Port Angeles Kayak Symposium Canceled
The 2013 Port Angeles Kayak Symposium has been canceled. It had been scheduled for April 12th through 14th.
The owner of Olympic Raft and Kayak, which sponsors the symposium, said:
“I know this decision will not be a popular one, and I do understand what PAKS means to everyone. Please believe me, this has been a heavy weight on my shoulders, but ultimately I have to put the business before anything, even my own heart sometimes. I believe that this was such a difficult decision for me because I do understand what an event like this means to the local and regional community.”
The owner of Olympic Raft and Kayak, which sponsors the symposium, said:
“I know this decision will not be a popular one, and I do understand what PAKS means to everyone. Please believe me, this has been a heavy weight on my shoulders, but ultimately I have to put the business before anything, even my own heart sometimes. I believe that this was such a difficult decision for me because I do understand what an event like this means to the local and regional community.”
posted by Tom Harper at 12:53 PM
28 Comments:
What exactly does that mean? Is he way too busy to manage the event? Too many people signed up to attend?
Why was it cancelled?
Never heard of them before.
Anon 1:06 - No, you are on the wrong track. It's the opposite. Like when a restaurant, clothing store etc. closes, it's a lack of customers. You serve crappy food, sell ugly low quality clothes made by slave labor odds are, many of your customers will eventually look for less toxic options, as they present themselves - despite the fact that said entrepreneur blames the realtor, the internet, the economy and personal gerontolical issues.
You want people to sit in toxic water, odds are they will find other places once word gets out to the present generation that the water is toxic.
Anon 8:41 - Is it unreasonable for one to expect an article about an event being cancelled to actually explain why? The owner of the kayak place, who also is the sponsor of the event is quoted saying all kinds of things.. EXCEPT why!
Okay, I know. It is the PDN we're talking about.
So... the zipline ropes are toxic?
No, Silly. Port Angeles is toxic.
Yes, the industrial "stain" or ring around my kayak took two hours to remove and messed up the finish....will never again kayak downtown....or anywhere near Seattle....or PT....Dung. Spit is fine, for now.
Dude ... this brings me sadness.
Yeah, this just joins a very long list of sports events that fail in Port Angeles.
So anyone want to lay odds on how much longer the discovery marathon will be around?
What is the discovery marathon?
This harbor clean-up study is fucking bullshit. I didn't pollute the harbor so don't make me pay for it. There's talk of getting a grant for the city's share but what happens to that money since they've already been taxing us for it through the utility bills? We'll never see a refund, that's for sure. The city's portion of the study (that we shouldn't even be paying for in the first place) should be coming out of the general fund or some reserves, to be replenished by the grant if it comes through.
The rate-payers paying for the harbor sediment study is just another example of the regular folks subsidizing the Nippon mill. There's no question that the mill is responsible for dumping way more pollution in the harbor than could ever come from city sources; and yet the mill will pay for only a fraction of the study. Will the townspeople ever wake up and stand up to this injustice?
"I didn't pollute the harbor so don't make me pay for it"
This is an interesting comment.
I don't know the particulars of which industrial operation polluted what areas, with what chemicals, when. But, I'll bet they employed Port Angeles residents when they did, and paid taxes that were used to pave roads, and otherwise help run the city.
We all like the conveniences and money these industrial operations produce. We like the oil and other petrochemicals well enough that you still see lots of big vehicles driving around in Port Angeles.
Yeah, the Port is polluted, and so is the rest of the planet. We are happy to get the perceived benefits of modern life, and real slow to stop the pollution. But, asked to be responsible for the damages caused by the things that give us this modern life, and we see the great outcry.
People like to talk about how much they care, until they actually have to do something. Then the crowd really thins out.
Hey, I haven't pooped in the water for years.
"We all like the conveniences and money these industrial operations produce. We like the oil and other petrochemicals well enough that you still see lots of big vehicles driving around in Port Angeles."
I've never been employed by any of the polluting industries around the harbor. I don't want telephone books and I read the PDN online. Nothing in the harbor is refining oil or other petrochemicals. I ride my bike whenever I can and combine trips when I drive. Again, I did not pollute the harbor. The companies that did should be paying for the study and the clean-up.
Up through the early sixties the City of Port Angeles dumped their raw sewage into the harbor. Every conceivable chemical was dumped down resident toilets. So, yeah, the city and everybody that shit in a toilet contributed to the polluting of the harbor.
To Digital Amish -
Are you seriously implying that Port Angeles residents who flushed their toilets and sent dirty dish water down their drains should bear more responsibility for cleaning up that harbor than the heavy industries who purposely dumped tons of toxic chemicals and heavy metals into the water?
The point trying to be made here is that the biggest-by-far polluters are being shielded by the City from having to pay their fair share, which is placing an unfair financial burden on city residents.
