Robin Laananen
Tim and Patty Crawford have spent $50,000 to protect this land.
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TIM AND PATTY Crawford don't call themselves environmental zealots. But since they purchased their three-quarter-acre lot in Shoreline five years ago, a cozy fenced property with a salmon stream running through the middle, they've become seasoned advocates for the stream and its beleaguered wildlife. They say they've had no choice.
First, the city of Shoreline proposed building a new fire station next to Thornton Creek, right on the lot the Crawfords own. Next the city refused to stop an upstream neighbor from putting a backyard cottage next to the creek. So the Crawfords, armed with the city's own environmental rules, sued the city and landowner. Then two years ago, the Crawfords tackled an even more daunting cause: trying to prevent a massive retirement center from being plunked down on the banks of Thornton Creek. So far, they've won some hard-fought battles, but the fight is costing them heavily, both in dollars and personal trauma. This is a story of how far one couple is willing to go to save its stream. And there's still no end in sight.
SEVEN MONTHS AGO, the Crawfords thought their troubles were over. They emerged victorious from King County Superior Court, having won a lawsuit that halted construction of the proposed retirement center not far downstream from the Crawfords on N.E. First in Shoreline, a suburb just north of Seattle. But last week, Tim was in court facing charges of burglary and harassment that he allegedly committed on the site of that same project, owned by Aegis Assisted Living, which is based in Redmond. Aegis' construction foreman says Tim's opposition tactics literally stepped over the line, accusing Tim of trespassing on the company's site and obstructing construction. Aegis has also filed suit in county court, claiming the Crawfords and 50 other Shoreline residents allegedly slandered and libeled the company at a neighborhood meeting. This legal onslaught by Aegis is the most personal yet in its scrap with the Crawfords, who contend that the city of Shoreline is sacrificing salmon to economic development by refusing to keep Aegis' development back from Thornton Creek, home to the threatened chinook and various other salmon species.
At issue is the recuperative potential of Thornton Creek, which flows off the largest watershed in Seattle and is the city's only remaining habitat for chinook salmon. (see "Where's the City?" p. 20). The waterway is by no means picturesque for most of its 15-mile run to Lake Washington. Private development has stripped its banks of trees and shrubs, and flood walls have shaped it into a narrow channel that is inhospitable to fish. Still, cutthroat trout and coho salmon populate the stream in hardy enough numbers that river otters swim the creek to hunt them. Seattle Public Utilities has dedicated millions of dollars to help restore the creek, and a recent proposed Northgate Mall expansion that would have permanently buried a segment of the stream in a concrete culvert ran into fierce citizen opposition and has been put on hold indefinitely.
Thornton Creek is also a cherished amenity on the Crawfords' property. The stream runs under the couple's backyard fence, traverses the length of their lot, and emerges from beneath their carport as it continues downstream. Patty has videotaped salmon spawning in her backyard rock pond, which she and Tim have shaded with a grape arbor. Patty says an otter once entered her yard hunting the fish. She says at first she thought the city of Shoreline was indifferent to projects near the creek because officials didn't know it teemed with wildlife. So she went out and caught the salmon on tape. "We thought the city should be excited about the fish in the creek," says Patty. "We were that ignorant."
The city of Shoreline sees Thornton Creek through a very different lens, as evidenced by the scene a few hundred yards south of the Crawfords' property, where a parallel fork of the stream runs alongside the Interstate 5 embankment as it passes behind Aegis' 4.5-acre site. There, a culvert is barely visible beneath a thin row of firs and a blackberry bramble. The foundations of Aegis' 140,000-square-foot complex are squeezed in close to the creek, replacing the 100-foot cottonwoods that were cut down to make room. Patty, brandishing site plans, shows where parking lots are planned next to a pond just upstream of where the two forks converge. It's not a pretty sight, and a casual passerby probably wouldn't stop to view what happens on the property. But Patty says this wasn't the case until recently. She says that under the property's previous owner, United Cerebral Palsy of King and Snohomish Counties, native plants were reclaiming the site. The site also included a public park around the pond, donated by area businesses and civic associations.
The Crawfords aren't giving up on the creek; so far, they've sunk more than $50,000 of their own money into their campaign. When the Aegis facility received the city of Shoreline's blessing to disregard city and state laws that require 100-foot buffers around salmon-bearing streams (in some areas, Aegis had permission to pour concrete within 10 feet of the creek's banks), the Crawfords took Aegis and the city to court.
