NORDLAND — A state Department of Health official assured his audience that the inner waters of Mystery Bay would remain open to commercial shellfish harvests, but the outer bay would likely be closed later this summer.
“Our plan is to have no classification of the inner bay,” said Bob Woolrich, growing area program manager for the office of shellfish and water protection.
Woolrich made the remarks to about 100 people Monday night in a meeting that brought together state, county and tribal agencies.
The state has been considering reclassifying the Mystery Bay commercial shellfish growing area as prohibited or conditional, which could have led to closure of the inner bay.
That was good news to Jake Johnson, Marrowstone Island Shellfish Co. manager, whose family has owned the operation on the inner bay at Nordland for nearly 100 years.
Johnson opened the meeting by calling for unity among shellfish farmers to work with government officials to find a solution to an overabundance of boats moored near shellfish beds.
Saying he was a boat owner himself and had nothing against boaters moored in the bay, Johnson said his company’s issue was the fact that state health had classified the bay as threatened, and that could close the family business.
“It’s a situation where we all need to come together,” Johnson told the audience.
Health officials said the issue is the number of vessels and mooring buoys located in the bay, which increases the possible risk of discharge from boats that could affect human health through potential contamination of commercial shellfish.
Woolrich cited the national guideline that defines a marina as more than 10 boats. If a marina is defined, then boats cannot be near shellfish beds.
Woolrich said Mystery Bay has six stations that take water samples for the state Health Department six times a year.
Stakeholders, including government agencies, tribes, elected officials and shellfish growers are working together to address the situation in which different uses such as shellfish beds and moorings can be sustained.
Brady Scott, state Department of Natural Resources district manager for the Orca Straits District Aquatics Region, said 10 buoys in Mystery Bay had been found to be unauthorized, one with a boat attached to it.
The DNR issued letters May 21 stating that unauthorized buoys would be removed in 30 days.
The agency, along with Jefferson County Department of Community Development, has identified 64 buoys in inner bay, inside the sand spit and on the outer bay beyond the spit.
“The next step is to proceed with the buoy removal,” Scott said.
Then the outer bay would be reclassified for closure and the separation between the inner and outer bay would be marked, he said.
State Rep. Kevin Van De Wege, D-Sequim, attended the meeting, a collaboration of the state Department of Health, Jefferson County Department of Community Development, the state Department of Natural Resources, State Parks and Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association.
Van De Wege said he was looking for solutions that might solve the issue through legislative action.
The lawmaker’s ideas ran from fining those who illegally place buoys to creating a state account to pay for buoy removal.
Kelly Toy, Jamestown S’Klallam tribe shellfish manager, indicated the tribes are taking a hard line on treaty rights.
“The tribes will not accept anything that is going to affect our tribal resources,” she said.
The Jamestown and Port Gamble S’Klallam tribes, making up the Point No Point Treaty Council, warned federal, state and county officials in a recent letter that the threatened closure of shellfish beds was an affront to their treaty rights.
Mystery Bay remains on the state Department of Health’s “threatened” list for 2009, but Woolrich said the problem with an increasing number of boats moored in the small Marrowstone Island harbor may be resolved soon.
The Department of Health has identified 16 other Western Washington harvest areas as being threatened with closure based on increasing pollutants. That’s a slight improvement over the 17 threatened areas listed in 2008.
Each year, the agency reviews water quality and pollution conditions in each of Washington’s 102 classified commercial shellfish growing areas. Areas that don’t meet stringent public health standards must be closed. Other areas with increased pollutant levels are listed as “threatened with closure.”
The listed sites are evaluated and watched by the agency and other stakeholders such as Jefferson County Public Health. The “threatened” designation serves as an early warning and helps target pollution control.
Jefferson County Department of Community Development handles buoy permits for the state and has conducted a survey in the past year that shows 63 buoys have been identified with owners.
The county reported that 25 have legal permits, seven are “grandfathered,” meaning they were in the bay before regulations existed, and five have been determined to be moored outside the bay.
As steward of the 2.6 million acres of state aquatic lands, DNR manages the bedlands under Puget Sound and the coast, many of Washington’s beaches and natural lakes and navigable rivers. DNR manages these lands not only to facilitate navigation, commerce and public access, but also to ensure protection of aquatic habitat.
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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
