FRONT PAGE

Blue Heron Express rolls on – for now

By Meg Olson

The Point Roberts Blue Heron Express is still alive, but users of the community van will need to build a compelling argument the Point needs the program if they plan to hold on to it next year.

At their October 19 meeting the board of the Whatcom Transportation Authority (WTA) was considering the future of the Point Roberts community van program, and that one option was to discontinue it. “The board did not take any decision as far as taking the van away,” said WTA public information coordinator Kim Cedarstrom. “They still have their van.”

What the board did approve, Cedarstrom said, were new criteria for the community van programs in the county – today there are three – and set a maximum of four. Every three years the WTA will accept proposals for community van service and the new policy will allow staff to evaluate who gets a van for the next three-year period. Point Roberts and the Lake Whatcom Regional Treatment Center will need to reapply in early 2006, and the Lummi Nation, who just got a community van, will need to enter the competitive process the next time the call for proposals comes up.

Applicants for the community vans will need to submit a detailed proposal of how the van would be used, who it benefits, why they need it and how it connects with other WTA services. “They will be weighed against the criteria and against each other,” Cedarstrom said.

Local resident and van supporter, Shannon Thomsen said the criteria, unless they are changed, rule out the possibility of the van staying in Point Roberts. “You’re going to make this a competition and we’re going to lose because we don’t have the population,” she said.

The current criteria hinge on numbers of riders and trips per day, she said. Thomsen said she would like to see the transportation plan criterion, which she understands to be the meat of evaluating a program, be changed from “how many people you expect to use this service, how often would they ride, and how the transportation you are requesting would help alleviate congestion/pollution,” to include some mention of mileage per rider, an important factor in making transportation decisions for distant parts of the county. “I’m not asking that they not have criteria,” she said. “All I’m asking them to give us is a more level playing field.” Point Roberts riders may need the van for different reasons than riders in the county core, but that doesn’t make those reasons less valid.

Thomsen said she disagreed with WTA chairman Jerry Landcastle’s assertion at a previous committee meeting that the Point was seeking an “entitlement” in asking for a community van. “If you take these criteria as they are, a community nearer Bellingham will have an advantage,” she said. “The WTA has an obligation to everybody and they need to have criteria to reflect that. For the Point and other outlying areas what we are proposing is fair.”

Thomsen and a group of supporters of the community van program tried to present their suggested modifications to the criteria that would make them a goal small outlying communities could reach for.

However, they got delayed at the border on October 19 and were five minutes late for the WTA board meeting. Thomsen said they were told the item had already been acted on and discussed and Landcastle did not allow the group to speak later in the meeting. They’ll be back at the board’s November 10 meeting, hoping to have their concerns heard.