Regarding the editorial, “Improvement district would yield good results,” page A4, January Kingston Community News:

While hordes of cars disgorge from the ferry on a daily basis, most continue straight through Kingston unless the gas tank is empty or the kids are clamoring for a Big Mac. Kingston presently offers no clear identity to the traveling public, so most people never consider it a destination. They just put the foot to the pedal and barrel on through.

Even so, Kingston-area residents continue to invest significant creative energy into making the community more commercially attractive, one recent example being Main Street Ale House’s expansion into the breakfast and lunch market. Another is the casual and quirky Mossback Restaurant that just opened on Ohio Street a few blocks uphill from the ferry route, specializing in serving locally grown foods.

But while laudable in its intent, the January editorial contains a major factual error that needs to be corrected. In making an argument for forming a business improvement district, the editorial surveyed the available alternatives. In that context, it stated, “The Port of Kingston, a publicly funded government, has authority only at the port.” This assertion is false.

While they originally began as instruments for promoting water transportation (back before many shoreline settlements were even accessible by road), in the last 50 years ports have transformed into general agencies for promoting economic development anywhere within the district’s boundaries.

The Port of Kingston is geographically a rather large district, extending west nearly to Gamble Bay. It takes in the entire Kingston commercial district and a lot more besides. The port has ample legal authority to execute a business improvement plan for the downtown Kingston commercial area as well as the taxing and bonding power to fund planned improvements.

The precedent for ports undertaking economic development projects unrelated to water bodies are many and varied. Most Washington airports are operated by port districts. East of the Cascades, one finds so-called “dry land” ports focused exclusively on upland economic development. A few (Sunnyside, Othello and Grandview come to mind) do not have even so much as an inch of navigable water within their boundaries. Voters routinely approve and successfully operate port districts devoted primarily to economic development in communities where no major water resources exist.

It may be that the current Port of Kingston commissioners lack any serious interest in undertaking a downtown business improvement plan. Or perhaps the local business leaders themselves prefer pursuing a plan that would be totally under their control. But these are questions of vision and confidence, not authority and power.

Any future conversation about creating a downtown business plan should clearly understand that such a proposal would comfortably fall within the port’s statutory mandate.

Stafford Smith
Indianola