Port of Nome holds Open House to explain projects

Port of Nome officials invited to an open house last Thursday at Old St. Joe’s, with the goal to present several projects around the small boat harbor and Nome’s port to the public.
Looming large was of course the expansion of the Port of Nome as it is to become the country’s first deep draft Arctic port. But other projects, most still in the wishful-thinking phase, were presented as well. Cartoonish drawings depicted key areas of the harbor vicinity with ideas of public infrastructure like cruise ship visitor facilities on River Street, industrial storage areas, tank farm upgrades, a port trash reception facility plus an incinerator, a bathhouse and laundry facility and an increased moorage area at the Snake River.  
The Denali Commission just last week notified the city that it approved a grant for $1 million for the Port of Nome Snake River Moorage facility.
The federal Dept. of Transportation last year awarded a grant of $13.2 million for the $16.5 million project that would dredge about seven acres, add 1,700 feet of floating dock and develop a portion of the shoreline on the west bank of the Snake River.
As Nome enters into the first phase of the port expansion to begin this summer, Port Director Joy Baker was on hand to explain the complex cost share between the U.S. Corps of Engineers and the City of Nome. The city is 100 percent responsible for the so-called Local Service Facilities. “It’s a term coined by the Army Corps that makes the distinction between the federal features, which are the breakwaters, the armor stone and the dredging. The remainder of the infrastructure to be built – the docks, roads and utilities are all on the local sponsor, which is the City of Nome,” Baker explained. “So we are 100 percent responsible for the design and construction costs for all the sheet pile dock, the gravel, the surfacing of the road, and the buried utilities to support fuel, water, sewer, power and fiber.”
In addition, the city is obligated to pay 10 percent of the so called general navigational features, which are the actual rocks and material for the causeways.
Congress authorized $250 million for the Corps to build out phase 1A of the port expansion and the Alaska Legislature allocated $175 million to the city of Nome – both sums will be spent on phase 1A of the project, slated to begin this summer.
Just this week, the Nome Common Council authorized port and city staff to apply for another federal DOT grant to fund construction of portions of phase 1B of the port expansion project, in the amount of $11.25 million. The city is 100 percent responsible to pay for the construction of the Local Service Facilities. According to documents in the city council packet, the estimated cost of the local service facilities in phase 1B total $14.75 million. If the grant is awarded, the city would use $3.5 million from the State’s contribution to cover the total cost.
Phase 1B consists of extending the causeway by 2,300 feet, adding a 1.870-ft. sheet pile dock, fenders, bollards, ladders and dock filling working surface and an access road, as well as constructing the utility infrastructure. Phase 1B won’t go out to bid until 2028.