A letter to the Commissioners of the Port of Seattle:
As far back as the opening of the Second Runway in 1970, noise has always been the primary resident complaint about the airport. Residents organized and then struggled for decades to obtain a measure of relief in the form of noise buffer land and sound insulation systems known colloquially as Port Packages.If that sounds like the same struggles for dignity, health and safety as organized labor, you’re not wrong.
Sadly, nothing was given. It had to be fought for.
When Peat, Marwick and Mitchell, were hired to write a review the original Sea-Tac Communities Plan of 1976 for the FAA they put it very well:
As one of the first airport sponsors in the country to be sued over noise, the Port had little or no guidance from elsewhere as to how to deal with the problem. In the absence of such guidance, what may be termed a “let them sue” approach was essentially followed by the Port during the period from 1957 to 1972. Under this approach, every noise lawsuit was contested in court. If the Port won, no further action would be taken. However, if the property owner (s) was “..awarded damages, the Court would typically decree that the Port receive an avigation easement in return for the payment of such damages.”
Unwinding those gains
Under resolution A93-03, the Puget Sound Regional Council required the Port to provide Port Packages for all homes under the flight path in order to receive permission to build the Third Runway. The Port made significant progress, but ultimately fell far short of living up to that commitment, both in terms of quantity and quality of workmanship.
And since the Third Runway, those hard won gains have been gradually walked back. Regardless of cause, the benefits that residents worked so hard to achieve are now increasingly at risk.
- Every year, the DNL65 actually keeps shrinking. So homes that were once eligible are no longer.
- This also means that homes with existing, but failing, Port Packages are no longer eligible for future updates. Yes, there are always Federal proposals to reduce that ’65’ down to a lower number. But a proposal is not a law. And the law says that, every year, the number of homes eligible for sound insulation keeps getting smaller. Whether the Port approves of the FAA’s policy or not is irrelevant. The fact is, it is to their benefit that the number of eligible homes continues to shrink. One less home. One less possible payment.
- Therefore, the Port can, in theory support updates to existing (and defective) sound insulation systems by supporting changes to the law in Olympia, while in practice, slow walking the process. Again, by blaming the FAA (or Congress) for not providing them the money to do it.
- But again, the longer the Port holds off on providing an update (or a replacement initiative program as it is called in San Francisco), the more homes “self-deport.” Because the moment a homeowner decides to install their own replacement windows, they are permanently taken off the eligibility rolls. The FAA will never reimburse homeowners for their out of pocket expenses because they will not pay for systems they cannot inspect.
Accepting responsibility
Nor should they. The FAA grant program includes a C6 assurance system, which was supposed to guarantee both the sound reduction and the quality of the workmanship. In their haste to get so many systems installed so quickly, the Port allowed many, many poor-quality systems to slip past that process.
Payment
- But regardless of who is at fault, it is also notable that there is nothing precluding the Port itself from paying to provide Port Package updates out of pocket. Conflating Federal reimbursement with ability is not accurate.
- In fact, the Port has already gone ahead with plans to pay out of pocket for the 1,100 homes remaining from those Third Runway obligations.
- The FAA has already provided reassurance that they will provide reimbursements for any approved projects. The Port no longer has to “get the money up front” from AIP in order to install sound insulation systems. Instead, you can “buy now, get reimbursed later.”
The good news
But despite past problems, today’s Port Packages are very good and we congratulate their team for doing the lessons learned and making improvements.
Even more important, as the Port will tell you, a Port Package is a complete system. It’s not just some windows. We completely agree.
To create a proper sound insulation system one must evaluate each home individually and holistically, to achieve both the proper sound reduction and provide healthy interior air quality. Sound reduction is, of necessity, a process of making homes ‘tighter’. The two cannot be separated from one another.
Today’s Port Packages follow FAA guidelines and meet both those requirements. They are built to last and the Port can be justifiable proud of the systems it is installing today.
