The proponents of Renton water fluoridation have generally been arguing that fluoridation has been shown safe and effective at reducing cavities, that the science was settled years ago by thousands of studies, that fluoridation helps everyone have fewer cavities especially the poor, that prominent organizations and individuals for decades have endorsed community water fluoridation, that the US has been moving toward more and more community fluoridation, that fluoridation was considered by the Center for Disease Control to be one of the 10 greatest health achievements of the 20th century, and (counter-productively) that opponents of fluoridation are conspiracy theorists.

The opponents of Renton water fluoridation argue that the science does not in fact say fluoride is safe for everyone nor is the science complete, that fluoride effectiveness when swallowed is significantly less than when applied topically, that fluoride in the water supply has not been shown in double-blind studies to reduce cavities, that fluoride should not be given to people without informed consent, that it is a “drug” that is being forced upon everyone in the entire community in an uncontrolled dose (dependent on their water consumption and the use of other fluoride products) and with no regard to their age or medical status, that far more nations on earth have rejected community water fluoridation than adopted it due to the reasons given above, and (tangentially) that it is a poison in high concentrations.

I’m paying extra close attention to this debate this time.  While I grew up with community water fluoridation, believed it safe, and have never proposed eliminating fluoride from Renton’s water, two years ago I proposed lowering our fluoridation level after the EPA reduced its recommended level  (which we subsequently did– click for details).

Rentom’s Liberty Park Wellhead, one of several facilities in Renton where water is filtered, treated, and fluoridated

As another piece of data, a few years ago I installed a reverse osmosis filter for my daughter to remove fluoride from her water after she positively correlated painful and expensive gastrointestinal issues it to fluoride hypersensitivity– a condition recognized by the National Academy of Science (see below).  Prior to cutting her fluoride intake, her condition had led to over $600 of prescription medicine per month, with an annual $10,000 colonoscopy, and a risk of possible surgery to remove her colon.  After isolating fluoride as the cause, which she did by drinking water exclusively from her husband’s family well outside of Renton and then she verified by living symptom-free in Japan (where they don’t fluoridate and few products contain fluoride), she has reduced her medical expenses and symptoms to zero by eliminating fluoride from her diet.  This experience did not make me convinced I needed to eliminate fluoride from the water supply, but it left me with an open mind on the topic.

In an age of information, diversity, and respect for personal choice, water-fluoridation opponents (like my daughter) are not just fringe voices anymore. In the last two months, overwhelming citizen coalitions in the two largest unfluoridated city’s in America, Portland Oregon and Wichita Kansas, have just made it clear to their leadership that they want a voice in this debate– Wichita (population 384,000) just rejected fluoridation by 59% to 41%, and Portland Oregon (population 593,000)  just got the issue put on a public ballot as a referendum (collecting about 43,000 signatures in 30 days when less than 20,000 signatures were needed) after their city leaders voted to fluoridate their water.  While some may say these citizens are recklessly bucking the trend set by larger US cities over the last few decades, others argue they are following the lead of the world’s greatest international cities that have rejected community fluoridation such as Tokyo, Paris, London, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Rome to name just a few.

On November 16th, as I was trying to make sense of all of this, I received an email from our City Utilities department sending me to an official CDC website for definitive information on Fluoride.

The email read:  “Please find below a link to the CDC’s website on fluoride.  There is a lot of very good information on fluoridation on this site.  The CDC touts fluoridation of public water supplies as one of the 10 best health innovations of recent times. ” The email contained a link to the CDC website.  CDC  Community Water Fluoridation

Okay, I thought.  When controversy strikes, I should follow the process.  Hence, I followed my city staff’s recommendation, went to the CDC site, and familiarized myself with the safety studies.

