Water Warriors working hard to make the ballot. This is like a marathon and volunteers are hitting the wall with fatigue as they keep collecting signatures.

The weather is perfect for petitioning – we love the clouds and cool temperatures. Our June 15th deadline is approaching fast and we still need signatures on both petitions. We are getting close but we have to keep pushing as last week we did not hit our weekly goal – so this week we have to make those signatures up. We need 350 signatures on the green sheet and 500 signatures on the blue one this week. Now is the time to help make a difference and be part of a group of concerned citizens that want to protect our water now and for the future.

I grew up learning to take care of the property my parents owned. I helped to maintain the creek flowing on the boundary of our property on its way to Grays Harbor Bay. I dragged branches and debris out of the creek so that our property would not be flooded.   So that set the stage for everything else I would choose to do regarding water. I have read extensively about land and water reclamation and conservation around our country. I have spent a lot of time on and around Commencement Bay. So when I heard the words, “largest methanol plant in the world”, I knew it was the wrong thing for Commencement Bay, and I knew I had to get involved in helping to stop it. I had the knowledge and experience that made me confident to speak up.

When I learned about “Save Tacoma Water”, I was grateful to be able to join a group where I could contribute. This particular set of circumstances regarding NW Innovation Works – the application process, the petition process, and the seeming permissive attitude of our public officials toward NWIW – might set a standard that other companies would follow. It was all going to have a negative effect on Pierce County residents regarding taxes, utility fees, and air and water pollution. Commencement Bay is not the largest bay in the world, and Puget Sound is not the largest inland sea in the world. It narrows considerably on its route toward the south end of the Sound. The enormous container ships that were being planned would overwhelm all other shipping.

Although NWIW had asked for a larger quantity of fresh water per day, Tacoma’s public officials got the company to come down to 10.4 million gallons per day. They declined to consider using recycled water. There was a hint that after the permitting and construction process was over, the company would lobby to get more fresh water per day. Now, American Rivers, a conservation organization, has identified the Green River as “at risk”, and developing temperatures too warm for safety of animal and plant life in its waters. Measures will have to be taken to deal with this problem. The proposed methanol plant would cause warming.

We need to protect our precious fresh water source for the use of businesses, residents, and recreation. And we need to preserve it for future generations. In one way, this is a difficult decision to make, because it will involve hard work in planning, communication among groups, and cooperation. But in another way, it is an easy decision to make. Puget Sound is a very beautiful and precious water resource for our region. Clear, clean water is a gift to us given by us after the cleanup of Asarco, which we have all participated in. It is our duty to keep it that way. I am in for the long run.

Near the food court at the Tacoma Mall, Billie volunteers at the table collecting signatures for the Water Protection Petitions.Volunteers will be there this holiday week-end on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. If you haven’t had a chance to sign the petitions yet, head to the Tacoma Mall and get your civic duty done.

I signed with Tacoma Schools 49 years ago to come and work in one of the finest elementary counseling programs in the state. I was aghast when I first visited the community. Back then, the city was dismal, the politics were corrupt and the port smelled. To be honest, I was depressed thinking “What have I done?”

Slowly over time, with new leadership and public commitment, Tacoma has been on a trajectory of renewal. We have invested millions of tax payer’s dollars in cleaning up our city and port. Our city has become beautiful and healthier.

Coming to understand the toxic air pollution effects of the proposed methanol plant and experiencing the effects of global warming last year with our drought, I knew that I had to do something to help protect our beautiful city, Port, and pristine water supply. Knowing that clean water will be the global issue of this century and knowing that Tacoma’s water supply will be effected by global warming, it was a ‘no brainer.’ Save Tacoma Water provided an avenue to make a meaningful contribution. I want to live in a healthy and clean city that has the needed resources for its people.

Sally loves lines of people – as voters readily sign both Water Protection Petitions – Initiative 6 and Charter Amendment 5 – Yes! to Protect.

Why I choose to volunteer for the Save Tacoma Water can be summed up in three words, past, present and future.

Past: My mother’s parents and sisters emigrated from Pisa, Italy to Tacoma. They did not know how to speak, read or write English when they arrived. My mother was the first person born on American soil in her family. She spoke, read and wrote Italian as her first language and acted as translator for her parents her entire life. I feel immense gratitude for all of the immigrates that eventually found their way to Tacoma in order to build a city out of dirt and mud. These hardworking individuals that crossed oceans and continents suffered difficulties that we cannot envisage today. I know these stories personally. It is my responsibility to honor their sacrifice and hardships by continuing to enhance our standard of living.

Present: I am volunteering for the present generation that seems to be more addicted to social media than concerned for their resources. The majority of them appear to be brainwashed by the media. When I ask the generations of X,Y and millennials to sign the petitions, they often say “not now” as they are running into the store to shop and spend money, and I think to myself “if not now, when?”

Future: I volunteer for the security of the next generation that will be forced to live in an environment that has an unforeseeable future and standard of living. It is the least that I can do to lend them a helping hand that will secure that they can live and prosper in the city that we will be leaving behind.

Sally Radford working the line outside the democratic caucus meeting recently.

Collecting signatures on the Water Protection Petitions. Sally has mastered working multiple boards – note that she has four people signing all at once. Go Sally!

Shout out to our volunteers! We have new petition sheets with a new look. Why? Well, we needed to print more. Plus, it will help us in our signature collecting efforts for the next month and they will prepare voters for a yes vote in November.

Volunteers will no longer have to respond to the question, “We stopped the methanol refinery, why do we need these petitions?”

The citizens of Tacoma and all the rest of the loud voices from around the region can all take a bow for getting Northwest Innovation Works to cancel the project, but remember this quote from the Tacoma News Tribune:

“Right now, we no longer have a project in Tacoma,” Godley said by phone.

By STW volunteer, Debby Herbert

As a California native and transplant to Tacoma, I have additional perspective on why our water protection petitions are so important, and is why I am working with this petition campaign, and feel so dedicated to this cause. California is almost always in some state of water conservation and/or drought status, so I have lived in a water scarce environment for a good part of my life. Voluntary and mandatory water cutbacks, I assure you, is not a place we ever want to be and is a primary reason I moved away from California and came to the Northwest. On my four day exploratory trip to the area it rained non-stop for four days, and I said to myself on my return trip home, “I’ll take it…there is water!”

Dan Decker is one of Save Tacoma Water’s super volunteers and turned in a huge stack of petitions a few minutes ago – 31 full pages (640 signatures) of blue petitions and 24 full pages (480 signatures) of green petitions. Wow, this is a superfabulous effort. A huge thanks goes out to Dan!

Dan is a dedicated volunteer petitioning daily, going door to door. Tacoma residents are readily signing the petition. Volunteers report that the signers prefer the “blue” petition because they understand that the charter amendment cannot be overturned by the politicians. The clock is ticking, if you haven’t joined with all of us Citizen Lawmakers, now is the time to get out and collect signatures – our deadline, June 15th is quickly approaching.

Check out our ad in this week’s edition of the Tacoma Weekly (available Thursdays) – the paper in town to read if you want to be informed, especially when it came to reporting about the methanol refinery. Support this newspaper as the publisher is one of the visionary people endorsing our Water Protection Petitions.