Bellingham’s Comprehensive Plan update is due in 2025. All Whatcom County towns are coordinating with the County for a countywide Comp Plan update. On October 24, Bellingham’s City Council and Planning Commission met jointly to review strategic options for growth in population, jobs, and housing through 2024, and to consider “preferred alternatives.” Possible options were presented for number of people moving here, jobs created, and homes built. The County requires such estimates to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement, which will finalize “preferred alternatives.”

MBG’s Rick Eggerth commented that a preferred alternative was premature, as environmental considerations like urban and community forests, wildlife corridors, and climate resilience remained unconsidered. City staff claims that after the draft EIS is created, the City can “pivot” to better address such concerns, if necessary.

This is troubling. Authors of draft EIS’s rarely welcome revisions. We will continue monitoring this in an effort to prioritize environmental concerns.
 

As with many pollutants, recent campaigns against PFAS have come too late to prevent global saturation of these insidious chemicals, but awareness has been raised and actions to curtail their use are succeeding, like the victory here in Bellingham.

Here's a link to an article that reviews state bans of PFAS: https://stateline.org/2024/10/22/more-states-ban-pfas-or-forever-chemicals-in-more-products/
 

Mount Baker Rapidly Losing Glaciers

“The landscape of Mount Baker, Washington's third-highest peak, is undergoing a dramatic transformation, with its glaciers retreating at unprecedented rates that echo a global pattern of accelerated ice loss.”