Bob Andrew for PDS Assistant Director, Whatcom County

Why Now? Bob is so New Here!

He came here on assignment in October 2005 on a medium-term consulting engagement (Oct 2005 to March 2006 without his family), settled into Birch Bay as a tenant, and soon became involved at Birch Bay Steering Committee. Because of his experience with both transportation and land use issues in Washington, D.C. his advice was quickly sought out on issues such as traffic calming.

Expertise from Other Jurisdictions

From his upbringing in New Zealand, later returning there in the 1980's to teach and work, Bob has lived under both Parliamentary and Federal forms of government. At the local level, he brings knowledge of how workable it is having one single government entity in a county with stable geographic bounds, rather than a rural county government surrounding towns whose borders keep changing over time.

He also brings intimate knowledge of the feasibility of establishing a Business Improvement District in those areas where that might make sense (such as the business license owners along Birch Bay Drive): a self-assessing BID that is targeted at levels of service above what are reasonable for the county to do e.g. prompt response to an initial clearing of the road of logs after a flood, leaving the heavy work for the county, or nightly street sweeping in summer tourist season, seasonal staff on the street to direct tourists etc.

Bob's Whatcom Co. Knowledge?

Through attending breakfasts and workshops of a local entrepreneurial services network "Focus Northwest" Bob has become known by other communities beyond Birch Bay within Whatcom County, e.g. Sudden Valley Community Association. On that board, his advice was soon sought out by Ambassador Roger Bull, a retired Canadian High Trade Commissioner and former Executive Director of PNEWR. In this case, the topic was whether or not to incorporate as a separate city: Bob provided him a counter-argument of developing urban services whilst staying within the county and doing planning on a broader scale that looked at all the districts that service SVCA, as well as working with the other major land owners along Lake Whatcom south edge on water quality issues. This was given to the SVCA Board as a one-page discussion document entitled "Sudden Valley in the 21st Century - the Wider Scene: Crossroads in Time between Planning & Technology"

Bob's Preparedness for This Job

As a commitment to settling into this area, Bob arranged to wrap up his full-time consulting assignment a few weeks earlier than planned, except from some ongoing coordination with the engineers he handed the work onto. Given his professional background in facilities engineering, he committed himself in the meantime to investigating the technical options in improving cellular and data communications within Urban Growth Areas. He has drafted a second discussion document in improved cellular service for SVCA, using a historic barn but conforming with the NTHP standards for "Locating Telecommunications Towers in Historic Buildings"

Bob has also participated in the GovTech "Digital Communities" half-day seminar series launch in Seattle, and has identified the feasibility providing Cisco mesh micro-cell data infrastructure for communities like Birch Bay. For a business district This has the potential to have a priority channel for security purposes that could be shared with  public safety, fee-paid access for cafes or rental accommodation, and free access in the public commons.  This was to be the topic for a Feb 21 Birch Bay Chamber luncheon, which has been deferred.

Why Bob, over other Candidates?

Bob comes from an Engineering Background, rather than Planning but worked directly with NCPC and DC on planning issues such as streetscape and pocket parks that had fallen between the cracks. In technology, he's experienced  in GIS, and in relational database systems as used in the current Accela 'Permits Plus' system. On Grants Management, he was worked directly with the federal Grants.gov tools used for tracking funds given to local organizations. He can certainly deal with it on the grants recipient end, and be innovative in pursuing opportunities for synergy in applying for grants funding.

On the personnel experience side, Bob looks forward to an interview opportunity to discuss directly with the  County management and staff what their expectations are in a progressive, unionized, organization.