From the ACCCLB:

December 11, 2007

Todd Stamm, Community Planning Manager
City of Olympia, Wa.

Todd

I have reviewed the staff recommendation to remove Smith Lake from the Chambers Basin moratorium, the letter from Brown and Caldwell and the rebuttal from GeoEngineers.

In light of the staff commentary regarding the developers denial of access to the property for the purpose of evaluation, the submittal of a developer funded study in lieu of the cities study and commentary by Brown and Caldwell (an independent third party engineering firm hired by the city to review and evaluate the developer funded study) noting that the developers study was incomplete and inconclusive in that it does not address significant concerns that initially precipitated the moratorium two years ago, I do not believe that removing this property from the moratorium is in the best interests of the city and definitely not in the best interests of the neighboring property owners both upstream and downstream, many or whom have lived on their properties for decades.

 The fact that the developer funded the GeoEngineers study, at the very least suggests a bias on the part of the engineers to support findings most advantageous to the developer.

The report from Brown and Caldwell points out more that once that the GeoEngineers report does not adequately address either upstream or downstream impacts of the proposed “solution” for flooding as related to Smith Lake.  Brown and Caldwell agreed primarily with the general description of soil types and that it was theoretically feasible to import enough fill material onto the site to elevate construction enough to keep the foundations out of the water table during the periods of high ground water, while pointing out that impacts to adjoining, downstream and upstream properties were not adequately addressed.

Building up the elevation of that site by eight feet will most definitely inhibit migration of upstream surface water, forcing it to back up until it can find an a route around.  Additionally the added elevation will accelerate the shedding of surface water from the site to those properties downstream.  We are discussing a 50 acre site, receiving 54 inches average annual rainfall, or somewhere in the neighborhood of 225 acre-feet of stormwater on an average year, that is going to be funneled through Shana Park and Wilderness and will most likely overflow the ditch when it reaches Spooner Berry Farm (further degrading Mr. Zhan’s ability to make a living farming the property he has owned for decades).

The comments imbedded into the Brown and Caldwell report by GeoEngineers do not seem to be substantiated and also seem to flatly contradict in many cases the observations of city staff and the direct testimony of neighboring property owners who have lived on that land anywhere from 20 to 40 plus years.

It is my understanding that as of December 4 of this year Smith Lake is full to the brim and close to overflowing it banks.  I would highly recommend that city staff physically visit the sites in question to determine current conditions.

Sadly the history of development in the Chambers Basins, has been that developer funded engineering studies are manipulated and massaged until they “prove” stormwater code compliance.  City and county staffs have not had the resources necessary to validate the purchased studies and by and large have accepted them at face value.  The result has been the incremental increases of flooding in the basin as the open spaces are paved over and their ability to absorb stormwater is diminished or eliminated entirely.  As there is less and less open spaces left the problems are becoming increasingly critical.

Many of the long term residents can independently substantiate the history of flooding in the region (including Smith Lake).  Additionally I would suspect that careful examination of the records maintained by the residents over the years will indicate incremental worsening of the flooding, roughly corresponding to the incremental development of the basin.

In conclusion I believe that the release of this property from the moratorium at this time, based on a potentially biased engineering study, that an independent firm hired by the city found to be incomplete and inconclusive in regards to one of the two major concerns addressed by the moratorium, would be extremely irresponsible.

Sincerely

Gus Guethlein