PORT ANGELES — Port of Port Angeles commissioners unanimously approved surplussing 6.1 acres at Terminal 7 at the Intermodal Handling and Transfer Facility and exchanging it for 0.8 acres belonging to the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe.
The vote came Tuesday following the second of two public hearings to consider the resolution.
The tribe’s property contains three stormwater ponds the port said are critical to ongoing surface and infrastructure upgrades to the site, formerly known as the log yard.
An $8.6 million U.S. Department of Transportation Maritime Administration grant the port received in 2022 is funding regrading and paving the yard and improvements to the cofferdam.
The ponds will be connected to the new infrastructure at a future date to help manage stormwater at the site.
Obtaining stormwater ponds that already were in place was better for port operations in the long run than developing, permitting and constructing new ponds, said Chris Hartman, the port’s director of engineering, at Friday’s hearing.
The port’s current stormwater discharge system is inefficient and costly to operate, Hartman said. As water quality permitting requirements become more strict, the port needed to look ahead to how it can meet state and federal regulations.
“The infrastructure with the stormwater ponds will allow us to better utilize the property that is to the north and west that we use more seasonally now,” he said, as well as meet any future permitting requirements.
Commissioner Steve Burke on Friday asked the value of the stormwater infrastructure on the tribe’s property.
Hartman estimated it was in the ballpark of $500,000, although that was not the primary motivation for the exchange.
“It is more than the value of that infrastructure, it’s the fact that it’s there,” Hartman said. “Any development would be slow and cumbersome because of the sensitivity of the whole waterfront.”
The log yard property is the site of Tse-whit-zen, an ancestral Klallam village occupied for more than 2,700 years. The village was uncovered in 2003 during a state Department of Transportation construction project for repair of the Hood Canal Bridge. The three stormwater ponds were part of that project.
Construction stopped when human remains and artifacts were found. In 2004, the tribe and WSDOT reached an agreement for archaeological objects to be removed so construction could continue.
Port commissioners and tribal leaders will sign a memorandum of agreement outlining an arrangement for balancing cultural preservation and continued use of the site at a special joint meeting Thursday at the tribe’s Justice Center, 341 Spokwes Drive. The Maritime Administration and the state Department of Archaeology and Historic Preservation also will be MOA signatories.
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Reporter Paula Hunt can be reached by email at paula.hunt@peninsuladailynews.com.
