Wrecking yard opponents fight on

by Pat Muir
Yakima Herald-Republic

WAPATO -- Opponents of Yakima County's plan to move a wrecking yard on the road to wine country spent an afternoon at the disputed site recently, discussing landscaping details with county officials.

But they were adamant their cooperation does not mean they are conceding defeat.

Craig Fisher, one of the most outspoken critics of the move and a member of the opposition group Citizens Protecting Resources, said he went along because he wanted to make sure the county lives up to a requirement that it screen the site from view.

But in an interview, Fisher restated the group's opposition to the location of a wrecking yard on one of the county's main wine-tourism routes.

"We absolutely want to cooperate with the county on designing the screening in the event that (the relocation) does go through," he said. "But we are still of the firm belief that that is the wrong location."

The conflict stems from the county commissioners' decision in 2004 to move the Douglas Auto Wrecking yard from an island in the Yakima River near the Donald-Wapato Bridge to the disputed site at the convergence of Yakima Valley Highway and Donald-Wapato Road.

The idea was to get it out of the river for flood control reasons and to prevent contamination of the river. The deal was finalized last June with an agreement that the county would pay Quintin Douglas up to $425,000 to move his business. He was given two years with a $50,000 bonus as an incentive to get the job done in half that time.

Since then opponents -- some of whom protested the move early in the process -- have come out of the woodwork. This despite the county's consistently stated position that the move is a "done deal."

Citizens Protecting Resources, or CPR, hired Yakima land-use attorney Jamie Carmody and last month sued to stop the move. They allege that ballooning costs for the deal constitute illegal gifting of public funds. Having failed to get a response from the county, they filed a motion last week for summary judgment. The county has a 20-day deadline to respond.

The group also launched a Web site objecting to the deal on environmental and economic development grounds. The site includes copies of the lawsuit and other documents as well as a summary of the opponents' positions. It also urges people to contact the county commissioners and other elected officials.

From the county's perspective, however, the project is moving forward. And during Tuesday's site visit, county officials actually found some common ground with its critics.

Commissioner Mike Leita, Public Services Director Vern Redifer and county fish and wildlife biologist Joel Freudenthal agreed with the four-member CPR delegation that the site should be screened with landscaping rather than just a fence.

"It is a consensus, if you will, that there needs to be a green component," Redifer said.

Landscaping, Leita explained, will be less of a target for graffiti than fencing and ultimately will cost less to maintain.

It can also be done in such a way to meet the required 8-foot screening requirement on the project, said Colie Hough-Beck, a Seattle landscape architect who is consulting on the project.

The aesthetic benefits will help the site maintain an appearance decent enough for wine tourism, according to Leita, who said he envisions the natural screening will look like
"a Tuscany thing."

While the discussion was amicable, Fisher emphasized that agreement on fencing does not indicate his group is backing down.

Fencing "doesn't keep the water from getting polluted," he said. "It doesn't fix the money issue. It really doesn't fix the tourism issue, either."

* Pat Muir can be reached at 577-7693 or pmuir@yakimaherald.com

* On the Web: www.citizensprotectingresources.org.