A cruise ship study, ongoing contention with the Lutak Dock contractor and downtown camping opportunities were some of the things on the Haines assembly agenda on Tuesday evening.
Members met for about three and a half hours and also heard a lot of testimony from residents frustrated with the management of the Chilkoot Lake State Recreation Site brown bear population after revelations that the new park ranger shot and killed a young female who was becoming aggressive about food with visitors.
Assembly members decided to send a letter to the state’s Department of Natural Resources and Division of Parks’ southeast superintendent Preston Kroes asking for a permanent campground host, offering to pay for half of a bear-monitor position, and requesting more educational signs.
Lutak Dock conflict continues
Representatives from the Haines Borough, Lutak Dock contractor Turnagain Marine Construction and their lawyers met last week to talk about ongoing issues.
“We were not able to reach a resolution at that meeting,” said borough attorney Taylor McMahon during Tuesday’s assembly meeting.
The company has now asked that the borough move into mediation and have asked for a response to that request in the next 10 days.
That would involve a process where a third-party, neutral mediator gets involved and tries to help the two parties reach an agreement.
“It’s my understanding that the primary issues are payment of invoices,” McMahon said.
The company has two invoices in with the borough, one for $275,690 and the other for about $2.8 million. Turnagain had threatened to stop work on the dock project if not paid on at least one of those invoices.
Assembly member Natalie Dawson, who was part of the team which met with the contractor and lawyers – said that the company has not yet responded to the borough’s request for more information and clarity about its invoices and for a new total overall cost of the dock.
“So the meeting ended with them asking to go to mediation, although our lawyers have told us that as part of mediation we should be receiving the additional information that we’re addressing,” she said.
If mediation does not work, the next step is to go to court.
Another issue that would come up in mediation is a pile of steel the company purchased before it had approval from the federal agency administering the grant for the project.
Borough officials said they did not approve the purchase either. Ultimately, in late February, the company said it would sell the steel, but it may not have done that yet.
“I would say that that issue is in flux. When I initially came onto this project I also heard that it was a resolved issue,” McMahon said. “I subsequently heard that Turnagain Marine is still in possession of that pipe pile and wants to be reimbursed.
Co-managing Portage Cove for camping
The borough is poised to enter into an agreement with the State of Alaska for managing the Portage Cove State Recreation Site.
The 7.4 acre plot along Beach Road has been the subject of an ongoing dispute as part of a larger conversation over the lack of available tent camping near downtown.
The state banned camping at Portage Cove and mayor Tom Morphet organized a ‘camp-in’ and gathered signatures from people pushing state parks to reopen the area.
“We were hoping to have an agreed-upon contract for the assembly to review at this meeting,” Morphet said. “But that contract is still under negotiations.”
He said he was hopeful it would be ready for review by the next assembly meeting.
“Maybe not. There’s only about six or eight weeks left in our camping season,” he said.
In the meantime, tourism director Rebecca Hylton asked that assembly members allow tent camping at Picture Point temporarily now that the only campground in downtown, Oceanside RV Park, is moving to shut down its tent camping sites.
“It’s the only thing that I could brainstorm so that tenters here have a place to go that’s within walking distance of town,” she said. “We would make sure that we’re doing it in the most appropriate way. We would not advertise this. This would be specifically for people who come into the visitor center that are asking for a place to put their tent for the night that’s close to town.”
She suggested a three-day cap on camping at Picture Point.
Assembly member Dawson asked about a bear safety plan at the temporary site and Hylton told her there is not one currently.
“That’s one of the big sticking points [with] state parks and why that’s not moving forward at the time,” Hylton said.
Ultimately, Dawson recommended adding bear-proof food containers at Picture Point and Hylton said the visitor center budget could be used to pay for that. Assembly members chose to direct the manager to open camping at Picture Point.
“We’re not going to solve this problem but we are chipping away at it,” Morphet said.
Cruise ship study
Tourism Director Rebecca Hylton is working on a community survey focusing on what Haines residents believe cruise ship tourism should look like in the next few years.
On Tuesday, Hylton said she spent the day showing off the Haines area to a group of representatives from American Cruise Lines.
The brand has about 200 people per cruise ship, and next year the company plans to bring two ships to Haines, or about 5,000 people over the course of the season.
“This specific cruise line, I think is a really good fit for our community,” Hylton said. “It’s a higher end ship. They really appreciate nature, they focus on small groups, it’s not overwhelming our community.”
Hylton said she is still working to figure out what niche Haines can fill in the cruise industry.
“They came here specifically because they are pushed out now of Skagway,” she said. “There’s no berth for them. These larger ships are taking up all of the space in the ports and that does mean I also had a conversation with Royal Caribbean cruise lines this week as well.”
That company is concerned about a ballot initiative coming up in Juneau that could result in a ban on large cruise ships in town on Saturdays.
“They have nowhere to put their ships. They’ll be looking for places to put their ships and in their words it’s going to directly impact our community and surrounding communities about their itinerary and their options. We’re talking the difference between a 3,000-passenger ship, a 2,000-passenger ship and a 200-passenger ship.”
Hylton said she wants to get to a place where she has clear direction from the community on what kind of cruise ship traffic people want to support. She said the Tourism Advisory Board can bring a proposal for the study to the next assembly meeting for members to review.