On the Center for Disease Control Site,  I clicked Safety, then National Academy of Science, and then their 2006 report for EPA, per the tree below:

Safety,

National Academy of Science

The 2006 NRC Report on Fluoride in Drinking Water: A Scientific Review of EPA’s Standards

And I found something I never expected.  Far from showing that the science is resolved, the CDC site directs readers to a study prepared for the EPA by the  National Academy of Science in 2006 (seven years after the CDC proclaimed fluoride one of the greatest health achievements of the 20th century); the National Academy of Science Study says there may be linkages between community water fluoridation  and reduced brain development (lower IQ), bladder cancer, Alzheimers, diabetes, auto-immune disease, gastro-intestinal illnesses, brittle bones, accute florosis, downs syndrome, and a host of other problems.  The CDC also says on their website that while originally community water fluoridation was thought to reduce cavities by 50% to 60%, today they now believe the benefit may be (18%-40%) reduction in cavities because of all the other sources of fluoride.

This data from CDC struck me as a LOT of risks of EXTREMELY serious illness, reduced brain functioning, and pain and suffering– to get as little as 18 % reduction in cavities, and I expect readers will want to see it for themselves.  As you read through it, remember that it is the data from the PROPONENTS of water-fluoridation.  I would  not have even had to open the email and links about poisoning our water that I received from the opponents.  I have copied the link path below, along with key findings and recommendations from this report.

Here is a sample:

“…it is apparent that fluorides have the ability to interfere with the functions of the brain and the body by direct and indirect means. To determine the possible adverse effects of fluoride, additional data from both the experimental and the clinical sciences are needed.”

“Fluorides also increase the production of free radicals in the brain through several different biological pathways. These changes have a bearing on the possibility that fluorides act to increase the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.”…”Studies of populations exposed to different concentrations of fluoride should be undertaken to evaluate neurochemical changes that may be associated with dementia. “

“The conclusion from the available studies is that sufficient fluoride exposure appears to bring about increases in blood glucose or impaired glucose tolerance in some individuals and to increase the severity of some types of diabetes. In general, impaired glucose metabolism appears to be associated with serum or plasma fluoride concentrations of about 0.1 mg/L or greater in both animals and humans… A comparison … will show that the 0.03-0.1 mg/kg/day range will be reached by persons with average exposures at fluoride concentrations of 1-4 mg/L in drinking water, especially the children.”

“Further effort is necessary to characterize the direct and indirect mechanisms of fluoride’s action on the endocrine system”

“The primary symptoms of GI [Gastro-Intestinal] injury are nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. Such symptoms have been reported in case studies  and in a clinical study involving double-blind tests on subjects drinking water artificially fluoridated at 1.0 mg/L.”

“It has long been suspected that fluoride, even at concentrations below 1.2 mg/L in drinking water, over the years can increase the risk for renal calculi (kidney stones). Research on this topic, on humans and animals, has been sparse…”

“Genotoxicity tests indicate the potential for fluoride to cause mutations, affect the structure of chromosomes and other genomic material; affect DNA replication, repair, and the cell cycle; and/or transform cultured cell lines to enable them to cause tumors when implanted into host animals.”

“An association of uterine cancer (combination of cervical and corpus uteri) with fluoridation was reported by Tohyama (1996), who observed mortality rates in Okinawa before and after fluoridation was terminated, controlling for sociodemographics. This analysis is a follow-up of the positive results from a previous exploratory analysis that comprised a large number of comparisons conducted by this researcher with the same data set.”

“The combined literature described above does not clearly indicate that fluoride either is or is not carcinogenic in humans.”

“Further research on a possible effect of fluoride on bladder cancer risk should be conducted.”

“Additional research is needed on fluoride concentrations in human bone as a function of magnitude and duration of exposure, age, gender, and health status.”

“The current MCLG was designed to protect against stage III skeletal fluorosis [includes increased risk of fracture]….the committee judges that stage II [which is reached with lower levels of fluoride] is also an adverse health effect, as it is associated with chronic joint pain, arthritic symptoms, slight calcification of ligaments, and osteosclerosis of cancellous bones.”

“On the basis of this information, all members of the committee agreed that there is scientific evidence that under certain conditions fluoride can weaken bone and increase the risk of fractures.

“High-quality studies in laboratory animals over a range of fluoride concentrations (0-250 mg/L in drinking water) indicate that adverse reproductive and developmental outcomes occur only at very high concentrations. A few studies of human populations have suggested that fluoride might be associated with alterations in reproductive hormones, fertility, and Down’s syndrome, but their design limitations make them of little value for risk evaluation.”…”A reanalysis of data on Down’s syndrome and fluoride by Takahashi (1998) suggested a possible association in children born to young mothers. A case-control study of the incidence of Down’s syndrome in young women and fluoride exposure would be useful for addressing that issue. “

Looks like a lot of risk and uncertainty for  an 18% reduction in cavities.

