously. Send comments, complaints or ideas for Hammer items to ronjudd@cascadiadaily.com.
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