By Pepper Fisher
SEQUIM – Opponents of a proposed gravel pit in the Happy Valley area near Sequim got their way on Wednesday when the landowners rescinded their conditional use permit application because of threats to their family.
John David Kirner notified Clallam County Planner Donella Clark that there would be no need to go forward with Thursday’s Public Hearing on the matter because he and his family were withdrawing their request to go forward with the plan. In his letter, Kirner said he expected that there would be some opposition to the plan, but did not expect the “extreme public defamation of our family’s character and threats to our family’s way of life.”
Kirner said his business, Kirner Family Real Estate LLC, had been threatened by boycott, his family had received anonymous threatening letters at their home, and he said someone fired shots from the road into items on his home’s property just a few hundred feet from his front door.
The planned operation was to clear a portion of 7.5 acres of land, then mine and crush basalt rock into gravel. The plan would have involved drilling and blasting the basalt with explosives.
A group of opponents set up a website called stopthehappyvalleypit.org/, citing noise, vibrations, dust, public safety and increased dump truck traffic as their primary objections to the project.
People in favor of the mine had concerns about supply running low in their communities, driving up prices. But County Commissioner Mark Ozias pointed KONP to a 2020 study of these types of mineral resources in Clallam County and their projected demand. The study concluded, “The existing mines contain enough resources to be able to supply the mineral resources Clallam County will consume for some 36 to 78 years at current rates of consumption.” The study included the projected demand for Road Maintenance, Construction Aggregate, and Construction Ready Mix. It said the materials being produced in all 3 regions of the county were between 3.5 to 15.5 times more than was being used annually, as of 2020.
Joe Smillie at the Washington State Department of Natural Resources told KONP there are 33 gravel pits operating in Clallam County.