PORT ANGELES — The salary proposed for the chief of the recently formed Port Angeles Harbor Works Public Development Authority would be the fourth-highest in the public sector in the North Olympic Peninsula.
Port Angeles City Manager Mark Madsen, one of the architects of the new public corporation, estimated the director’s salary at $150,000 annually.
Only the Olympic Medical Center administrator, Peninsula College president and Clallam County Public Utility District general manager earn more than that, while other directors of public entities make less.
That salary is intended to attract a person with expertise in both technical matters and marketing, Madsen has said.
The city of Port Angeles and the Port of Port Angeles agreed to form the independent, public corporation last month.
The board of directors — with two members appointed by both the port and the council — was formed on June 4.
Former Port Angeles Mayor Orville Campbell — who was chosen by the other four board members — serves as chairman.
The corporation is intended to focus on the cleanup of Port Angeles Harbor as well as that of the 75-acre former site of a Rayonier pulp mill.
It also must come up with a redevelopment plan for the now barren former mill site — which is still owned by Rayonier — and market it.
The site at the end of Ennis Street in Port Angeles is in the eighth year of a toxic-waste cleanup project supervised by Rayonier, the state Department of Ecology and the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe.
The possibility of purchasing the Rayonier site — assessed at close to $5 million in 1999 — was brought up by Bob McChesney, the port’s executive director, on Friday.
“The PDA [public development authority] has some unique attributes that will be very useful in acquiring the property, getting it cleaned up and marketing it,” McChesney said.
