MOU on Cruise Ships Approved on 4-3 Vote

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Created on Wednesday, 13 November 2024 15:44

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By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
    Assembly members at a busy meeting on Tuesday approved a memorandum of understanding on cruise ship passenger limits, appropriated more funds for the marine haulout project, and gave direction to purchase an electric van for the Parks and Rec program.
    The MOU between the city and the Sitka Dock Company and the decision on the van passed on narrow 4-3 votes, but most of the other items were 7-0 decision in the meeting that lasted about two and a half hours.

City officials pose with a gold shovel at the location of a new marine haulout Friday at the Gary Paxton Industrial Site. Pictured are, from left, Assembly member Kevin Mosher, GPIP Board of Directors members Chad Goeden and Lauren Howard Mitchell (holding her son, Gil Howard), Municipal Engineer Michael Harmon, Assembly member Thor Christianson, Municipal Administrator
John Leach, Mayor Steven Eisenbeisz, Sitka Economic Development Association Executive Director Garry White, and GPIP Board of Directors Chair Scott Wagner. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)

Cruise Ships
    The vote on approving the memorandum was 4-3, with Chris Ystad, Kevin Mosher, Tim Pike and Mayor Steven Eisenbeisz in favor; and JJ Carlson, Thor Christianson and Scott Saline against.
    Assembly members had a lively debate over whether the MOU was needed, but in the end approved the document that will serve as a “framework” for port calls in 2025.
    The Assembly this fall directed City Administrator John Leach to negotiate an agreement with dock owner Chris McGraw, in line with achieving Tourism Task Force goals of “flattening the curve,” taking out peak days, shortening the season, and designating quiet days.
    As approved, the MOU was unchanged from the draft that Leach negotiated with McGraw, and that Leach presented to the Assembly for approval Oct. 22, three weeks ago. The vote was postponed in order to give the Assembly and public more time for review.
    Leach’s memo to the Assembly seeking approval of the document said, “An important factor to be aware of is that the 2025 cruise calendar has already been populated and cruises have already been placed up for sale by the cruise companies. The CBS and (Sitka Sound Cruise Terminal) will work collaboratively with the cruise companies to address any conflicts with this agreement, if approved.”
    The Assembly was split on the question of signing off on the agreement with the operators of the privately owned cruise ship terminal.
    “I don’t see a lot of benefit for the city, because it’s going to cost us money,” Thor Christianson said. He noted the loss of lightering fees if the city, under the terms of the agreement, limits the number of passengers lightered to the Crescent Harbor or O’Connell lightering docks if necessary to keep the total visitors in one day less than the 7,000 limit in the MOU.
    “Seven thousand is probably not the number I would have picked as an ideal number, and if we (McGraw and the city) were both working toward that I’d be much more inclined to vote for this but we’re not,” Christianson said. “It’s all on the city and I don’t think it’s fair and I don’t think it’s a good deal for the city.”
    Kevin Mosher offered a different perspective, saying the time is right for this MOU, it’s flexible and can be changed at any time, and it’s important to approve it now, before the cruise schedule is set for the 2026 season, he said.
    “No item is perfect, not at all, but I think it’s important, too, for the timing,” he said, noting that the cruises are booked two seasons out. “It’s important to do this because it’s something the community wants and it’s not perfect but it’s fair.”
    “This document speaks to what the city is going to do and that’s because it’s the only thing that we control,” Tim Pike said. “I didn’t read it in terms of the city’s giving everything up. I read it in terms of the task force that we established and gave us direction. They said what they wanted, where we needed to go. ... It’s not perfect but it’s a step forward.”
    A few said the document with the dock company isn’t needed, since it calls for the city’s taking action on large cruise ship days, which the city can do on its own without an MOU.
    “Perhaps this isn’t the document we need to make those decisions, but we do it in a fashion that isn’t making promises to a private business owner,” JJ Carlson said. She said the document has some “great strategies” but wondered whether an MOU was the right format, or if the city should explore its own lightering policy that achieves the same goals.
    When the MOU was presented to the Assembly for approval three weeks ago it was at the same meeting at which the commission members were being appointed to the new Tourism Commission. The commission has not yet had its first meeting.
    The MOU says the city will establish the criteria for planning cruise calls, including not allowing ships with more than 1,000 passengers to dock at the city’s docks if doing so would result in total cruise passenger numbers exceeding 7,000.
    On days when 4,500 passengers are scheduled on ships at the city docks, the cruise company won’t allow the docking or tendering of ships of more than 1,300 visitors at the Sitka Sound Cruise Terminal, if doing so would result in more than 7,000 in Sitka for the day.