When we go into council chambers tomorrow night, and ask our followup questions of the professionals, I won’t be interested in hearing name dropping about a Surgeon General in the Reagan Administration who thought fluoridation was a good idea 30 years ago.  In general, I will have little interest in recommendations from three or four decades ago– too many of the old recommendations have been invalidated through the years.  I want to hear scientists address the issues raised by EPA, CDC, and National Academy of Science in the 2006 study posted on their own website.

Thanks for reading.  Please feel free to give my your input about this report in the comment section below.

See my excerpts from the 530 page document below, complete with links to the original text, by clicking here

]]> http://www.randycorman.com/?feed=rss2&p=3241 5 http://www.randycorman.com/?p=3223 http://www.randycorman.com/?p=3223#comments Mon, 20 Aug 2012 04:01:42 +0000 Randy Corman http://www.randycorman.com/?p=3223 My granddaughter is getting bigger. Here she is at our 11-acre “Riverview Park,” (a few hundred feet from Cedar River) ready to challenge me to a game of croquet.

Now that the library election is behind us, I plan to mix up my blog entries with more varied topics. Next up…trees!

A few months ago single women from around our region met with television studio representatives at the Landing (Renton’s shopping center near the lake) in order to interview for ABC’s next season of “The Bachelor”.

At the time, many Rentonites may have been unaware that a very popular finalist from the 2012 season of the Bachelor (one of the Bachelor’s final two suitors) grew up in our area, having attended Liberty High School while being very involved in the equestrian community– she taught horseback riding lessons on her parents’ farm just a stone’s throw from the May Valley Bridge that connects Renton and Newcastle.

Lindzi Cox, finalist in 2012′s “Bachelor” and star of Bachelor Pad 3, teaching riding to my daughter Susie in 2001.

Lindzi is an excellent riding instructor, and she gave lessons to all five of my kids and even some refresher lessons to my wife. Lindzi is an outstanding rider herself, and was a charismatic co-manager at her parents’ farm on the base of Cougar Mountain where they boarded horses as well as taught riding. We all missed her after her family moved to Florida shortly after Lindzi graduated from high school.

My daughter Katie was delighted when she spotted Lindzi again on television and in talk shows, as Lindzi competed with another finalist in last season’s bachelor competition. While she got edged out in the finals of last season, she had become astoundingly popular with Bachelor fans, so ABC cast her in “Bachelor Pad 3″ this season. A quick Google check shows she now has countless fans, which is not a bit surprising for those of us who know her.

Lindzi Cox in 2010 (photo owned by ABC and hosted in the examiner here)

Click here to see a video from “the Bachelor”, which features Lyndzi’s equestrian experience (including the horse “Devon” from the photo above).

Click here to see a video inwhich Lyndzi is interviewed by Jimmy Kimmel, following the end of the 2012 “Bachelor” season

There was also discussion about go-forward planning for the Cedar River Library renovation, and some other issues that brought out comment at last night’s meeting. Jenny Manning, Editor of Renton Patch, was in attendance and I’m sure in the coming days she will be posting more detailed stories about specific topics that arose.

Pictured: The storefront west of the Piazza, where a new library had been proposed to replace this tired building. While voters rejected moving the library from it’s over-the-river location, most citizens I have talked to feel it is worthwhile for the council to focus on further revitalizing this section of downtown Renton. I have heard many good ideas proposed

(From Union Hat)

The vote on the library location is in: Renton Wins!

Cedar River Library lovers get to keep the location we all have appreciated for nearly half a century. Awareness of the need for real revitalization in the oldest part of downtown Renton has not been this great since the local improvement district was created in the late 60’s.

There is still lots of work to do, but we have a chance to get things moving in a productive direction. Here is a To Do List to jumpstart the creative dialog between Economic Development Department, the City Council and the downtown business owners. Please add to my relatively random list of ideas.

