Dear Kirkland City Council members,

“We can never have enough nature. It soothes, it repairs – it is a tonic for the soul,” wrote Henry David Thoreau 160 years ago. Clearly, Thoreau was a man who knew something about the positive benefits of open space.

Fast forward 110 years. JFK reminded us that ours is a small but special planet and that nature – and access to it – was integral to our American heritage and wellbeing. He said: “We must have places where we can find release from the tensions of an increasingly industrialized and developed civilization. Where we can have personal contact with the natural environment which so sustains us.”  Now this was a man who knew a little something about civic and community duty.

So when I learned (only recently) of the city of Kirkland’s potential plans to level and then shoe-horn an 83,000-square-foot Aquatic Recreation Center and 200-plus parking spaces where beautiful Juanita Beach Park now sits and delights so many people, I was stunned and heartsick.

Putting aside the fact that the city has yet to thoroughly exhaust all possible sites more suited to a mega-recreational complex. The fact that the traffic analysis presented to date is woefully incomplete and that Kirkland residents currently have access to a variety of pool venues (despite potential school closings), what we’re considering is the preemptive decimation of a well-used, well-loved public park right in the backyard – and in some instances front yard – of the Juanita Beach community.

Here are a few important points for the council to contemplate. Parks mitigate climate, air and water pollution impacts on the surrounding environment and public health. Parks are proven to improve water quality, protect groundwater, prevent flooding, improve the quality of the air we breathe, produce habitat for wildlife and provide a place for children and families to connect with nature and recreate outdoors together. On that last note, parks provide gathering places for families and social groups as well as for individuals of all ages and economic status, regardless of their ability to pay for access. Parks provide a place for health and wellbeing that are accessible by persons of all ages and abilities – but especially to those with disabilities. Parks improve the local tax base and increase property values.

Numerous studies show that quality parks are cited as one of the top three criteria businesses evaluate in relocation decisions. Access to open parklands and their health advantages have been strongly linked to reductions in crime and to reduced juvenile delinquency. And parks have a value to communities that transcend dollars and cents. Parks provide a sense of public pride, social equality and cohesion to every community they’re in.

These benefits and many others are unique to the presence of parks and integral to the quality of our lives in and around Juanita Beach. And once wiped from the face of this earth are irreplaceable. They are, in part, the fabric of what makes Juanita Beach special, not just for those of us who live here but for all who come to the Beach to enjoy this small corner of the world we call home.

I’m not saying that a new Aquatics Recreation Center is a bad idea. What I am saying is that a good idea poorly executed does nobody any good; in fact, it can be harmful beyond repair.

So when you consider the proposal of building a mammoth recreation center where Juanita Beach Park now stands and the likely negative environmental impact, snarling traffic, the irreplaceable loss of trees, natural beauty and common space, the excursionist nature of a pay-for-access center, the spiraling cost and the fact that the community that will be most affected by it’s construction does not want it, by-and-large – it begs the question: why are we considering this site at all? There must be another locale.

Council members please take this center elsewhere. Good idea, bad idea or otherwise, Juanita Beach is not the place for it.