Folks caught onto this when they smelled a rat with the HarborWorks fiasco. But now the same city official mind-set is in play in shifting pollution cleanup responsibility from major polluters --- wealthy corporations --- to the public.
The problem isn't so much what we are doing, it's just that there is so many of us doing it that nature can't clean it up anymore.
Isaac Newton predicted that mankind would vanish by 2060, he may have been right, time will tell the way mankind goes about doing things. On the bright side, if you take a mortgage out in 2055 you won’t have to pay it off.
Blame everything on industry seems to be the mantra around here.
It's the City of Port Angeles wastewater treatment plant that works hard to treat its contributors daily offerings prior to discharging the effluent 3500 feet offshore into the harbor. Compare that to the city of Victoria across the strait that directly discharges sewage without any treatment into the Strait!
Nippon's treated effluent is piped about 1200 feet NNW of its Ediz Hook wastewater treatment plant into the Strait, not the Harbor.
So who is dumping into the Harbor again?
"Up through the early sixties the City of Port Angeles dumped their raw sewage into the harbor."
I wasn't even alive then. My parents didn't leave here then. Everyone who moved here or was born here in the last 50 years is still responsible to pay for the study?
"But now the same city official mind-set is in play in shifting pollution cleanup responsibility from major polluters --- wealthy corporations --- to the public."
Don't get me wrong, I think those responsible for polluting our planet should be responsible for their fair share. We all gotta wipe our asses.
But, who really thinks that is what actually happens? Who do you think paid for the clean up of the BP oil spill in the Gulf, for example? BP? Or do you think the $4 a gallon gas we've been paying ever since has been going in part to that clean up?
When a barrel of oil was close to $150, a gallon of gas was around $4. For the last year or longer, the price has been around $80, and the price for a gallon of gas has been around $4.
Corporations just pass their "operating costs" onto consumers. Us.
Nice try at re-creating history, Anon. 3:52, when you say "Nippon's treated effluent is piped about 1200 feet NNW of its Ediz Hook wastewater treatment plant into the Strait, not the Harbor." What you don't mention is that up until taxpayers paid for and built that outfall pipe last year (under the guise of "mitigation" for the removal of the Elwha dams), the mill discharged its effluent onto the western shoreline of Ediz Hook. And years before that, the mill and other waterfront industries dumped untreated waste directly into the harbor.
It's too bad that so many in town are so lacking in historical information that they might be duped by your clever manipulations.
"So who is dumping into the Harbor again?"
The study is not to determine who is dumping toxics into the Harbor, now, but to evaluate what exists after many decades of such practices from a variety of sources.
We the people pay, no matter how cleverly the situation is constructed.
Cease! Cease! DeSota has went.
Nice try to you Mr.7:57 am on April 3rd. I did check my facts, as you should once in a while. See
NATIONAL POLLUTANT DISCHARGE ELIMINATION SYSTEM
WASTE DISCHARGE PERMIT NO. WA-000292-5. Nippon's outfall 001 has always been to the strait, not the harbor. The Elwha Project money didn't relocate the outfall, just improved it in the same location. Get your facts straight please.
Oh, how wrong we have always been! There has been some terrible mistake!
Anon 1:27 wants us to believe that the paper mills at the base of Ediz Hook can never have discharged any pollutants to the harbor because "outfall 001 has always been to the strait".
How generous, then, of innocent Nippon to even contribute a small fraction of the cost of cleanup for harbor pollution. We should beg forgiveness for thinking baseless thoughts and write thank you notes to Japan instead.
Fascinating to what lengths some people will go to twist and spin public opinion to favor powerful special interests.
BTW - why do you suppose the regulatory permit is called a National Pollution Discharge ELIMINATION permit? Could it mean that the holder of the permit generates pollution that should be regulated and eliminated?
I'll assume that 7:36 pm understands that pollution permits manage, not eliminate, pollution.
Matter is neither created nor destroyed is a rule of the universe so what's left over, albeit modified, is discharged after treatment.
I'll get back to my hut and tend my warming fire after scavenging for some food - there's no harm in that and we all need to live like I do.
Anon 8:08- As was posted previously:
"We all like the conveniences and money these industrial operations produce. We like the oil and other petrochemicals well enough that you still see lots of big vehicles driving around in Port Angeles.
Yeah, the Port is polluted, and so is the rest of the planet. We are happy to get the perceived benefits of modern life, and real slow to stop the pollution. But, asked to be responsible for the damages caused by the things that give us this modern life, and we see the great outcry.
People like to talk about how much they care, until they actually have to do something. Then the crowd really thins out."
With the US now fixated on fracking and drilling, and building pipelines to facilitate the extraction and burning as much fossil fuels as we can, as fast as we can, we can look forward to a happy and prosperous future. For a little while, atleast.
We USED to care about the future we were creating for our children. Now, all we care about is our comfort, and money.
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