Pass an ordinance requiring a private kitchen and bath for rented rooms in the historic district and providing tax credits for renovated office space.

Provide property tax credits to owners who strip off all of the ugly 1970’s upgrades to the building facades and/or restore the brick and stone exteriors and windows to their original design using energy efficient materials. For buildings constructed after 1920, encourage modifications that harmonize the visual appearance of the exteriors with the buildings constructed between 1900 and 1915.

Replace all of the old, ugly and increasingly unsafe sidewalks on S 3rd between Main and Smithers. Replace the odd gutters at the corners. Choose a concrete finish that is safe and durable, but reminiscent of the original wood sidewalks or Renton brickworks sidewalks or both. Include modest midblock sidewalk bump-outs for easier pedestrian street crossing and sidewalk vendor kiosks. Include utility hookups.

Replace the odd 1970’s street lighting and the remaining corner mounted traffic signals. Choose a pole and lamp style reminiscent of early 1900’s gas lamps. Consolidate the little hand holes, and improve the underground conduits to add capacity and provide a building entrance to every structure in downtown. This will allow connection of very high speed fiber to the second story offices. Combine superfast Internet with low cost office space on the southern end of the eastside tech corridor and you create a high-tech startup incubator.

Realign SR-900. The Historic District along S 3rd suffers from far too much vehicle traffic and too little foot traffic in part because they are in direct conflict with each other. By extending MLK way diagonally through the Safeway parking lot to connect with S 2nd and doing a modest widening of S 2nd there could be nearly the same traffic carrying capacity on S 2nd as there is now using both S 2nd and S 3rd.

Reduce S 3rd to a single west bound lane with diagonal parking along both sides. Provide traffic calming planters at each intersection with small street trees and low growing vegetation. Consider stained concrete intersections as we have in The Landing. The finish could reflect roadway bricks made at the Renton brickworks.

Bathe the historic district in very high speed, free wi-fi. Include Rainier, The Landing and the Ikea Shopping District. Perhaps Sunset between N 10th and N 12th and parts of N 4th should be included. Municipal wi-fi is not nearly as cool as it used to be, but is increasingly expected as part of any desirable destination. Very young tech startups might ride on free wi-fi for the first year.

DO NOT spend 10 million dollars to renovate the Cedar River Library. Do an essentials only renovation for about $2 million. If KCLS insists that there needs to be an entrance near the south parking lot, put an attractive rain roof over the pedestrian bridge leading from the parking lot to the existing entrance. When the economy improves a more extensive remodel and expansion to a Ragional library can be considered.

DO spend about 2 million renovating the existing Big 5 structure and relocate the Police Patrol Operations Division into the building for at least 5 years. There has been talk of building a new City Hall building in the old downtown for several years. That is not going to be affordable for a decade (never if we get Barack’d again on Nov. 6th). We can do some stimulus and a lot of crime prevention by putting the police who chase criminal’s right into the belly of the beast. Once West Hill annexes, that location will be a more central location for most of the high crime areas in Renton.

Vacate Mill Ave. S between Bronson Way and S 3rd and expand the parking for the Library and the Museum. With the expanded traffic volume on S 2nd/Bronson the Mill and Bronson intersection will no longer be viable anyway. Put a large bus stop bump out on Bronson where Mill used to be. Include a large sign identifying the KCLS library.

Get KCLS to pay for including the Cedar River and Highlands Libraries in the Renton Wayfinding sign system. They promised us some signs, we should hold them to their promises or they will continue to have no reason to respect Renton.

Yes the projects described above will cost something like 200 million dollars and it will be difficult to amass that much cash. It does not need to be done all at once. Something like 15% to 20% must be local matching funds, but once you have the 30 to 40 million budgeted, it is possible to get federal, state and county improvement grants that could provide practically all of the remaining money needed to actually revitalize Renton. The 10 million we dumped into the parking garage might have attracted 50 million outside dollars. We could have SR-900 realigned already if we had leaders with a little less impatience and just a little more vision and faith in our community.

Get the Administrator of the Community and Economic Development Department to move into town. Strongly encourage the other department heads to live here as well. Their perspective needs to be that of a participant, not a detached management consultant.

