This letter is in response to the front page article about Mike Ashley’s complaints that John Koster presented a bill to the Legislature for certain proponents of the formation of Freedom County.
I drew the original lines for the proposed Freedom County and was one of the Snohomish County Property Rights Alliance members that started the project. The current proponents of Freedom County were adversaries of our group.
We wrote an enabling act to the Legislature for Freedom County but could find no legislator to present it. We contacted then-Rep. Koster and, as a group, met with him in Monroe to present our enabling act. He agreed and it was proposed to the Legislature. The act adhered strictly to the guidelines of the Washington state Constitution for the formation of new counties. The bill was replaced by the Legislature with one that did not meet constitutional guidelines and the effort was eventually defeated in court.
The reason Rep. Koster presented our bill was his sense of duty and his sincere responsibility to all those who elected him. Those who asked for his help were the 12,000 who signed the petition and those in the room asking for his help. They included two pilots shot down in World War II and now retired, a retired schoolteacher, two retired farmers, a retired forestry worker, a retired nurse, and two veterans of the ground fighting in Europe one at the battle of the Bulge. If Mr. Ashley thinks that Rep. Koster should have turned his back on them and refused to help, where would this country have been if they had turned their backs and run when their country needed them? We would like Mr. Ashley to know that the people currently involved with Freedom County had nothing to do with the original efforts to form Freedom County.
Stanwood
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