By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
Shee Atika Inc. and a new Sitka company, Adventure Sitka LLC, are proposing developing 17 acres of city-owned property near the end of Halibut Point Road for a new tourism venture to open in 2022 – in time for Sitka to welcome up to 400,000 cruise ship visitors.
The plan for “Harbor Point” calls for leasing the property and building a trail system, park areas, garden, lookout points, zip lines and dock, with opportunities for tour departures and interpretive services to learn about Sitka and Native history, culture and foods.
“We are proposing this because the expanded cruise traffic is going to require additional activities for visitors to take part in,” said Chris McGraw, one of the partners of Adventure Sitka. “If 7,000 passengers come in, you can’t just drop them off at Centennial Hall. You need to disperse passengers and one way to do that is to provide new experiences.”
A tourist attraction is mapped out in a proposal from Shee Atika and Adventure Sitka. (Map provided by 11.17 Design Studio, LLC)
Shee Atika, the Sitka urban Native corporation, will be the developer and Adventure Sitka will be the operator of Harbor Point. McGraw’s partner in Adventure Sitka is Dennis McDonnell, president of Alaska Coach Tours. McGraw’s company Halibut Point Marine owns and operates a deep water dock with berthing space for two cruise ships at a time.
The Harbor Point site is six miles out of town, and about a third of a mile farther out Halibut Point Road from the cruise ship dock.
Shee Atika CEO Karl Potts said the urban Native corporation has been interested in pursuing economic opportunities in recreational tourism for some time, including in the Katlian Bay area where Shee Atika already owns land selected under the Alaska Native Land Claims Settlement Act.
When he was approached by Adventure Sitka for a project closer to town, Potts was looking for something that “ticked all the boxes.”
“It had to be financially viable; two, it had to be culturally sensitive, three, because we have a big investment in downtown Sitka, we didn’t want anything we did to ‘cannibalize’ the downtown core business district,” Potts said.
Shee Atika owns real estate downtown, including a commercial and office building at 315 Lincoln Street.
The 17-acre parcel is part of the No Name Mountain/Granite Creek land use master plan released last year. After interest in the parcel was expressed, the Assembly approved a request for information, and later a request for proposals.
Shee Atika and McGraw’s company submitted a proposal.
City staff said they are asking followup questions of all those who responded to the RFP, and responses are due at the end of the month.
The proposal goes next to a review committee, which will make recommendation to the Assembly for final consideration on the lease. No formal action on a lease has been scheduled yet.
The property is zoned R-1, single family and duplex residential, which means it will have to be rezoned if the proposed commercial uses are approved.
Citing high development costs, a planning consultant said the best use of the 17 acres would be for high-end residential or commercial recreation use. The Assembly approved an RFP that would allow for purchase of the property for residential use, but leases only for commercial ventures.
City staff members said they couldn’t say at this time whether other responses to the RFP were received, since details still need to be negotiated with prospective companies.
The Plan
Projections for the 2022 cruise season not only foresee a large number of cruise ship visitors but more frequent visits of larger ships of up to 4,905 passengers capacity.
In 2019 Sitka had 220,000 cruise visitors, but only one ship in the new higher capacity class made a port call here, the Chamber of Commerce said.
Chris McGraw said these ships, called “neopanamax,” are expected to come to Sitka frequently, presenting not only opportunities but challenges to the community, since a two-ship day would bring 9,000 visitors, plus crews, to town at one time.
McGraw said the facilities at Harbor Point will not have the capacity to accommodate all the passengers on a cruise.
“We anticipate the site to be able to accommodate between 300 to 400 passengers per day,” he said.
McGraw estimated sales tax revenues for the city from tours and services sold at the park at $75,000 to $100,000 per year.
He estimated that in the past, some 1,300 to 1,400 tickets to tours were sold in a season. That number will need to be 4,000 to meet the demand of the arrivals in 2022.
“There’s going to be a lot of people that won’t be able to take a tour – everything would be sold out,” McGraw said. “We need more tours for more people to partake in that.”
The site plan shows a number of low-impact activities on a trail system, a turnaround area for buses and other vehicles, and a welcome center and set up for interpretive talks. Areas have been identified for a salmon bake, whale lookout, “cultural beach food,” and canoe launch. A zip line route has been identified with three destinations, although this and other details are still “conceptual,” McGraw said.
The partners have been working with various visitor attractions and educational organizations in Sitka interested in having a presence in the Harbor Point park. Allen Marine and Sitka Tribe of Alaska also are working with the partners on plans.
McGraw and Potts said the goal is to offer something new and “authentic” in Sitka, and take some of the visitor traffic out of the downtown area. Another goal is to create something new and that would not compete with what’s already offered.
Potts said Shee Atika plans on investing some $3 million to $4 million in construction. McGraw projected that there would be jobs for 20 to 30 seasonal workers when the new visitor facilities are in operation, and 8 to 10 jobs in construction. McG Constructors Inc. will be the contractor on the construction.
Potts said the partners hope Sitkans will see a benefit in having a new recreational area and trail system during the off-season.
Shee Atika owns 3,000 acres in Katlian Bay, plus a number of commercial and residential properties near and in town, including the Shee Atika building at 315 Lincoln Street and properties on Alice and Charcoal Islands.
City Administrator John Leach said the city has asked for clarification from all responders to the RFP, and at the same time is developing a Tourism Master Plan of its own to handle the big increase in cruise visitors.
“I think we absolutely can handle 400,000 tourists but we would do it in a different way,” he said. “The public has to be a part of the process, and there’s going to be a balance between what (Shee Atika and Adventure Sitka) wants and what the public wants. It has to be a community process.”
Leach said city staff will be looking out for the community’s interests, and the interests of existing businesses.
“Redirection of revenue is not new revenue,” Leach said. “If money is moved to another location, that’s not new revenue. ... It will be beneficial to the community if they’re able to capture revenues that would’ve been lost.”
The 16-page description of the project includes Shee Atika’s record of successful business ventures, the experience of Adventure Sitka partners, both organizations’ commitment to the community, and the track record of contractor McG (formerly McGraw Custom Construction).
Much of the site is devoted to calling attention to Sitka’s natural beauty and Tlingit culture and history. The goal is to create a site “like none other in Southeast,” McGraw said.
Potts said the goal is to create something that works not only for Shee Atika and Adventure Sitka, but the community as well.
“We have a rare opportunity to make this what Sitka wants, adds to the economic vitality and contributes to things for residents to do when the tourists are gone,” Potts said.
Visit Sitka and Chamber of Commerce executive director Rachel Roy said she’s pleased to see a private venture planning to offer something new to visitors.
“It is essential to have a robust offering of tour excursions for the cruise lines to sell and to offer passengers something more,” she said. “It strengthens the marketability of a port. We need to continue to develop tour options. It brings tax dollars tax revenue into the community. The tax revenue comes to the city from those additional excursions and creates jobs.”
