Editor,
The Board of Directors of Citizens of Ebey’s Reserve thanks Ken Pickard, our first president and one of our founders in 2012, for his ability to organize us and to speak out when others would not.
This is also an opportunity for COER to thank the many others who have devoted their time, passion, personal resources and reputations to resisting injustice on behalf of this community and to extend a “thank you” to those who have found their voice and are speaking up when wrongs needed to be righted.
Organizations change and mature. New leaders emerge. COER’s board has been lucky to have others from our community join us. We encourage every thoughtful citizen to be inspired and to step forward to resist an unprecedented expansion into Puget Sound by the U.S. Navy and it squadrons of Growlers. And we must remind ourselves that it’s not anti-American to criticize policy; rather it is our birthright as Americans.
Since those early days, COER has demanded honest consideration for real health and safety impacts of Growler noise. We expect credible analyses of naval impacts on our threatened and endangered marine and bird life, and serious examination of the effects of jet noise that degrades our children’s learning environment. We insist on real crash risk studies provided to us by the Navy on a troubled F/EA-18 aircraft, including the Growler, which is 10 to 36 times more likely to crash than its predecessor, the Prowler.
Today, COER is a key collaborator helping to create a regional movement made up of like-minded groups throughout Puget Sound who are standing up and fighting for one of the most beautiful, quiet, and pristine environments in our nation. This larger Alliance now represents 25,000 members and is having regional success, like defeating two bills in the Washington State Legislature last month that would have given the Navy power over local land use planning.
Now entering our sixth year, COER’s mission remains steadfast: to move Growler trainings to suitable locations and ending the Navy’s policy to place all EA-18G Growlers here. In this effort, we are committed to a legal challenge of the final Environmental Impact Statement due later this year.
Maryon Attwood, president
Citzens of Ebey’s Reserve