If you don’t like my crazy ideas, please post some of your own. It is time to come together to move Renton ahead.
Reply

_______________________________________
Commment to above, from RentonBen

I like all of them – a series of rational improvements, and no expensive boondoggles.

________________________________________
Follow-on Comment from Union Hat

OK Ben,
How about this? Annex West Hill and extend Renton level police service west to Seattle. Cleaning up crime in downtown Renton needs a regional approach and the King County Sheriffs don’t get the funding they need to hold up their end of the deal. If we are going to beat the crime in Renton and West Hill, we need to join West Hill to Renton first.
Still rational?
____________________________________

Readers, please join this discussion with your ideas by clicking on the comment button!

After an exciting three-month campaign full of passion, door-belling, blogging, information booths, a parade enty, and letters to the editor– covering subjects such as library patrons desires and needs, conflicting cost estimates, conflicting parking predictions, and discussion of many other “unknowns,”– Renton citizens have overwhelmingly selected “Over the Cedar River” as their favorite location for a library. The first returns were showing the Cedar River locations leading the Piazza location by 76% to 24 %.

Cedar River Library Campaign Chair Stuart Avery summarized the sentiment tonight at an election-watch/victory party by restating the theme the campaign had adopted, “there really is no better place.”

As a special treat, former Renton Mayor Don Custer, a charming, witty, senior statesmen for our city who presided over Renton when the library was built in 1966, stopped by the party tonight. Don shared stories of the original library construction, and reminded us the project was accomplished for about $300,000 . He said the inspiration for the library came from Italy and England, where he and others had seen shops on bridges. He said one of the original architects also took their inspiration from a building on the US East Coast that was located on a bridge over the freeway, but none of these buildings were libraries.

Some of the supporters of the competing Piazza Library site had expressed a desire to move the library to stimulate revitalization of downtown. At tonight’s party, there was a prevailing sentiment that downtown revitalization was a worthy goal deserving of city emphasis, but that moving the library was not the right approach– several citizens were eager to share other ideas for bringing improvements to the areas near the Piazza.

The Renton Patch has other details on the election which can be found here.

Thank you to all who participated in this campaign, and thanks to the voters of Renton for supporting our unique, treasured library.

Cedar River Library supporters in the River Days parade ten days ago

I’ve always like parades. I’m walking (and waving) next to Marcie Palmer who serves with me on City Council– Stuart Avery, Cedar River Library campaign chair, is to the far right leading the procession (in white campaign T-shirt)

Some supporters of the Piazza library site, including the Renton Reporter, have repeated the idea that in terms of construction costs, remodeling the Cedar River Library carries “unknown” costs, while building at the Piazza site is highly predictable in cost. (You will find this assertion in this article for example.)

I don’t agree with this opinion however, as there can be many additional construction impacts hidden in the soil conditions, and these generally won’t be known until we start digging. These unknown underground conditions are an issue for the Piazza site, but not the Cedar River Site.

Some hidden conditions that have added to costs in Renton projects before are soils that are inadequate to support the building or the floors without reinforcement, contamination from previous uses, and the discovery of Native American artifacts on the site.

Already, a Geotechnical report provided to KCLS dated November 2nd 2011, done by Geo Engineers, has determined that the Piazza Library will need a more robust foundation system than the typical spread footings and slab-on-grade that were assumed when the 9.3 million dollar estimate was produced. The engineering firm has determined that the soil is so compressible and subject to liquefaction at the Piazza Library Site that the builders should install “lean auger-cast columns” (poured in-place concrete piers made with a lean concrete mix) up to thirty feet deep in a grid approximately every five to eight feet across the entire floor just to support the loads. The site is underlayed with multiple layers of silt and clay and alluvial sand, which makes it subject to liquefaction in an earthquake.

