By BOB WILBUR

I am Bob Wilbur, chair of Citizens of Ebey’s Reserve (COER), and I’m disagreeing with Allen McPheeters’ Aug. 28 column, which jabs at the Island County Joint Tourism Board for advocating regenerative tourism — i.e. promoting visitors who would come to participate in projects that would enhance Whidbey’s environs while making them feel they are contributing to bettering the world about us.

You seem to resent this sort of visitor involvement: “[T]he tourism board is acting as a fundraising and volunteer recruitment platform for environmental groups that have little or nothing to do with tourism.”

Contrary to that, I believe our tourists are drawn to the island particularly because of its environmental attributes, its sparkling shores and deep woods trails, its opportunities

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