Anacortes American, August 21, 2002
An environmental group says it plans to appeal the issuance of a permit by the city of Anacortes for the T Bailey project on March Point to the Anacortes Board of Adjustment.
Tom Glade, vice president of Evergreen Islands, said the group, Friends of Skagit, Skagit Audubon and the Skagit Land Trust met with the city officials last week and learned that a first permit, for fill and grading, had been issued by the city for the project.
Glade said Evergreen Islands plans to appeal within the next two weeks.
Evergreen Islands, as well as several other environmental and conservation groups, have called for more intensive environmental review of T Bailey’s planned facility because of their fears of its effect on a colony of nearby herons.
The Port of Anacortes recently issued a Mitigated Determination of Nonsignificance, meaning it has determined that the project probably won’t have a significant adverse effect on the environment, though conditions have been added to help ensure that at the 26-acre, undeveloped March Point property. The site of a former gravel pit is located between South March Point Road and state Highway 20.
Several environmental and conservation groups responded to that determination, calling for a more intensive environmental review to assess effects on the herons.
Earlier this year, the Port commission approved a long-term lease for the property to T Bailey, which is a steel fabrications and construction company. One of its biggest projects of late has been the manufacture of 200-foot-high wind towers, and transformed into power-generating windmills along the Columbia River basin. Officials have said the T Bailey expansion will mean more jobs for the community.