The City of Burien will not participate in next week’s planned Stakeholder Advisory Round Table (StART) lobbying day in Olympia, a decision city representatives say reflects ongoing disagreements with the Port of Seattle over airport related policy priorities and a lack of meaningful collaboration on issues affecting residents beneath Sea-Tac flight paths.
Following Burien’s decision not to attend, the Port of Seattle canceled plans for the Olympia trip by StART members, according to Brian Davis, vice chair of the Burien Airport Committee. In the message to community representatives, the StART facilitator cited low participation and availability as the reason for the cancellation.
Community representatives from Des Moines have also announced their plans not to attend.
Davis outlined the City of Burien’s position in a letter read Wednesday, Jan. 28, at the Highline Forum, where he said the city could not support most of the shared policy priorities promoted through StART.
“We are unable to sign on to most of the items on StART’s list of shared policy priorities,” Davis said. “We have no interest in promoting agenda items that will be decades in the making.”
Davis said Burien’s concerns center on the immediate impacts of airport operations, including aircraft noise, air quality, and economic effects on neighborhoods under flight paths. He cited what he described as the cumulative effects of roughly 1,200 takeoffs and landings per day, exposure to ultrafine particles that are not regulated at the federal level, and development limitations that affect certain types of businesses, including in home daycare providers.
He also criticized StART’s stated goals on air quality as vague and raised concerns about positions related to noise insulation repair and replacement.
Burien has endorsed Senate Bill 5652, which would establish a statewide system for air quality monitoring and assessment and create guidelines with state oversight for repair and replacement of airport funded noise mitigation packages. Davis said the Port of Seattle initially indicated it might help develop compromise legislation but is now signaling it will not support the bill.
Davis also expressed concern about the Port’s position on Senate Bill 6240, which would direct a portion of future aviation fuel tax increases to help fund programs outlined in related legislation.
“There is a lack of true collaboration on the issues most important to our city and its people,” Davis said.
“Sending our delegates to StART Day in Olympia would contribute to a false narrative about the state of relations between Burien and the Port – which we do hope we can change in a meaningful way. And the sooner, the better,” Davis added.
Thanks, Brian Davis, for your leadership and thank you, Des Moines and Burien councils for taking the stand (and your pending appeals of the Port’s unprecendented growth plans – opposed even by the US EPA). This is a big deal – adding 80,000+ annual flights and asserting there is no impact on neighbor communities is shameful. It is too bad our Port Commissioners – many of whom airport groups supported – have in the end taken such an incredibly harmful stand against our communities on public health and the environment.
Again,the airport was there before you or your house. You chose to move there. I live here and have all of my life and I enjoy the airplanes!
I have been a long-time observer of and commenter at StART and it has become painfully obvious that the Port and many WA State legislators have no intention of providing and working for relief for airport communities, relief from ever increasing noise and exposure to health and wealth risks. As the blog describes, there is a time when so-called cooperation and “working together” gives a false impression, keeps the lie alive, that the Port and its elected officials are concerned about airport communities. Pulling out of Lobby Days and the explanation given for it are honest. Aviation needs to be regulated and the earlier the better, including a right-sizing, sharing existing resources, and replacing short-haul flights with trains.