Of course contamination is always a concern when digging up old building sites, especially on locations where commercial use dates back before World War 2. While I am not aware of any surface evidence of fuel oil tanks, it is always possible that there are tanks buried in the site (either from heating oil or automobile fuel). It is also possible that before the sporting goods store moved in years ago, someone used the site in a way that allowed contamination to flow into the soils. Old fuel tanks and contaminated soil conditions are common discoveries in older parts of town, and they add cost to building projects. If these conditions exist, even deep under the surface, they will easily be discovered in the process of perforating the site with the newly required “lean auger-cast columns.” Here is a Seattle Times article which says that even the removal of a relatively small, basic home heating tank can cost up to $100,000 if there has been leakage. This cost would be many times greater for an underground gasoline tank. Click here to learn more about Renton sites where this work has been undertaken at great expense, such as the Texaco site that now hosts Big Foot Java, and the recently closed Jet City Espresso, which was formerly Charley’s Automotive.

Native American artifacts were discovered during the expansion of Renton High School in 2001, and during the building of the Henry Moses Aquatic Center in 2004. Both of these discoveries halted the projects and added costs, and could have led to costly redesigns if satisfactory resolution had not been reached with the tribes and the state regarding how to preserve the discoveries. Click here to read more (see page 25 of the report). The discovery report refers to the sites as “floodplain”, in reference to the Lake Washington and Black River conditions that existed before 20th century river and lake manipulation. No doubt the Piazza Library site is part of the floodplain, and was a historic area of activity for the Duwamish tribes.

While none of these risks should disqualify a site from construction, it is simply wrong to imply that there are no “unknowns” prior to excavating a site like the Piazza library location.

This photo, which is hosted by the UW Library, shows a 1930′s gas station at 3rd and Logan, in what appears to be the parking lot of the former Big 5 Sporting Goods store. The fuel tanks were single-walled back then, and they lacked monitoring for detecting leaks. There is no word yet on whether records exist which show the removal of these fuel tanks.

Reason number 1– The editor opens the editorial by showing he is out of step with the Council, the Mayor, and the citizens on this topic

The editor begins his editorial by saying that he personally would not have let the library location go to a vote. In this regard, he disagrees with all seven Renton council members and the Mayor of Renton, who felt that the public should be heard on this issue when we placed the issue on the ballot two months ago. The Renton Reporter editor also disagrees with the 15 % of registered Renton voters who signed a petition asking for a vote. This seems quite out of step with the desires of the community.

Reason number 2– The editor’s track record for accurate library information is not good

The editor claims voters knew, or should have known, they were voting for two new libraries when they voted to annex to KCLS. His statements include “From the beginning it’s been clear that in all formal documents Renton’s elected leaders agreed to build two new libraries.” and “.. it was clearly spelled out that the city would build two replacement libraries for KCLS if annexation should occur.” and “It was also clear (in the 2010 voters’ pamphlet and elsewhere) at the time of the vote that annexation would mean the city would have to build two new libraries for KCLS. “

But two years ago before the KCLS election, the Renton Reporter never informed voters that a vote for KCLS was a vote for closing Cedar River library. In the Renton Reporter editorial of January 27, 2010 a week prior to the KCLS annexation, Dean Radford wrote: “Renton residents will have some local control over whether the city builds a new library, perhaps in the Highlands, if and when a levy to do so is placed on the ballot. That’s a glimmer of local control, although the building would belong to KCLS.” Beyond this editorial, there were four special reports on the KCLS annexation issue; in these reports, the Renton Reporter never once mentioned that the Cedar River Library would be subject to closure with annexation to KCLS. Yet this possibility of closure is obviously an issue of paramount importance to thousands of trusting citizens. (See more on this issue by clicking here) One must conclude that either the editor did not know all the facts when he wrote his editorial of January 27, 2010, or else he was trying to mislead the public. I like Mr. Radford, so I want to believe it was a misunderstanding on his part, but voters need to keep that in mind as they review today’s library editorial.

Reason number 3– The editor cites the lack of clarity in this election, but goes on to support the people who brought us the lack of clarity

In today’s editorial Mr. Radford says, “Unfortunately, what’s really missing today is clarity, especially about the cost to renovate the library over the Cedar.” Of course we lack clarity because (A) there was a deliberate push by the Piazza library supporter to force this library choice too fast, when the plans including re-purposing were far from complete; and (B)the Renton Reporter has swallowed a rushed, secret KCLS study with blatant errors, including double-dipping on contingencies, incorrect mitigation fees, wrong assumptions, and other problems. I agree that this is “Unfortunate,” but throwing support to the people that created this lack of clarity is foolish, especially when they have been found responsible for similar misinformation before.

