Local plans for improvements to a landing strip and cabin on U.S. Forest Service land at Katzehin Flats stopped due to procedural costs, according to backers.
The Takshanuk Watershed Council inherited the project from the Haines Sportsman’s Association after the Sportsman’s secretary Marilyn Parks, who was spearheading it, became ill. The project was to be funded by Secure Rural Schools money, through the Lynn Canal-Icy Strait Resource Advisory Committee.
The committee approved $55,000 for the work that Parks described in 2011 as mostly airstrip improvements.
When the watershed council inherited the project, the focus shifted to moving the cabin about two miles north of its current location. Brad Ryan, who was executive director of the council, said discussions with pilots led him to believe there wasn’t a problem landing near the beach there, and the historic airstrip already had trees growing in it.
Furthermore, Forest Service officials were interested in investing money in the cabin only if usership increased, Ryan said. Around 2002, the agency discontinued maintenance of the cabin, a rustic shelter built from a shipping container and barged to Katzehin about 40 years ago. It sits more than a half mile from the beach there, in a patch of woods.
Ryan said the northern location would have improved usership. “The cabin’s in an inconvenient spot. I think it would have worked fine at the new location. There was a lot of excitement in the organization (about moving it). It was going to be a fun project,” he said.
Ryan said the effort stopped when he was told that moving the structure would require a National Environmental Policy Act review at a cost, he was told, of about $30,000. That wouldn’t have left enough to move the structure, he said. “It became cost prohibitive.”
Ryan said he didn’t see the need for rebuilding the cabin at its current location. Volunteers have worked on the structure over the years, including making it weather-tight, he said.
“It’s in great shape. People still use it. It just doesn’t meet (Forest Service) specifications,” Ryan said.
Admiralty Island National Monument Ranger Chad VanOrmer said this week it’s unclear whether the $55,000 approved for the project is still available. “(Officials in Washington, D.C.) are trying to decide if that money that was authorized but not spent can be carried over.”
If the money can still be used at Katzehin, work could be done there, with labor provided through a different local partner, such as a non-profit or government agency, VanOrmer said.