Birch Bay has boomed with growth over the past several years with hundreds of new homes plus new commercial properties being added. The Whatcom County Fire Department says that it can no longer serve the area to the same level without money for new firefighters and equipment.

Although taxes from the new homes bring in some revenue, the fire department fell $3 million short of what they need or $2700 per house. In September they came to an agreement with the developers of Horizons at Semiahmoo that they would pay $2500 per new house. Fred Bovenkamp, Peter Horne and Jim Kaemingk, the developers of the Semiahmoo projects, are now saying that the fee is too much.

The fire department said that it did not want to put the added burden onto the individual home owners and that is why they were charging the developer. Problem is, if you charge the developer they are just going to in turn charge the buyer of the house. Granted it would be a one time charge and it would be able to be rolled into their mortgage, but the bottom line is the buyer is still paying.

I understand that fire services are essential and that they are not cheap. However, I do not understand this: the money per home that they were receiving before was sufficient, yet now that they have more homes (therefore more money) and the entire area has increasing home values (therefore increasing taxes because they are a percentage) it is not enough?