Mount Baker from Cypress Island
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efore 1968, there was no unified voice for the environment in Washington. Then a group of visionary conservationists got together to advocate for stronger environmental protections. In the process, they created one of the first and most effective state-focused environmental organizations in the country. Since then, Washington Environmental Council consistently has been on the forefront of efforts to advance smart environmental protections in our state. We were instrumental in enacting bedrock laws to safeguard our communities and our wild lands, including the Shoreline Management Act, the State Environmental Policy Act, the State Superfund Law, and the Growth Management Act. In recent years, WEC has gone back to our roots – bringing people together through the Environmental Priorities Coalition. By unifying the environmental community around four clear goals, we have built collective power and succeeded in advancing bold solutions. We’ve worked to address climate change by promoting cleaner cars and greener buildings, and setting responsible limits on climate pollution. We also led the Priorities effort to pass the nation’s smartest e-waste recycling law. WEC works beyond Olympia to protect Washington’s environment. We played a central role in the No on I-933 campaign, an initiative that would have allowed for irresponsible development across our state. We have worked to establish basic safeguards for our streams and rivers. And in a state defined by our majestic forests, WEC has worked to protect important fish and wildlife habitat and move us towards modern and sustainable forest practices. Since our inception, WEC has helped to create a strong, unified voice for the environment by bringing together uncommon partnerships across communities, issues, and political parties. Together with you, our partners, we’re looking forward to 40 more years of building a better future for our children and for all of Washington. Cover: Patos Island Lighthouse, Alden Point, Patos Island State Park, San Juan County
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he present day achievements of the Washington Environmental Council make me proud. I believe our success comes from setting priorities and that means making tough choices and saying no to people with important and good ideas. Being disciplined and focused is what makes WEC so effective. By not trying to be everything to everyone, WEC has helped the movement to a powerful new place. Looking back to our early days, Governor Dan Evans asked environmentalists and his key cabinet and legislative leaders to come up with ten environmental priorities – if there was agreement, he would call a special session of the legislature. WEC helped pull it together, he called the special session in 1970, and nine out of ten priorities passed. A year later, the Shoreline Management Act was passed. Exciting times then and today! – Joan Thomas, former State Parks Commissioner and one of the founders of WEC
Nisqually River Delta, Pierce and Thurston Counties
Hemlock & redcedar, Olympic Peninsula
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ashington Environmental Council is the type of group I’d love to see in every state in the nation.
WEC’s expanded partnership with Washington Conservation Voters, when combined with the leadership on the Priorities coalition, gives the entire community a cohesive voice in the state capital. That is very powerful. The power comes from focusing a community around Priorities – what you put on the top of the agenda, and what do you choose not to put on top of the agenda - in any given year. Every legislator in Olympia –friend and foe alike – always knows the four environmental priorities! All around the nation, people are looking at this model and the success it has enjoyed. I predict it will be widely replicated. Beyond question, the environmental community is enjoying a new era in Washington State, and much of that can be credited to WEC. After 40 years, WEC remains at the cutting edge of innovation among state green groups. – Denis Hayes, President of the Bullitt Foundation and founder of the first Earth Day
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f you care about clean water then you should know about Washington Environmental Council. WEC’s involvement in the fight around Buckhorn Mountain helped even out the odds of a David vs. two Goliaths - the mining company and the state government itself. In the early 1990s WEC got involved and transformed the nature of the fight from a ‘not in my backyard’ struggle of a small group of Okanogan Highlands residents to a statewide issue. Good science and the law helped stop the stateapproved mining company plan to blow off the top of Buckhorn Mountain and pollute the local waters. WEC brought expertise, relationships and the voice of the state environmental community to the table. They helped get that word out and built support for the passage of the Metals Mining Act in 1994. The need for WEC’s statewide role is stronger than ever. They help ensure that our laws are improved and enforced. State agencies must do a better job. We need WEC to continue their commitment to protect the public interest in a clean and healthy environment. – David Kliegman, Okanogan Highlands Alliance
Vine Maples along the Wenatchee River
Aerial, San Juan Islands, San Juan County
