PORT ANGELES — The Port of Port Angeles is leaning into the industries that have sustained it since it was established in 1923 while developing new port-owned facilities and seeking ventures that will create opportunities for businesses, provide jobs for workers and support the community, Executive Director Paul Jarkiewicz said Wednesday.
Jarkiewicz spoke on Coffee with Colleen, the weekly online show of the Clallam Economic Development Council hosted by Colleen McAleer, the EDC executive director and District 1 port commissioner.
Port commissioners in June appointed Jarkiewicz its interim executive director after Geoff James resigned from the position; they approved his permanent status in July.
“The biggest things that we do — forest products, maritime and property lease and rents — are at a tipping point right at this moment,” Jarkiewicz said.
“We have to take a look at various other opportunities, so we’ve delved into other things like aviation, CRTC — Composite Recycling Technology Center — and other industries such as Stabicraft,” he added.
While not the economic driver it once was, Jarkiewicz said the timber industry was nonetheless a vital sector responsible for about 1,900 direct and indirect jobs in Clallam County.
“Logging, servicing the sawmills and making sure that we’re supporting the transportation of product out of the port, we still do that on a regular basis,” Jarkiewicz said. “There’s a huge impact and ripple effect across the economy as to what we do with forest products, so that’s why the port works so diligently to make sure that we’re supporting that industry.”
Transforming the site of the former PenPly mill on the downtown waterfront into a Marine Trades Center was one example of the port leveraging and improving its assets to encourage economic growth, Jarkiewicz said. The project will enable such existing tenants as Platypus Marine and Westport Yachts to expand and provide opportunities for new businesses to start.
A grant from the EDC will provide the majority of the funding to develop infrastructure at the site before businesses can move in to develop their own facilities. Jarkiewicz said he anticipated infrastructure construction to start in 2024 and the site to be operational sometime in 2025.
“We’ve decided to take this site and transition it into an area where we can actually increase our business line and allow future clients to come in and take advantage of the waterfront and the capability of pulling the vessels out of the water and putting them up on the hard to work on,” he said.
The port’s industrial park on 18th Street that is already home to CRTC, Murrey’s Olympic Disposal, Stabicraft and Angeles Composite Technologies is also slated for expansion.
“The next project that we’re working on is putting in some new industrial warehouses in the North Industrial Park,” Jarkiewicz said. “We have quite a bit of inquiry coming in as far as warehousing, transport docks, cross docks for trucking, et cetera. And we’ll be taking a look at how we integrate that into industrial park without making a huge impact to the community.”
The port also would like to be able to enhance its ability to transport timber by barge across the Salish Sea, a function currently served by its Intermodal Handling and Transfer Facility. Over the next two years, the port will use an $8.6 million grant from the Department of Transportation Maritime Administration Port Infrastructure Development Program to improve the facility as well as upgrade stormwater management on the site.
“There’s a pent-up demand we’re not able to meet, so we’re taking a look at how to improve the throughput there,” Jarkiewicz said.
The port would also like to be able to meet demand for hangars at the airport, whose runway was recently resurfaced, repainted and has new lights.
“We have an entire master plan of hangars that we want to put in,” Jarkiewicz said. “Most of our hangers at the airport right now are getting older, but we’re also at 100 percent occupancy for the enclosed hangers.”
Looking further ahead, the port is pursuing foreign trade zone status with assistance from congressional representatives and U.S. Department of Commerce. A secure foreign trade zone facility outside the jurisdiction of U.S. Customs and Border Protections enables importers and exporters to move goods and in and out of the country with paying no or reduced fees, duties and tariffs.
Jarkiewicz said a free trade zone could create cost savings for its existing clients as well as attract other businesses to the area.
“The number one job that we have at the port is to go ahead and establish economic development, make sure that we’re there to support the economy and make sure that we’re there to support business,” Jarkiewicz said.
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Reporter Paula Hunt can be reached at paula.hunt@soundpublishing.com.
