Higher quality materials, lower turnout, more time…
Community Development Directors from Burien, Des Moines and SeaTac held a joint presentation to help residents provide more effective public comment on the SAMP. The video and poster boards were much better than previous efforts and we urge residents to watch.
Turnout was less than forty. So, if the goal had been community engagement, that improvement could be seen as wasted. But since the Port of Seattle has extended the public comment period to August 20, 2026, there is time to promote the material more widely. We strongly encourage the cities to do so.
Community open house poster boards
Three City DEIS Comment Letter Template
Good news. Bad news. Good news.
Most of the material matches well with the STNI message. The comment template in particular is very good. Residents not willing to wait for the STNI comments (coming next week), could do much worse than to follow this.
On the other hand, set aside staff members, Senator Tina Orwall, four members of the Burien City Council, one from Des Moines, and six members of the two airport committees–that leaves less than two dozen ‘civilians’.
But that was to be expected. Even the Port of Seattle’s bigger-budgeted open houses did not bring in many more. We hope this puts to rest the lie that ‘community engagement’ is the key. It’s important to try, but an absence of hundreds of angry residents is no reason to throw in the towel.
Fortunately, what matters is continuity and commitment from city staff. In the decade since the SAMP began, there have been any number of good pieces of information, well-funded community events, and promises from electeds to ‘finally’ become engaged. It never happens.
But the quality of these materials showed more educated commitment to the airport community than we’ve seen in a long while. That should give people who are looking for signs that fence-line communities are taking these issues more seriously–a small ray of hope. If the presentations had been poor, that would have been a reason to raise a white flag.
After the meeting we heard any number of people saying, “Now what?” The answer is simple: tell your electeds to give these administrators the mandate and the tools to create our own airport master plan. Airport issues can only be addressed successfully by people who are in it for the long haul.