Emergency management members confirmed

A rare positive impact of the severe saltwater flooding that swamped La Conner in December was the flood of well qualified applicants seeking appointment to the Town’s new emergency management commission.

Mayor Ramon Hayes last week nominated five applicants. The Town Council confirmed them during the panel’s March 14 session.

They bring extensive histories of public service, meteorology, climatology and engineering.

“What a great lineup, this is exciting,” Councilmember Mary Wohleb said following a unanimous vote that empaneled Bill Stokes, Duane Carpenter, Gerald George, Doug Asbe and James White on a commission tasked with addressing flood management and a wide range of emergency preparedness and public safety issues.

Stokes, a former council and planning commission member, knows first-hand the impacts of flooding. He and his wife, Sandy, were forced from their Caledonia Street home by the Dec. 27 floodwaters.

That event, which caused an estimated $1.8 million in property damage along the town’s waterfront and in its low-lying areas, was prompted by what is being called a “perfect storm” with highly imperfect results – the combination of seasonal king tides, unusually low atmospheric pressure, strong winds, heavy rain and snow melt, all on the morning following a Town staff holiday.

Longtime residents have said that while La Conner has experienced flooding before, they hadn’t seen rising and rushing water here to that extent.

“We’ve been talking about it for 20 years,” Stokes noted in his application to the new commission, “and it’s time to get something done.

“I don’t want to get my house flooded again,” he added, “and I want to help protect businesses and residents exposed to flood loss.”

“Bill knows how to get things done,” Hayes told the Council. “He knows government. He knows how to navigate those waters.”

Carpenter brings experience gained during a career as a meteorologist for the U.S. National Weather Service and supervisor for the National Operations Center at National Weather Service headquarters in Silver Spring, MD.

“My forecast responsibilities,” Carpenter said in his application, “included all aspects of weather, including public, marine, aviation and hydrology. Being a meteorologist at the NWS,” he said, “brings my weather knowledge to the commission, allowing me to demonstrate the various forecasting services and products available from the NWS and other weather partners for town preparedness, safety and response.”

George has conducted research on two Central American volcanoes, has a background in high altitude ecology and instructed in human anatomy and general zoology at San Francisco State University. He also served four years as a U.S. Naval officer on the staff of the Commander of the Seventh Fleet, finishing as the admiral’s protocol officer in Japan.

He lauds La Conner as a “perfect, friendly, compact, walkable town.”

Asbe holds degrees in chemistry and chemical engineering. He was a process engineer in the pulp and paper industry.

“I was part of the process management system,” he said, “developing process safety systems, including design, procedures, training, maintenance and operation. This also included the assessment of risks and development of solutions.

“I have worked with teams to evaluate risks and develop solutions in the pulp and paper industry,” Asbe added. “In retirement, I have continued to sail on the waters of the Salish Sea and beyond. The boating experience keeps me in close contact with the tides and weather conditions.”

A member of Skagit Bay Search & Rescue with undergrad and graduate degrees in civil engineering, White is experienced in water resource modeling, information technology and communications.

A HAM radio operator, he has worked with the U.S. Department of the Interior to build a land use data base.

“I was a general manager for a mapping software company,” he told Hayes, upon making application, “and I have managed data collection for programs for water resource models.”

Hayes said he was impressed with all commission applicants.

“We had another applicant,” he explained, “who lives in the Pull-and-Be-Damned area who is also very qualified. But since we had five qualified candidates from here in town we went with them. But if something else comes up, we’ll definitely approach that person.”

Envisioned as a flood management board to study data and meet monthly with experts in the field, the scope of the commission was expanded to focus on earthquakes, tsunamis and other public emergency situations.