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y name is Aden Kahr and I’m eleven years old. I’m a sixth-grader at the Bush School in Seattle. Over the past couple of years, I’ve worked to find solutions to climate change. I started reaching out to others in my school and community. Working with WEC and the Environmental Priorities Coalition, I met with legislators and the Governor to urge them to lead the way on fighting climate change. I have a deep commitment to make a difference on climate change. It’s the absolute most critical challenge facing our planet and it’s going to affect me and everyone in my generation if we don’t take action NOW. I’m optimistic that together we can find solutions to this profound predicament. – Aden Kahr, Seattle, WA
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worked with WEC during the campaign to help defeat Initiative 933. That initiative would have opened the door for irresponsible development here in Snohomish County and was an enormous threat to the future of farming in our state. My family has been farming Snohomish for almost 100 years. Along with the dairy, we’ve grown broccoli, peas, corn, and a variety of seed crops in our fields. We greatly respect the land that has given us so much and we know our biggest responsibility is to take care of the land for the next generation to farm. WEC worked with me on the ground here in Snohomish County — getting the word out to voters about the danger to our farmland and way of life. Hundreds of farmers like me across the state joined together in the campaign to stop that initiative. We helped build a strong coalition who all shared the common thread of wanting to protect our communities and preserve our irreplaceable farmland. WEC helped make sure that people around Washington heard our voices loud and clear. – Cliff Bailey, Snohomish, Washington
Aspens, Cascade Range
Hoh Rain Forest
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first got involved with WEC in 1979, when I was outraged by some of the logging I’d seen out on the Olympic Peninsula. I tried to find out what was going on and how it could be done better, so I turned to WEC as a source of information. And the next thing I knew, I was taking a three-day tour around the Olympic Peninsula with the chair of the WEC Forestry Committee. By the time I got back, I was hooked. I’ve been working on forestry issues for WEC ever since. When I look back over the decades of working on forestry for WEC, I can see real progress. Early on, we took some important steps forward with the Timber, Fish and Wildlife Cooperative, which added riparian buffers and review of roads and harvest on unstable slopes on both State and private forest lands. WEC continues to oversee the Forest and Fish Habitat Conservation Plan along with the other members of the Conservation Caucus. More recently we had some hard-fought successes around state forest logging levels and Forest Stewardship Council certification. But we’ve still got a ways to go before our forests are truly sustainably managed; implementation of the regulations and agreements and the adequacy of water quality protections remain ongoing concerns. Achieving real and lasting protections for our state and private forests will continue to take a lot of work and a lot of patience. The only way we’re going make progress is to stay involved, bring people together and hammer out ways of doing things better. And that’s something that WEC has proven it can do. – Marcy Golde, Olympic Forest Coalition and WEC Board Member
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first became involved with WEC after reading a newspaper article about the Local Farms – Healthy Kids campaign. As a parent of two daughters I had been working in Port Angeles to bring locally-grown food to our schools and was thrilled to learn that WEC was working to make this a reality for kids across Washington. Working with WEC on this campaign was a totally inspiring and rewarding experience. Participating in the Legislative Workshop gave me the opportunity to see first-hand how organized, competent, and dedicated WEC and the other coalition partners were in achieving their environmental priorities. This experience inspired me to head back to my community to seek support for the Local Farms – Healthy Kids bill from parents, teachers, and our school board. It also inspired me to visit Olympia and lobby my legislators directly. Of course the fact that the legislation passed was very rewarding, but perhaps more rewarding still, was my renewed sense of hope and the belief that each one of us really can make a difference. – Beth Loveridge, Port Angeles, WA
Aerial, Palouse
Quinault River, Olympic National Park
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joined the board of WEC in 1998. Little did I realize then that I would get involved with a six-year negotiation around Manastash Creek, a tributary creek near Ellensburg. Water rights in Washington have traditionally been a place where a history of distrust prevents any meaningful progress – it’s a loaded issue here and in other Western states. Through the Manastash Creek Steering Committee, we were able to bring farmers, environmentalists, Tribes, state agencies, and others together and eventually work out an agreement that led to the restoration of the creek, while providing water needed by local farmers. With our water supply at risk due to climate change and population growth, we’ll need to take this successful model and build on it. – John Arum, WEC Board Member
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ashington Environmental Council is today the leading environmental organization in Washington.
