To the editor:

Confronted with a huge budget deficit and many business failures, Commissioner Angie Homola’s incredible suggestion is that Island County should create a new little bureaucracy: a surface-water utility.

It does not seem to matter to Homola that this would mean new and higher taxes for someone, maybe everyone! Nor does it matter that we currently have excellent protection through our environmental and land-use policies that cost almost nothing to enforce.

No, a new income stream needs to be dragged from our hardworking citizens, who are already stressed in this economic crisis!

“I think it’s where we have to go. Most other counties are doing this already,” said Homola at a commissioners’ meeting. (Record)

At another meeting, as commissioners struggled to make difficult cuts necessary for a balanced budget, they were asked by Sherriff Mark Brown that no further cuts be made from law enforcement.

Many of us feel that there is already a deficit in that area, and fewer officers would endanger the safety of the people of Whidbey Island. Public safety is not just one concern among many — it should be the primary duty of government. Homola’s response? She pushes new clean-water, open-space and land-use policies!

“My quality of life is as important to me as whether I feel safe in my home,” states the commissioner. (Record)

One almost expects to see the White Rabbit come around the corner muttering that he is late.

Nancy Thompson

Clinton