This is an open letter to Mayor Patricia Cohen and Oak Harbor City Council, regarding Dillard’s Addition sewer extension.

Thank you for giving us the opportunity on Thursday, April 26, at the City Council regular Economic Development meeting to express our concern about this project, and for listening to those concerns. Several owners are absentee, and probably still have no idea of the actions that are proposed to be taken against them.

I saw no members of the press at the meeting, so I would like to once again summarize a few of our major points. Some facts are incontrovertible:

The city of Oak Harbor’s “Developer Reimbursement Agreement Application and Process” clearly states that such an applicant is required to notify all affected property owners 10 days prior to council consideration. He is required to produce an affidavit of mailing of such notice with the date of mailing.

At the council meeting on March 6, Councilman Campbell asked City Engineer Eric Johnston whether affected property owners had been notified. He did not answer the question. The proponent of the project, Robert Anderson, was present. He did not answer either. An answer should have been required; and in the absence of an affirmative, this matter should have been tabled until such notice was proven. This would have been an appropriate time to set a public hearing at a future date, requiring such notice be made and certified.

Publication of the city council agenda in the newspaper six days prior to the meeting does not constitute legal notice to affected citizens of a particular action, and it is most disingenuous to suggest that it might. This matter was not on the agenda as a public hearing. Legal notice is a particular, clearly defined process whereby specific information, including details of a proposed project, is brought to the specific attention of affected property owners of record via U.S. mail, publication of legal notice in the newspaper, and posting of public notice signs in the affected area, describing the project proposed.

These notices are required to be disseminated a minimum number of 10 days prior to any action being taken. If any affected property owner requests it or statute requires it, a public hearing, as defined by law, must be held prior to any action being taken.

These are good laws, exist for a reason, and are not discretionary to proponents or city staff. They exist for the protection of all parties—proponents, city council and staff, and the citizens of our state.

It is nonsensical to argue that the intention of public notice and public hearing laws is to make known to affected citizens after the fact about an action which deeply affects them. That is analogous to city council and staff helping to start the engine of a semi-truck, knowing it is going to be driven rapidly through our neighborhood, clipping all our houses, and claiming they didn’t have to tell us because they were unsure of the damage it would do. But they will, after the fact, tell us the driver’s name and attempt to inventory for us their version of the extent of damages, for which we will then be billed.

No. It is their duty to tell us, or ensure that the truck driver tells us, before that truck is allowed to go into gear.

I ask specifically that you put this project on hold until such time as alternative, more conventional, less costly and less potentially troublesome sewers can be evaluated. This project was not installed as proposed. There is no public health or other emergency that requires a rush to judgment or action. This section of the city was not included in any published short or long range planning for sewer upgrades or extension. But when it’s done, it should be done right, and with the informed consent of the affected property owners.

Emma Young

lives in Oak Harbor.