Thinking Big: Issaquah, Olympia Warm To Global Task

You can't say they think small in Issaquah.

While other suburban communities struggle with mundane things like new roads, schools and houses, there's a group of people here trying to come up with local solutions to a cosmic problem: the effect of global warming.

They're doing it for a local reason, too: Issaquah, with its back against the wall of the Cascades, gets some of the worst air pollution in the Puget Sound area.

And there's a similar motivation for another group of future-thinkers in Olympia. Living in a city built on fill atop an estuary, they're so concerned about melting ice sheets and rising sea levels that they've convinced the city to buy nonpolluting electric cars and to enforce a strict tree-protection ordinance.

It's the spirit of "think globally, act locally" - very locally.

Both city councils have created their own global-warming task forces to talk about how they can take steps locally to reduce the atmospheric pollution many scientists believe will lead to an increase in the planet's temperature. Last week, they gathered in Bellevue with regional experts and local politicians to talk about such heady subjects as atmospheric change, ozone control, decreasing snowpacks and rising sea levels.

"People are taking this very seriously," said Issaquah organizer John Seebeth.

It's hard to imagine local governments tackling a more abstract and complex subject - and one they have less chance of

changing.

On the other hand, change has to start somewhere, reasons Issaquah task-force chairman David Kappler. And if Issaquah sets an example for the Northwest, the Northwest could set an example for the country.

But, he admitted, "I'm not sure this group is going to change the world."

Olympia, which got a head start when the City Council made the study of global-warming issues one of its 10 top goals in 1990, recently passed a resolution committing the city to addressing the problem over the long term.

As a result, the city now owns three electric cars, replaces old cars with fuel-efficient new models, encourages car-pooling, is improving walkways and bikeways, buys recycled products, recycles motor oil and antifreeze, and is giving every city-owned building an audit to cut energy use.

None of this may sound new or different. After all, Seattle has been recycling for years.

What's different is the motivation. Dorothy Craig, policy analyst for Olympia's public-works department, says the impetus behind all these changes is concern about global warming.

"I hear people say it's a global problem, there's nothing I can do about it," Craig said. To which Olympia can argue: We are doing something about it.

The Issaquah group, formed in October, is looking at similar ideas. In the short term, they'd like to see resolutions passed embracing greater awareness of the global-warming problem. In the long run, they want mass transit, more car-pooling, more bikeways and fewer concessions to the automobile.

"Global warming" refers to the theory advanced by many scientists that the earth's temperature is rising because the amount of carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons and other pollutants is increasing in the atmosphere.

How might global warming affect this region? Robert Fleagle, a professor emeritus of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington, addressed the task forces last week and told them higher temperatures could mean more precipitation - mostly falling as rain - in the winter, and less in the summer.

That could mean more severe and more frequent flooding in the winter, and a smaller snowpack because more of the precipitation will fall as rain. And this area relies on snowpack for irrigation, drinking water and hydroelectric power. In fact, Fleagle says, every midwinter storm deposits snow in the mountains that could be valued in the millions of dollars.

Global warming could also trigger a rise in the ocean level caused by melting ice sheets. A rising sea level could inundate the Nisqually River delta area, lead to salt-water intrusion into fresh-water drinking wells and cause more erosion of the shorelines, Fleagle said. In long-range plans, Olympia experts talk of their sewage plant being flooded, major roads being underwater and the downtown-business section awash in salt water.

In Issaquah, task-force members say they need to make people understand how global warming could change the world. "We need an extreme raising of consciousness by the business community and elected officials," said Michael Crouse, a member of the Issaquah Kiwanis Club. To that end, the group is composed of a variety of members - from politicians to Kiwanis Club leaders.