PORT TOWNSEND — Legislation to limit state Department of Health authority to shut down commercial shellfish operations in Mystery Bay off Marrowstone Island based on boat moorage buoy concentrations will be high on Rep. Kevin Van De Wege’s agenda in the coming legislative session.
“In my mind, they’re going a little bit overboard on this, and we are going to try to reign them in a little,” the Sequim Democrat told about 50 attending Monday’s Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Elks Lodge.
The Department of Health in August shut down the portion of Mystery Bay outside Griffith Point, citing too many boats moored in the shellfish-rich bay.
The National Shellfish Sanitation Program definition of a marina includes any water area with a structure such as mooring buoys constructed to provide temporary or permanent docking or mooring for more than 10 boats.
The state uses this as a benchmark for determining a closure to protect shellfish beds from possible pollution sources.
Spread across bay
In recent years, more than 60 mooring buoys have been spread across the bay in addition to mooring facilities at Mystery Bay State Park and several private docks.
In all, there are structures to accommodate more than 100 boats in Mystery Bay.
The number of boats continuously moored in Mystery Bay outside of the state park is about 30 in the winter. Up to 73 boats have been noted in Mystery Bay during the boating season.
Van De Wege, a paramedic with Clallam County Fire District 3, is serving his second two-year term, is now deputy majority whip in the lower house.
Feeding wildlife
He also proposes legislation to make feeding wildlife illegal.
“There are people that are artificially sustaining entire herds of elk or deer,” he said.
He said he would also join his legislative colleagues in looking a increasing taxation on oil tankers using Puget Sound waterways to transport oil.
Democrats and environmentalists have lauded Van De Wege for his key role in pushing through legislation to secure funding for basing an emergency response tug boat in Neah Bay at the mouth of the Strait of Juan de Fuca where it meets the Pacific Ocean.
“That tug has proven very valuable,” Van De Wege said, supporting 42 missions in 10 years.
“We’re putting the onus on the [maritime] industry to keep it out there,” the lawmaker said.
“Big Oil, which I battle a lot and will probably battle with more basically embraced it, sort of.”
Van De Wege serves on the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee with oversight of the Department of Natural Resources, the Technology Committee, the General Government Appropriations Committee and the House Rules Committee.
He said he worked with Rep. Lynn Kessler, D-Hoquiam, his 24th Legislative District seat mate and House majority leader, on pushing through an auto tab renewal opt-in program to give people the option of paying $5 through their auto registration for state parks.
He said he expects to see figures released Oct. 15 that will show how many have participated in the program.
Van De Wege is also supportive of biomass legislation that would allow the burning of timber harvest wood waste for generating power.
“We want it to be a business model that will succeed,” he said, citing a number of mills that have already adopted the practice.
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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.