Reason number 4– The editor uses a circular argument to try to dismiss re-purposing costs, a dis-service to taxpayers

The editor’s words speak for themselves here. Read them carefully. He says; “Don’t be misled by assertions that it will cost the city $10 million (or more) to upgrade it for another use. That’s only true for a state-of-the-art library. The city could continue using the building right away, with no renovation. When the time is right, it could seek the dollars needed to upgrade for a specific use, just like any other city-owned building.” Okay. So Mr. Radford is saying we can continue to use the building as is (as a library?), and we won’t have to pay the millions more until we want to upgrade if for another specific use (like an environmental center). He is agreeing with the exact assertion he is trying to dismiss. It would be laughable except that taxpayers will be on the hook for this future re-purposing expense and they may not know it. They will also be on the hook for annual operating costs for another facility, and there is no budget for this.

Many Renton residents are not aware that the taxpayer-funded Gateway Park west of the Piazza, including mature trees and landscape, will be torn out if the Big 5 (Piazza Site) is chosen for the new library.  This is because the Gateway Park square footage must be combined with the former Big 5 parking lot and the former Big 5 building in order to accommodate the new building and it’s entryway.  The landscape and trees are finally reaching maturity in this park.  Taxpayers paid approximately $250,000 to have this designed and landscaped around 1999, and to have an elaborate irrigation system installed (which has been helping the plantings grow and thrive for twelve years).  Like the parking in the area, the cost of this park has never been included in estimates for the cost of the Piazza Library.  If land purchases, off-site parking, and the cost of this park were included in the Piazza library cost, then the total price of this option would be between 11 and 12 million dollars, compared the the 10.1 million estimated for remodeling of the Cedar River Library.

If the Piazza Library site is chose, there will be an outcry when these trees get cut down. (Many Renton citizens have been complaining already about tree-losses downtown, primarily due to widening of nearby Rainier Avenue.)

You can read the story in the Renton Patch here  “Did KCLS Wrongly Use Public Funds to Mail July 2nd Letter”, and in the Renton Reporter here  “PDC complaints mount against KCLS over Renton mailing; read letter, study”

There have also been many complaints in cyberspace about this, including a large number in newspaper comment sections.  We have also received several letters of concern at city hall, in our official email (even though the letter was produced by KCLS, not Renton).

I had concerns in late June that KCLS might be preparing such a letter , and I knew it would do harm to the City of Renton’s ability to conduct an election on the library location that is both fair and perceived as fair by Renton’s citizens.  I cautioned KCLS leadership and the PDC about this serious risk in a letter I sent to them on June 25 which you can read here.

I received a response from PDC, which said among other things that KCLS must ensure their letter is “fair and objective.”  As of that response, the PDC had not seen the KCLS letter, and as hard as I tried, I was unable to obtain a copy of the letter before it was put in the mail to 43,000 homes.  Shortly after the letter started showing up in mailboxes, many members of the public found serious accounting and math errors in the analysis behind the letter, along with new subjective and questionable assumptions that were wrongly presented as facts.  As these citizens were contacting the media and writing to PDC (and writing to council,) I summarized my concerns in a blog entry here, and then sent a second letter to the PDC here.

The State Attorney General’s office has provided some excellent guidance to government agencies reminding them to be extremely cautious when informing the public about ballot issues.  One memo, which you can find here, closes with this advice:

“In closing, it is important to remember that the public is generally very sensitive to the use of public facilities or property on ballot propositions or initiatives and takes accusations of violations very seriously. Officers and employees who try to bump up against the “line” that divides lawful from unlawful conduct in this area may find, even if their conduct is eventually judged lawful, that their questionable activity has incited a public backlash against the very position they were attempting to advocate. As a result, public employees should walk a careful line to assure that the public is fully and adequately informed about the consequences of voting on a particular measure, without making unlawful use of public money or property to influence the result of the vote.”

I encourage KCLS and all public agencies to take this advice seriously in the future.