Engaging the community in Drayton Harbor\u27s comeback story

During the 1980 and 1990s, bacterial contamination in Drayton Harbor resulted in bay-wide closures of tribal, commercial and recreational shellfish harvest. In 2001, Puget Sound Restoration Fund partnered with local shellfish farmer extraordinaire Geoff Menzies to launch the Drayton Harbor Community Oyster Farm. With Geoff at the helm, the community farm invigorated a 20+ year community-wide effort to restore 810 acres of growing area to Approved harvest status in 2016. At the outset, seeding oysters in a bay prohibited to harvest, and involving volunteers in oyster farming, was a gamble. But the vision was that if people became immersed in the bay – literally, while tending oysters – they would experience its productivity first-hand and advocate for cleanup. Working toward a harvest date would also provide a framework and timetable for pollution correction efforts. Oysters planted in 2001 would be ready to harvest in 2004, which meant that water quality needed to be improved enough to meet standards. With the clock ticking, many individuals and agencies worked relentlessly to find and fix pollution sources. Washington Department of Health provided critical early support, recognizing that new strategies were needed to solve chronic pollution problems. Volunteer “farmers of the tideflats” put their backs into raising a crop of oysters. And the Bellingham Herald published quarterly updates to maintain public focus. Remarkably, 575 acres were conditionally re-opened to harvest in 2004, in time for a community oyster celebration. Since then, agencies and watershed residents have worked to further improve water quality. In 2013, the Community Oyster Farm fledged into the for-profit Drayton Harbor Oyster Company, LLC. And in 2016, the Drayton Harbor watershed community achieved the long-time goal of year-round local shellfishing