PORT ANGELES — The Feiro Marine Life Center and the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary have started their capital campaign for a new building on the Port Angeles Waterfront Center campus, but they are focusing for now on governments, foundations and corporations that can give larger amounts of money, Clallam County commissioners were told.
Melissa Williams, executive director of the Feiro Marine Life Center, told the county commissioners at their work session Monday that it is necessary to raise 70 to 80 percent of the money to start construction on the Marine Discovery Center, which would be on Front Street just west of the Field Arts & Events Hall.
“We will take donations, but we really are focused on these larger gifts,” she said. “The actual public part of the campaign, if someone wants to donate $50 or $100, is going to come at a later phase of the campaign.”
The building is planned to be 13,000 square feet and two stories tall but with no second floor, primarily for cost reasons. However the height of the interior would allow displays to be hung from the ceiling, Williams said.
“It’s not a cheap building, that’s for sure, and that’s because of the life support component,” she added. “We have animals that need filtered water. They have 24/7 electricity needs. We have to have a lot of backups and redundancies.
“These are things we don’t have in our facility now. So we are talking about more of a hospital-style building, which is going to be about maybe $1,000, maybe a little higher, per square foot,” she said.
Williams said 30 percent of Feiro’s revenue is earned income and 70 percent is from grants and donations and contracts to conduct programming.
“We really need that proportion to be the other way around and that would provide us with more financial stability,” she said.
“And given the fact that we’re on DNR land that is leased to the city, and the public process and the public permitting would not really be feasible given all the research that we’ve done.
“We don’t believe we would be able to make the building large enough to generate the kind of revenue we would need to be sustainable in the future,” Williams said regarding remodeling the current building.
The current building for Feiro, at 315 N. Lincoln St., was built in 1981 as a lab space for Peninsula College classes. It has reached the end of a 40-year lifespan, Williams said. The office for the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary is in a separate building, at 115 E. Railroad Ave., despite the fact the two agencies work so closely together.
Officials with Feiro and the sanctuary have gone through a number of design processes and just hired MIT, an architect and design firm in Seattle that is well-versed in museums, aquariums and other types of specialized buildings, Williams said.
They also visited six tribes in the region (Hoh, Jamestown S’Klallam, Lower Elwha Klallam, Makah, Quileute and Quinault) to see if they would be interested in participating and what would resonate with them, Williams said.
“Currently, we have about 30,000 people that go to both” Feiro and the sanctuary office, she said.
“This would take us to a conservative estimate of 75,000 people. We also would have the opportunity to work with the Field Hall and the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe to do joint programming as well as the tribes have said they would like to see different things represented in the building,” she added.
A new building would not only offer a better revenue model but also the ability to update their exhibits and make them more modern, Williams said.
It would also provide the opportunity to pursue accreditation, which would have a positive impact on their animal care and research abilities, Williams said.
In response to a question from county Commissioner Randy Johnson regarding operating expenses after the building is finished, Williams said the capital campaign consists of the building construction costs plus two different reserve funds, one of which is a building maintenance fund and the other covers the first year of operations.
“And, so, we will be trying to raise more money than just the building construction in order to make sure we are moving forward successfully,” Williams said.
“We have definitely learned about the wisdom of saving for a rainy day. So that is definitely part of our plan.”
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Reporter Brian Gawley can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 55650, or at brian.gawley@soundpublishing.com.