Preserving homes for the next generation is environmental justice
However, this leads to one of those very uncomfortable “discussions one can never have.” Both the Port and “pro-growth” politicians have discounted complaints from homeowners as “foggy windows” or “people wanting something for nothing.” That is not merely inaccurate and callous, it is short sighted.
Every airport community is or soon will be “majority/minority”. And it is no coincidence that such diversity manifests itself directly under the flight path. Regardless of who lives in any home now, the next owner of a failing Port Package will likely be a person of color and a first time homeowner.
They will not be the family who initially received the Port Package, they will have no idea what that means, what proper noise reduction or ventilation are about, and they will almost certainly have no idea about something called an ‘avigation easement’. They will simply assume that their home is as safe and quiet as everyone else in their neighborhood.
So regardless of who owns the home now, if the current owner has their windows replaced with a bargain-priced set, that not only takes the home “off the table”, it leaves every future owner with a lower quality of life they aren’t even aware of.
- How often (if ever) will any first time homeowner test the interior sound level of their home?
- And in today’s “no inspection” world of realty, how many homeowners will not learn about proper ventilation and the risks of mold and poor interior air quality?
- Many window installers advertise, “sound rated installation”, but what does that actually mean? The City of Des Moines went so far as to repeal its sound code in 2012. So any installer can advertise “sound rated windows” with no guarantee of actual performance.
The Port, on the other hand, must guarantee that sound reduction and workmanship; the FAA says so. Plus, the Port has the crews and the experience and the low cost of money to not only do these systems better than most commercial dealers, but also much less expensively than any of them.
Think about that: How many people ask about the electric code or the plumbing in their new home? We just assume a baseline of health and safety. But when it comes to air quality and noise? New homeowners here often have no idea what they’re getting. You can address that.
The ethos of the Highline Communities
The various Highline Communities were built to provide the “great value for money” neighborhoods that defined the American Dream. School teachers. Dock workers. Machinists. We could all find a place near the water, with great schools and low crime. That still is the American Dream
But today, if one lives under the flight path a properly functioning Port Package is a requirement, not a luxury. Good indoor air quality and relief from the noise is an amenity that every person here is entitled to if we are to maintain that value proposition.
The Port may never be able to officially accept responsibility for the decline of residential neighborhoods and schools directly under the flight path. But it can take steps to provide meaningful relief and maintain that quality of life for present and future residents.
The “trickle down” narrative
I’ve heard the last four Mayors of Des Moines (one of whom is now a Port of Seattle lobbyist) say that the Port can compensate Des Moines by partnering with the Port to build projects like the Des Moines Creek Business Park and now our Marina. That is very convenient since it marries the Port’s own mission statement with a philosophy that “economic growth solves all problems.”
Unfortunately, it is simply not true. The ferry program we just completed lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in only sixty days. The Des Moines Creek Business Park has never been a major economic driver for any public entity, besides the Port of Seattle, of course.
The sincere path forward
Providing a quality Port Package update, on the other hand, is an immediate, direct and long lasting benefit to the people under the flight path. It is the through line between the success of the airport and the negative impacts we put up with which makes your success possible. It is what residents want and need most and is thus by far the most efficient use of public money the Port can provide to help our community over the long run. People may occasionally visit the Marina. But they live under the flight path.
That is why noise mitigation was the central feature of the original Sea-Tac Communities Plan. The whole idea was that, as the airport grows, noise mitigation should increase commensurately. Obviously, it has not. The DNL65 is shrinking. And the Port has not even fulfilled its commitments from 1996.
This is the American Dream
Port Package updates not only preserve the value of our housing stock. They preserve opportunities for every future generation of increasingly diverse, value conscious homeowners in South King County. People shouldn’t have to become experts on interior air quality and sound reduction–they should be able to take those things for granted, just as they do electric wiring and plumbing.
The American Dream is not a business park local residents never benefit from or or a marina most people will visit only occasionally. It’s more like the safe, healthy home, at an affordable price, where you can raise your children, in one of the most beautiful areas in the world.