By SHANNON HAUGLAND
and GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Staff Writers
The city is on track for a new seaplane base by 2024, but potential users of the facility asked Wednesday that the city speed up the process.
“It needs to be done now,” said Kevin Mulligan, Baranof Island’s sole commercial seaplane pilot, at a stakeholder meeting for float plane pilots and owners.
Engineering and environmental planning consultants on the seaplane project held two meetings and an open house at Harrigan Centennial Hall to take comments from stakeholders and the public about possible environmental concerns and design features they wanted to see in the new facility.
But the general sentiment at both meetings was that it’s an urgent need right now. The city has targeted a tract of state-owned land on the north end of Japonski Island as the site for the new floatplane base.
Sitka has already lost aviation-based business to Juneau because of the inadequacy of Sitka’s 65-year-old seaplane float off Katlian Street, Chamber of Commerce director Rachel Roy said after the meeting.
Ken Nichols, an aviation engineer with DOWL, points to a map of a proposed Japonski Island seaplane dock during a meeting with stakeholders at Harrigan Centennial Hall Wednesday. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)
“There’s a sense of urgency this is needed,” said Tom Middendorf, a senior aviation planner for DOWL, the consulting firm that has been hired by the city. “And sooner rather than later.”
“It’s become a disaster why Sitka doesn’t have this facility by now,” Mulligan told the consultants.
The city is currently in the planning and environmental assessment phase, and some who spoke at Wednesday’s meetings expressed frustration about the length of time the environmental stage will take.
Kelli Cropper, the city’s project manager on the new facility, said that before planning can begin, an environmental assessment is needed, since the National Environmental Protection Act requires projects using federal funding to be assessed for environmental impacts.
“We’re going to go as fast as we possibly can with the process that we have to go through, and the funding cycles with the FAA,” Cropper said. “We can’t do it without the FAA grants... Hopefully we’re done by the end of 2023, but that one’s tight.”
A commenter said that the process could be shortened if the city contributes financing or obtains grants in addition to the federal funding that the project depends on.
But obtaining more money would be difficult and unlikely, Cropper said.
Sitka municipal engineer Cliff Richter said, “We can’t do it without the federal funding, and because of that, it adds a lot of red tape.”
Commenting at the stakeholder meeting, Assembly member Richard Wein said, “It’s kind of a head scratch as to the environmental assessment, where we have seafood processors dumping mid-channel fish entrails.”
The city is hoping that the FAA will cover 93.75 percent of the $16 million project. The general plan calls for a 14-plane dock, with a drive-down ramp, access to fuel, and uplands amenities including a small terminal building and parking.
Speakers also said the facilities should be designed to aid in the transport of people with disabilities and patients coming and going from the SEARHC Mt. Edgecumbe hospital. An airplane haulout and room for expansion were other needs mentioned.
Among the 27 potential environmental issues in the project are conflicts with marine mammals and birds, the herring fishery, and noise and air quality, engineers told the Sentinel after the meeting.
About a dozen people attended the afternoon stakeholder meeting, including pilots, city staff and members of the Coast Guard. The public meeting later in the day drew a turnout of more than 30, including pilots and representatives of such organizations as SEARHC, Mt. Edgecumbe High School, the Chamber of Commerce and Visit Sitka, the U.S. Forest Service, harbor users, small plane service workers, city staff and the general public.
Complete details on the seaplane base project can be found at the City of Sitka website.
