Coupeville crowd against Navy Growler expansion

COUPEVILLE – Whidbey Island residents did their best to show the U.S. Navy that it had neither right nor might on its side when 350 people filled the Coupeville High School Performing Arts Center Dec. 19 for a public meeting before the federal agency Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. Almost all attendees were in opposition to the Navy’s plan to bring 36 Growler jets to Naval Air Station Whidbey Island. The plans the Navy has filed lists 24,100 takeoffs and landings annually at the airfield near Coupeville.

The Navy is one of nine “consulting partners” that since 2014 has been working toward a memorandum of agreement on noise mitigation measures for historic properties on the over 17,000-acre Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve.

The Navy is the sole partner supporting the expansion. On Nov. 30 it terminated consultation toward an agreement, triggering the ACHP’s organizing of the Dec. 19 meeting. A handful of people, primarily retired Navy veterans, spoke in favor of the expansion. Almost all speakers at the two-hour meeting were adamantly against the plans.

The Navy’s position is that the effect of loud noise on historic buildings is the adverse effect they must mitigate, and their solution is a monetary settlement. Negotiations ended on this stuck point.

Dr. Allyson Brooks, State Historic Preservation Officer, and consulting partner, spoke forcefully of her frustrations in negotiations: “The calculations we brought were never good enough,” she said, speaking of the much lower 55 average decibel noise level cited by the Navy. Brooks referred to the 117 decibels measured and said averaging that with zero misrepresented the conditions. “The proposed mitigation is not efficient,” she told the ACHP staff.

The area of potential effect boundaries were too restrictive, she said, and did not include “portions of Whidbey Island, Camano Island, Port Townsend and the San Juan Islands.”

Island County Commissioner Helen Price Johnson and Port Townsend Council Member Michelle Sandoval offered the same criticism: the boundaries of the area of effect were too narrow, leaving out 40 Port Townsend properties listed on the National Historic Register, Sandoval said.

Johnson told ACHP staff, “You, too, will recognize the national significance of this landscape. There is no way to put a dollar value on it”

Later, Maryon Attwood, chairperson of the Sound Defense Alliance, remarked, “The Navy’s modeled noise measurements have resulted in an area of potential effect that’s too small and should include Port Townsend and La Conners national treasures.”

She expressed the audience – the community’s – sentiment when she said, “The whole Reserve is the Historic property – all 17,000 acres – not a particular building or view shed. It is all a nationally registered district.”

Anne Harvey, a 35 year resident of Coupeville, asked “what is an historic property, our 17,000 acre reserve, without people? Who will come to take in this landscape, to appreciate the historic structures and watch the eagles soar if there is a fourfold increase in Growler operations?” By not including Port Townsend or La Conner in its study, “The Navy is not acting as a responsible steward,” she said. She emphasized that “The only appropriate measures to address these adverse effects are to reduce operations or move the Growlers elsewhere.”

Brooks, having worked with a variety of federal agencies on mitigation, criticized that “the Navy gets to walk away from the spirit or intent of Congress. … The Navy has to take the State’s assessment seriously,” she said.

Instead of an agreement being reached, the community was becoming polarized. “This is neighbor versus neighbor,” Brooks said. “The [base] captain will move on in two years.” Area residents remain, needing to work through conflict with each other.

Jan. 14 was the deadline for the ACHP to provide comment to the Secretary of the Navy. The ACHP’s review “will take into account public comments,” according to its website. The ACHP’s comments are advisory only.

The partial government shutdown Dec. 21 meant “the ACHP’s 45-day clock will pause and the deadline for submitting our comments to the Secretary of the Navy will be adjusted,” stated an email from John Fowler, director.

That is a reprieve from a possible adverse finding.

“My hunch is that it is going to fall in the purview of Reps. Rick Larsen, Adam Smith and Derek Kilmer,” Brooks said in a Dec. 31 phone call, naming the congressional representatives from Washington’s third, ninth, and sixth districts.

Written comments can be sent to the ACHP: [email protected].