PORT ANGELES — A Thursday-night forum on the Port Angeles Harbor-Works Development Authority initially looked like it was going to be a tough crowd for its executive director as four people in the approximately 100-person crowd pitched hard questions and expressed concern over its mission.
But their critical tone was balanced by a handful of other attendees who voiced support for the public development authority’s goal to acquire and redevelop Rayonier Inc.’s former mill site, and who didn’t mind helping Executive Director Jeff Lincoln explain how the process would work.
One unidentified man questioned if a large tank on the property should be used at all for resolving the city’s sewage overflow issues.
Acquiring the tank was one of the main reasons for forming Harbor-Works.
“We want to know,” he repeated several times.
“You want to know; I don’t,” said KONP radio reporter Dick Goodman, who has publicly voiced support for Harbor-Works in the past, in response.
The answer to that question was deferred to city staff who were available at the end of the question-and-answer period to explain why the city wants to use the tank.
Staff have said that using the tank to store untreated sewage that would otherwise overflow into the harbor is the cheapest and most effective method of resolving the problem.
Another unidentified man, who voiced support for Harbor-Works, said that misconceptions surrounding the public development authority are “absolutely phenomenal.”
How much would it cost?
In response to one of the more pressing questions — how much acquiring the 75-acre property on the Port Angeles waterfront would cost the taxpayer — Lincoln told the crowd at the commissioner’s meeting room at the Clallam County Courthouse that the amount would depend upon how much would need to be spent on the environmental cleanup.
Rayonier already has spent about $25 million on cleanup since its mill closed in 1997 after operating for 68 years.
The property — which has been a state Department of Ecology cleanup site since 2000 — is contaminated with PCBs, dioxin, arsenic and other toxins from the mill.
An option, Lincoln explained, could be that Harbor-Works would get the property at no cost in exchange for paying for the rest of the cleanup, if that cost is equal to the value of the land and how much can be gained through redevelopment.
“By the end of the year, we will have the results of the market analysis,” he said.
“We will put that into the mix of what cleanup costs might be.
“We will use that to negotiate with Rayonier, use that to negotiate with Ecology, and hopefully we can deliver something to the community.”
But what if the cost of cleanup exceeds the value of the land to Harbor-Works?
Lincoln told the Peninsula Daily News after addressing the crowd that Harbor-Works could seek grants to cover the rest of the cost.
Ecology does provide a grant that covers about half of the cost of cleanup for property owned by a public entity.
But Lincoln also said that the public development authority would have to consider if it’s in the public interest to proceed, if that was the situation that it faced.
How much money it would receive through development could also be factored into how much cleanup it could financially handle, he has also previously explained.
Determine feasibility
And before acquiring the property, Lincoln said, Harbor-Works will have to answer the question: is this feasible?
“If Harbor-Works walks away, it will turnout to be a loss for both entities,” he said in response to another question from the crowd.
Lincoln was referring to the city of Port Angeles and Port of Port Angeles, which have loaned the public development authority a total of $1.3 million.
He said the issue of whether redeveloping the property is financially feasible will be answered through the “due diligence” process.
Harbor-Works has budgeted $380,460 through the next 10 months to determine what the risks are with the property and how feasible it will be to redevelop the land.
That money pays for consultants to do environmental, market and other analyses.
Several of the consultants were present at the meeting to answer questions from the attendees after Lincoln’s question-and-answer period.
Lincoln also said that he has three archeologists working with the consultants, and that Harbor-Works will cooperate with the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe if any remains are uncovered.
Remnants of a former Klallam village, Y’Innis, are known to be buried under portions of the property and the tribe is a partner in the cleanup project.
“We don’t intend to have a graving yard again,” Lincoln said, in reference to the uncovering of Tse-Whit-Zen in 2003.
Lincoln said the due diligence process will be done by March at the earliest.
The public will be able to comment on the draft findings of that effort in February, according to Harbor-Works’ timeline.
The timeline also lists cleanup and redevelopment to be complete in six years.
The city, with support from the port, created Harbor-Works in May 2008.
Ecology ranks the Rayonier site as a 2 on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 representing the highest potential risk to human health and the environment.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