WEC is viewed by those in government and in the private sector as the most influential and most effective environmental advocacy organization and clearly the one with which to do business. This is not because WEC is the best place to “get a deal”, but because WEC is a mature organization with effective staff and board leadership that is decisive, fair and confident enough to compromise where compromise is appropriate, but tough enough to know when to say “no”. Combine all that with WEC’s partnership with Washington Conservation Voters and you have a very significant organization indeed. The challenges we face and the deadlines associated with them are daunting indeed. We’ve spent 150 years creating the problems we face now on climate and Puget Sound and many other issues. To have any hope of meeting our goals in time we need an effective, mature and sophisticated environmental community pushing and pulling society along. Having the wisdom and sophistication of WEC at the helm of that community will be absolutely critical to success. – Jay Manning, Director of the Washington State Department of Ecology
Forest canopy, Hurricane Ridge
Hurricane Ridge, Olympic National Park
Washington Environmental Council extends our most sincere thanks to all of the partners, members, board, staff, volunteers, and supporters who, over the years, made our success possible. Special thanks to the sponsors of our 40th Anniversary Celebration featured on the following pages.
Fabulous at40
Congratulations to the Washington Environmental Council
Cascadia Law Group is delighted to join WEC’s member organizations and our community at large in celebrating your long history of hard work to protect our natural heritage. It has been our great privilege and pleasure to work so closely with WEC for so many productive years. We are delighted to mark the occasion of your 40th anniversary tonight, and look forward to continuing our work with WEC to face the environmental challenges of the coming year.
Cascadia Law Group PLLC specializes in environmental law, providing clients with the most effective representation available in our region. The lawyers
in our firm, in offices in Seattle, Olympia, and Winthrop, represent clients in litigation and regulatory matters that include complex, sometimes controversial environmental, land use, and natural resource issues. www.cascadialaw.com lawyers@cascadialaw.com
Seattle Rodney L. Brown, Jr. Joshua M. Lipsky Kurt B. Peterson Stephen J. Tan Eric Giles, Executive Director
Olympia Tanya Barnett Tom McDonald Joseph A. Rehberger
Winthrop Mary McCrea
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lawyers working to protect the environment
Grateful for 40 years of environmental leadership and protection.
Bricklin newman Dold tions and on la u t a r g n t Co Washing o t u o y ncil, thank ntal Cou e m n o r i nd Env embers a rts m , f f a t s s fo it for the ef s r e e t n volu s. t 40 year s a p e h t of
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DAN EVANS CONSULTING
The Donnelly Gray Group at Smith Barney
Congratulations to Washington Environmental Council:Â 40 years leading the way on environmental protections.
601 Union Street, Suite 5200 Seattle, WA 98101 206-343-2933
 2008 Citigroup Global Markets Inc. Member SIPC. Smith Barney is a division and service mark of Citigroup Global Markets Inc. and is used and registered throughout the world. Citi and Citi with Arc Design are trademarks and service marks of Citigroup Inc. or its affiliates, and are used and registered throughout the world.
Congratulations
Congratulations to Washington Environmental Council for 40 years of creating our state’s landmark environmental victories. We need WEC now more than ever, to lead our state in advancing strong, smart protections for our land, air, and water. Joe Ryan and Lee Nelson
Thank you for 40 years helping make Washington environmentally conscious.
Special thanks to Art Wolfe for the generous use of his beautiful photos of Washington. www.artwolfe.com
Beargrass Blooms in Spray Park
www.wecprotects.org