Sumas residents ponder if manufacturing facility is a jobs vs. environment debate
The Sumas community is grappling over whether to allow a company to build a manufacturing facility that makes concrete blocks, which could brings some jobs but would also impact area wetlands and a residential neighborhood.
A public hearing is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 12, at the Sumas City Hall, where the city council will hear about the proposed Sumas Concrete Products facility. The proposal calls for two buildings totaling 19,000 square feet to make a variety of products, including concrete building blocks and permeable paving stones that allow rain to soak into the ground. The facility is projected to have nine employees.
The proposed project would go into the Sumas industrial district at 3867 Kneuman Road. The proponent, Severin Samulski, operates a similar facility in Abbotsford, B.C. He is president of Lakeport Reach LLC, which does business as Sumas Concrete Products.
He said the Sumas facility would use the best available technologies to mitigate air quality and noise impacts. Some wetlands would also be filled, but the proposal calls for enhancing 4.4 acres of nearby wetlands as well as buffers along the south side of Sumas Creek.
A hill that overlooks the property is home to a neighborhood built around 2005. Those neighbors are concerned about the potential noise and air pollution, as well as the aquifer that is around that property.
“Everything in that area flows into the (nearby) creek,” said Steven Brock, one of the residents in the neighborhood concerned about the project, adding that it’s a beautiful, important area that shouldn’t be developed. “This is the wrong place for this project.”
It’s been the topic of conversation around town since it was introduced earlier this year, said Mayor Kyle Christensen. He’s heard from those in favor and against the project, prompting the city to provide hundreds of pages of information and giving residents more than a month to look through it before the public hearing.
“We wanted to make sure we weren’t rushing this,” Christensen said in an interview with The Bellingham Herald.
Neighbors concerns
The way Sumas resident Meg Krieg sees it, the objections to the project are three-fold:
▪ The plant will generate very little direct revenue to the city but generate pollution, noise and unsightly buildings.
▪ The pollution will be in fine particulate matter.
▪ The plant will fill in a wetland area that provides environmental benefits, feeding into Johnson Creek, which is a salmon-bearing stream.
The environmental organization RE Sources weighed in, sending a letter to the Washington State Department of Ecology requesting that the wetlands not be filled
“We respectfully disagree that filling these wetlands will not have adverse effect on endangered species or essential fish habitat,” said Kirsten McDade, pollution prevention specialist for ReSources, in the letter.
While the amount of air pollution is not a lot relative to some industrial facilities, Brock is concerned it would have a cumulative effect, landing right on the neighborhood and the aquifer area, which could lead to health issues.
Developer responds
In talking to residents about the project, Samulski said he’s spent a lot of time clearing up confusion. His proposed facility is a block manufacturing plant, which encloses the process within one building.
“We do not manufacture cement, we do not produce wet concrete for delivery,” Samulski said in an email, adding that the raw materials would be trucked in.
As for noise, he said the sound reduction system reduces the noise level outside the building to about 60 decibels, which is less than a lawnmower. The only waste material from the process will come in the form of cured concrete. No water is used for cleaning purposes, eliminating the need for settling ponds, he said.
A drainage system will also be built to treat stormwater runoff so that no untreated water ends up in the creek, he said.
Property background
Samulski purchased the former dairy farm property in 2007, soon after the neighborhood up the hill started being developed. Through the years the property has remained unchanged as the owner waited for the right economic opportunity to build a second location.
When he bought the property, Samulski said in a response letter he believed it would be a win-win situation.
“I could economically expand my business while producing an economic benefit to the city of Sumas,” he said in the letter, adding that he never imagined the citizens would be opposed to the project.
The property is on the northern edge of the large industrial zone for Sumas. Brock believes the project would be a better fit in the south portion of the zone, away from the aquifer area.
“There are other light industrial businesses popping up on the south side, and we have no objection to that,” Brock said.
Next steps
Once the public hearing is complete, the Sumas City Council will have the opportunity to weigh in on this project. If it is approved, the project would still need to secure a variety of environmental-related permits before coming back with a building permit application, Christensen said.
“A lot of different agencies will need to look at this,” he said.
This story was originally published November 11, 2019 at 5:00 AM.
