INSIDE

Ericksen asked to assist
in water supply efforts

By Meg Olson

“Things are starting to get stuck,” said Kevin Melsheimer.
The local electrician, owner of Leading Edge Electric, and other members of the local chamber of commerce pressed state representative Doug Ericksen to help resolve the current water crisis.

Ericksen attended the June 15 meeting of the chamber at the Dockside Café to update members on his efforts in the legislature and hear about local concerns. Securing a new source of water was on the top of everyone’s list.

Melsheimer said the building boom that sustained the Point Roberts trades in 2005 was slowing sharply down due to the current water moratorium. “All of us will be unemployed very soon if this is not ended,” he said.

“We can work with Canada on this,” Ericksen said. “There are many ways we can work with politicians from across the border.”

What he needed from Point Roberts, he said, was a unified front. Ericksen speculated that some local residents welcomed the moratorium because they wanted to see less development. “The hard thing, from my perspective, is that there are such diverse views here,” he said.

Byron Velasquez of Small World Tec thought most property owners and residents wanted to see the situation resolved. “There is a place in the middle where most of us would like to see a little growth,” he said. “The extremes will never be satisfied.”

Ericksen said if he had a concrete request he would spearhead negotiations to secure more Canadian water. “We need a proposal for the Point – grass roots up – that we can take to them and negotiate.”