05/25/2024
Dear WDCFA members and all fishers,
Please see the below email from Gridworks announcing meetings taking place in Westport on May 30th and 31st at the Westport Maritime Museum. There is also a zoom option for attending the meetings remotely. Governor Inslee commissioned Gridworks to complete a study on how a potential process for developing offshore wind (OSW) projects off of the Washington Coast should move forward. Gridworks is holding the meetings to discuss the report and its recommendations regarding the process and to obtain feedback.
Unfortunately, the draft report will not be available until May 28th, and the meetings begin, as noted above, on May 30th. Without seeing the document, it is hard to know what will be announced and recommended regarding the OSW process off of the coast of Washington on the 28th. But everybody needs to recognize how consequential, and potentially disruptive and destructive to our fisheries, the development of OSW will be. WDCFA has participated in OSW discussions for several years up and down the coast. Oregon is on the verge of being steamrollered into leasing and OSW project development, despite continued calls by fishers, environmental groups, fisheries management agencies, and tribes to slow the BOEM process down and not "lease first and ask questions later" as the process has done so far.
WDCFA has witnessed how flawed the BOEM process has been in other states and how BOEM leases first without adequate studies into the impacts of the OSW projects. BOEM moves forward with leasing without recognizing the potential cumulative impacts on our ocean environment and fisheries. It is imperative that these impacts be studied and taken into consideration before considering OSW off of the Washington Coast. Please take the time to attend the meetings if you can. Your attendance, even if you do not speak, will help demonstrate how important protecting the ocean environment and maintaining access to your fisheries is to you, your families, and the community. The ocean environment and the other species sharing ocean space with us need to be protected from potential industrialization through OSW.
Please feel free to share this information with all fishers from all fisheries.
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Kate Griffith
Date: Fri, May 17, 2024 at 1:00 PM
Subject: Public Meetings on Gridworks’ draft offshore wind engagement report May 30 & May 31
To: Maggie Dunham Jordahl
Dear all,
Gridworks extends a warm thank you for your contributions to our efforts in the Offshore Wind Engagement Project contracted on behalf of the Washington Office of Governor Inslee and the Washington Department of Commerce.
We invite you to join us for one of several public meetings to present our draft recommendations and hear your feedback.
As a reminder of Gridworks’ Offshore Wind Engagement Project scope and goals:
Our project is a pre-decisional effort to scope the type of engagement Washington Tribes, fisheries, industry, conservation groups, local governments, communities, etc., would like to see from and around formal federal offshore wind planning and evaluation processes, including how Washington might supplement the federal process.
Our work is an initial piece of information to help the state start larger conversations around the potential future of offshore wind in waters off the state coast.
This project is not intended to evaluate potential offshore wind development, but rather to recommend the design of a comprehensive and transparent process to do so and to communicate this framework within a final report to the Governor’s Office, due June 2024.
The governor will use our report’s findings and recommendations to inform next steps on offshore wind. Examples of possible next steps could include but are not limited to: pursuing a state planning process; convening of advisory groups; pursuing scientific studies to gather critical data; requesting a BOEM Task Force; a combination of each of these options; or taking no action. Gridworks’ report will inform both the scope and nature of options for consideration, and no decisions have yet been made.
A 1-page background document about our efforts is attached to this invitation.
Our efforts to develop a recommended framework began in late January with early research into offshore wind engagement practices in other states before moving to conversations with you and others over the last 2.5 months to inform our recommendations detailing a framework for a comprehensive, transparent, inclusive, and science-based engagement effort to plan for and evaluate potential offshore wind development off the Washington Coast.
Many of you have spent hours with us in one-on-one conversations, in group meetings, and exchanging ideas with us over email. Your engagement has been integral to our development of draft recommendations for the Governor’s consideration.
Our final report is due to the Governor’s Office on June 15, and prior to submitting our report, we’d welcome your continued feedback to shape our recommendations.
We invite you to join us for one of two public meetings to present our draft recommendations and hear your feedback:
Thursday, May 30, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Hybrid meeting
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5047713661?omn=89930749136
Call-in option: +1 253-205-0468; meeting ID: 5047713661
In-person meeting location: Westport Maritime Museum, 2201 Westhaven Dr, Westport, WA 98595
Friday, May 31, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.
Hybrid meeting
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5047713661?omn=81211983637
Call-in option: +1 253-205-0468; meeting ID: 5047713661
In-person meeting location: Westport Maritime Museum, 2201 Westhaven Dr, Westport, WA 98595
We aim to provide our draft recommendations to you on approximately May 28. We are still in the process of writing the report with draft recommendations. The likely earliest date we can provide a copy to you is the morning of May 28.
Meetings will begin with a short presentation of our work over the last several months, including discussion of our recommendations. We hope to spend the bulk of our meeting time discussing your feedback on the direction our draft recommendations take.
We hope to see you there! Please let us know if you have any questions.
Best wishes,
Kate Griffith and the Gridworks Team
