Talk of larger ferry divides Lummi Is.

SOME LUMMI ISLAND residents say a new ferryboat would ease life for the hundreds of people who commute every day on the 38-year-old Whatcom Chief. Others say it would burden the island community with higher property prices and a faster-paced lifestyle, and bring unwanted population growth.

LUMMI ISLAND, Whatcom County - Down at the Well Latte Dah cafe, all this talk about the county buying a bigger, faster ferry to connect the forested island to the mainland is enough to make Polly Hanson's eyes scrunch up in anger, as if she could shoot daggers across the table.

Hansen and the other longtime residents at the island's only cafe figure a new ferry would deliver nothing but wealthy new residents, higher property prices and a faster-paced lifestyle.

"You get the kind of people who want instant ferry service, they want instant everything else," said Hanson, 73, who has lived on the island for 29 years and runs a bed-and-breakfast inn. "All the roads would be widened. We'd be a paved-over lump. The big trees would be cut.

"It's like it always happens. If you build it, they will come."

They are already coming.

In the past 10 years, the population of the Manhattan-size island has increased 41 percent, to about 880 residents - about 90 percent of whom live there full time. In 1996, a single-family home on Lummi Island cost an average of $127,000. Three years later, the average had risen to $178,000, according to Whatcom County real-estate statistics.

The more people living on the island, the more there are who need to get off it. So county officials are studying whether to acquire a bigger ferry.

More than half the island's residents now use the 38-year-old Whatcom Chief at least once a day. It carries 20 cars and 100 people. Commuters complain they have to wait up to an hour during peak hours to get a place on the Chief, which normally comes every 20 minutes.

"We're maxing it out," said Dick Prieve, assistant director of operations for the Whatcom Department of Public Works. "The island is growing 4 percent a year, whether people like it or not. Car traffic is increasing about 2 percent every year."

Between 15 and 20 houses are built every year, and properties on the groomed north end go for a minimum of $300,000.

Years ago, the gillnet-salmon-fishing industry that once sustained many islanders vanished.

Now the longtime residents, consisting mainly of hippies, artists and middle-class pensioners who have liked the laid-back lifestyle, say they are slowly being driven out by higher rents and land prices. They're being replaced by vacationers, richer retirees and families who commute to Bellingham.

It's easy to distinguish the two Lummis. On the northern tip of the island, large homes sport terraces filled with teak patio furniture and well-maintained landscaping.

A few miles away, Legoe Bay has the feel of a funky beach town. The homes have peeling paint and are decorated with sun-bleached antlers and crab buoys. Old pickups and skiffs that have seen better days clutter the yards.

Opinions about the need for a new ferry are as sharply divided.

"If it's a bigger ferry, it will encourage people to buy a house over there," said Sharon Antholt, an art teacher at Western Washington University in Bellingham, who waited in her car at Gooseberry Point during the evening rush. She gestured to the fog-shrouded Lummi Mountain across the water.

"Now that I'm there, I don't want to see anyone else."

But opposing the ferry is easy when you don't commute daily, said Sharon Baker, a bank manager, who clapped when she heard the words "new ferry." She often gets stuck for an hour if the ferry is backed up or if the crew is on a break. "If I have a long wait, I can have a three-hour commute," she said.

Funding needed

While all this talk about a new ferry has created an uproar, it's still just talk.

In part because of the controversy, county officials have delayed applying for funding from the U.S. Department of Transportation until next year, said Jeff Monsen, county director of public works.

They want to get more feedback from the community as well as the Lummi Indian Nation, which leases land to the county for the mainland ferry dock.

If the county receives the money, a new ferry is still three to four years away, officials said. They still have to agree on a size and a price; Monson said the cheapest ferries start at $30 million.

In the meantime, the county will focus on improving parking so people could leave their cars on either side and walk onto the ferry. And officials are working with the Lummi Island Ferry and Transportation Committee to draft a 14-year plan for growth.

The county recently increased ferry service in response to a survey commissioned by the Lummi Island Community Trust. About 55 percent of the households surveyed said more frequent ferry service was a priority. Only about a quarter of the residents thought a bigger ferry was important.

Crew tiring

The Whatcom Chief, with its big painted eagle on the cabin, takes passengers across Hale Passage to and from the world that Lummi Island allows them to escape. The round trip costs $3.

Residents know Mark Richardson, who directs the cars, and Lauren Christiansen, who goes to each of the cars to collect fares and complains about always having to give out change for $20 bills. They know Don Hayes, the senior master, who checks his watch constantly.

But Hayes and his crew are getting tired. "It's really just too small for the amount of traffic we're having," said Hayes, who has worked on the ferry for 26 years. During the morning and afternoon rush, the crew members barely keep up. They go nearly four hours without a break. They frequently make extra trips to carry cars they had to leave behind.

Bad weather and big trucks slow them down, and every time they take a break, they fall even further behind.

But real islanders, insist the critics, don't complain about waiting. That's the price for their cherished rural lifestyle. They simply read a book or chat.

Many people here like being "stuck on the rock," as the joke goes, where there's one general store and one restaurant, which is open only on weekends. There's no bank, no dry cleaners, no gas station and no pharmacy. There's no sewage line and a limited supply of well water.

New residents criticized

Dale Granger's family helped settle the island in 1886. He avoids the wait by going into town once a week in late morning, when the ferry is less busy, and sees no need for a new boat.

"I want the island to stay an island," said Granger, who worked 30 years on the Whatcom Chief.

New ferry or not, these new residents have yet to earn their stripes, argue the gang at Well Latte Dah.

"We haven't had a series of good nor'easterlies to drive off this latest crew of whiners," said Aaron Rupp, a retired commercial fisherman and training officer for the fire department. The gang all laugh.

Of course, they aren't the ones waiting for a ferry.