Borough to make
final push for original
harbor expansion plan

By Tom Morphet

The Haines Borough is drawing up a $20 million alternative to its $33 million harbor expansion project.

But the project’s most ardent supporters aren’t letting go of their original vision. They’re hoping to convince Alaska’s Congressional delegation to secure initial funding for the larger project during a June 14 trip to Washington, D.C.

The trip is viewed as critical, because if initial funding doesn’t come this year, planners likely will be required to restart their efforts, with new cost and benefit estimates. Mayor Jan Hill, manager Tom Bolen and assemblyman Pete Lapham will represent the borough on the trip, accompanied by the municipality’s lobbyists.

Most recently, an aide for U.S. Rep Young told the borough the congressman wasn’t seeking the money for the coming fiscal year. Congress has authorized the borough to receive $11 million, but no money has been appropriated.

“I’m for fighting for it however we can,” borough harbor committee member Jim Studley said at a meeting of the committee last week. “We can go a little bit longer. We need to talk to Mr. Young’s people who can talk to him.”

Borough assemblyman Doug Olerud said events ranging from Hurricane Katrina to the electoral loss of former U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens have worked against the project. “Everything that could go wrong, in Washington, D.C. to prevent this from happening did go wrong in the past five years, in terms of timing.”

Manager Bolen’s $20 million alternative involves moving a planned breakwater closer to shore, an idea that would reduce the federal contribution but increase borough costs for non-navigational dredging. Bolen said the new configuration could provide as much berthing space as the borough’s preferred alternative.

“The clock is ticking here. We need to present something doable and realistic-looking here just to get the project started,” Bolen told the committee. “Potentially the only way to move forward is to get a project that the (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) believes is within our reach.”

Committee members were skeptical, however, and said they wanted broken-out cost estimates for expansion alternatives, including scale drawings, before including reduced alternatives in a harbor master plan.

Member Mike Mackowiak said he wanted to know the additional dredging cost of Bolen’s alternatives, and was concerned that a smaller expansion would reduce project benefits, a critical factor in federal funding.

Studley said he opposed putting a cheaper alternative in the master plan, for the fear that the project would default to a smaller expansion. “If you put it in there, that’s the one we’re going to get.”

Olerud said it was “one or two months early” to give up on the larger project.

Bolen’s plan is to have two, less-expensive alternatives ready to go if funding can’t be secured for the larger project this year. If no money is secured this year, the project could be delayed for years, he said.

The borough is in the process of rewriting its master plan for the harbor. The document will be used to chart improvements and explain the muncipality’s goals to agencies.