City Council urges Port of Seattle to reconsider lease agreement with Shell

SEATTLE -- The City Council voted unanimously Monday in favor of a resolution urging the Port of Seattle to reconsider its lease agreement allowing Shell to park its Arctic oil drilling rigs here.

Opposition in Seattle grows as Shell's Exploration fleet creeps closer to the city with its massive, 30-story high Arctic oil drilling rigs.



Mark Hennon is one of those opposing Shell coming to the ports.

"What that amounts to is a 300 -foot finger flipped at Seattle, flipped at the state, flipped at every thinking environmental person in the world," Hennon said.

But some argue the agreement between the Port of Seattle, Foss Maritime and Shell keeps jobs afloat.

Paul Queary, a spokesman for Foss, said, "If we don’t do that here, those jobs are going to go somewhere else and the jobs and economic benefit will flow to some other port city other than Seattle."

Opponents of the agreement say these jobs are not the kind of jobs Seattle wants.

The Port of Seattle Commission is to meet at 1 p.m. Tuesday to address the issue.