    The agreement calls for maintaining a weekend quiet day when the city won’t allow cruise ships with more than 1,000 passengers to dock at or tender to city docks or the cruise terminal “on a weekend day reserved for one ship with a capacity under 1,250.”
     Saturday is the designated quiet day in the MOU but there are provisions for changing that day through negotiations.
    Another section on scheduling says there will be more readily accessible ship schedules and coordination through sharing quarterly schedules with an explanation of changes, providing the lower berth capacity for each ship during the season and drafting a berthing schedule before the season “no later than 18 months before each season.”
    Other requirements for the city and dock company are to notify each other of schedule changes.
    Noting the potential losses of lightering fees for the harbor fund due to the city’s limiting use of city docks, Chris Ystad said he didn’t believe the city would lose much and “maybe scheduling would allow us to still reach those numbers.”
    “The Port and Harbors Commission is working on different ways of generating revenue,” he added.
    Chris McGraw, owner of the dock company, said today he believes the MOU is “a step in the right direction based on work that went on at the Tourism Task Force, which I was a part of.”
    “The document works to minimize the number of large days over 7,000 passengers, and creates a quiet day,” he said. “We –– the city and the cruise dock –– are both limiting passengers on the quiet day.”
    McGraw outlined berthing policy last year that he still intends to follow, which includes limiting the number of 4,000+ passenger ships per week to four, and no more than one larger ship (4,000+) and one smaller ship (less than 4,000) per day, up to four days a week.
    Asked what the city receives in return for hosting cruise ships and passengers, he responded that he believes the cruise industry has provided benefits for the town, in the form of economic activity for local residents, opportunities for young families and “sales tax revenues that fund a lot of city services and infrastructure for the entire community.”  
Other Business
     Also Tuesday night the Assembly:
    –– approved the promotion of City Controller Brooke Volschenk to Finance Director, succeeding Melissa Haley when she leaves that position March 31.
    –– passed on first reading supplemental budget ordinances appropriating funds for the haulout and shipyard project, the Crescent Harbor Park playing courts, and refurbishing a vehicle for the solid waste department. The ordinances will be on the Nov. 26 agenda for final reading.
    –– approved a budget ordinance on final reading for the final phase of the airport expansion project. The ordinance would increase the project funding and authorize the administrator to apply for a $9 million FAA grant. The ordinance calls for spending up to $300,000 from the airport fund.
Haulout Project
    The Assembly approved on first reading an ordinance accepting $336,475 in one-time 2020/21 statewide salmon disaster relief funds, and dedicating the money to the haulout and shipyard project at the industrial park.
    Work on the first phase of the project, estimated at $10.6 million, is set to begin this winter, as soon as the permits are secured from the Army Corps of Engineers and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for in-water work.
    The city applied for the permits in January and expected to receive them over the summer in time for an October 15 construction start date, GPIP director Garry White told the Sentinel today.
    “There’s been a lot of frustration working with the NOAA and Army Corps on permitting,” the GPIP director added today. The city applied for permits in January and expected to receive approval or denial within mandated 135-day turnaround, which would have allowed the Oct. 15 construction start.
    At last Thursday’s meeting the GPIP board voted to recommend that the Assembly accept the relief funds, and dedicate them to the project, specifically toward the concrete washdown pad.
    White said he’s expecting completion of the project on time with the facility opening next spring despite the permitting delays.
    A brief ground-breaking ceremony was held at the site of the haulout project on Friday, attended by White, GPIP board members and a few Assembly and city staff members. (See photo, page 1). Materials for the construction start are already under way on a barge headed to Sitka.
    The disaster relief funds are intended to offset the effects of a poor salmon years. Individual fishermen also received disaster relief funds, but the pool of funding accepted by the Assembly Tuesday is for affected communities, Kevin Mosher pointed out at the Assembly meeting.
The Assembly had a few questions for White, and approved the dedication of the disaster funds to the haulout project without objection.
    In other business, the Assembly appointed Robert Hattle to the Police and Fire Commission and the Local Emergency Planning Committee, in the “member of the public” position.
    The Assembly had a work session with the Sustainability Commission prior to the Tuesday regular meeting.
    The electric vehicle and other agenda items will be reported in a later edition of the Sentinel.