PORT ANGELES — Mayor Richard Headrick said Monday that Clallam County Public Utility District No. 1 should sign a new pro-annexation water contract with the city or have its supply shut off.
“It is time to draw a line in the sand and shut off the water if the district doesn’t sign a new contract,” Headrick told a Port Angeles Chamber of Commerce luncheon meeting.
“If they don’t, I’ll be the first in line to shut off the water.”
The new contract should include the controversial requirement that customers in the unincorporated area east of the city limit who are seeking new or upgraded service must sign agreements not to protest eventual city annexation, Headrick said.
The city has its eye on eventually annexing the U.S. Highway 101 corridor from the current east city limit to Morse Creek — or possibly beyond Deer Park Road.
Headrick, however, said such a move is probably at least five years away.
The agreements should be required despite opposition to annexation from what Headrick called a vocal minority of residents, he said.
“We are very serious about this condition. We expect it to occur,” Headrick said in his keynote speech before about 60 chamber members and guests at the Port Angeles CrabHouse restaurant.
The city and Clallam PUD have been at odds over water supplies since last month when the city presented a revised wholesale water supply contract to the district.
Wholesale source
Clallam PUD gets some of its water for nine systems in its service territory from the city of Port Angeles.
And PUD commissioners met for their regular meeting less than an hour after Headrick’s remarks.
PUD Commissioner Hugh Haffner said the mayor’s statements epitomized why residents living east of the city don’t want to be “under the city’s thumb.”
“What an attitude for the city to treat its citizens that way,” Haffner said.
“Is this another case of the city’s high-handedness?
“That the city has the audacity to think it can tell Clallam PUD customers what to do is another indicator of city treatment that makes people not want to be part of the city,” Haffner added.
