7/6/08
Seattle Post Intelligencer

Environmentalists seek 'low impact' mandates; Governments side with builders

By ROBERT MCCLURE
P-I REPORTER

Gov. Chris Gregoire made restoring Puget Sound a key part of her environmental policy.

Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels is known as one of the greenest mayors in the country.

And King County Executive Ron Sims has long labored to make sure people know he loves the Earth.

Yet who's standing in the way of requiring building techniques that a growing chorus of scientists says could rein in the largest source of most of Puget Sound's worst pollutants?

Gregoire's Ecology Department. And the city of Seattle. And King County. And Tacoma, and Pierce and Snohomish counties, and other local governments.

All are fighting in a state administrative court proceeding against environmentalists who want to require builders to use "low impact" techniques. Those methods slurp up rainwater that, in traditional developments, carries away pesticides, fertilizer, oil, dog poop and the other residues of our daily lives, dumping them in a nearby stream or bay.

Read more here.