Ports and Harbor Commission - Regular Meeting

So I'm gonna have to call

the meeting to order of the Ports and Harbors Commission on June 2. And for the record, commissioner Stevens, Kelly, Steve, Pearson, West are pregnant pregnant. We're pregnant. Our present. Whoo. Whole new whole new stuff. It's gonna be a good night. And Day is absent. Put that in the minutes.

I'm just having another meeting.

First item on the agenda is approval of the Ports and Harbors Commission regular minutes from February 11.

Anyone like to make a motion?

Move to approve.

Thank you, Vince.

I'll second it.

So moved by Commissioner Kelly, seconded by Commissioner Steed.

Anyone have any comments or corrections to the minutes?

Hearing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Anyone opposed? Aye.

All right. They have passed

unanimously. And,

next up, we're gonna turn it over to the clerk's office to walk us through, overview of commissions, roles, and responsibilities. Sherry? Okay.

So, Elise and I are here tonight. I think everybody knows me. I'm the city clerk. We're city of Baldives, and Elise, Sorenberg is the deputy city clerk. So we're here tonight because during strategic planning, the last couple of years, actually, the city council has given direction, to us to work with the boards and commissions, basically, to talk to you about roles and responsibilities, make sure that everybody is clear on those roles and responsibilities as they're outlined in the code, and also to, work with you to think about your goals and objectives, over the next few basically, even just like the next year.

Usually, a lot of times when you work on those, you you you do, a five year plan. Ports and Harbor, you guys have your Harbor master plan. I know that you work out off of. But what council is interested in doing is meeting with the boards and commissions, and we're gonna try to schedule that before the end of the year so that they can meet with the majority of their boards and commissions. You guys are actually up next.

To talk to them about so that you can talk to them about, you know, what are your priorities, where you are at with your master plan, what what you, to see if those align with what they have outlined in their strategic, strategic planning, that they've been doing. They're actually going to do their 2025 strategic planning, this month, twenty first and twenty second, I think, of June. So that's, coming pretty fast. So they're gonna be reviewing what they did last year, looking at, whether they wanna make, any revisions to those. So what we want you to start thinking about and working on is, basically discussing with them what your your your goals are for the upcoming year, and where you kind of are on your with your ports and harbor plan.

So there's that part of this. And what we're gonna do tonight is sort of run through what the Parks and Rec Commission just recently met with them, and has has done the work on this. And so we're just gonna show you what what their presentation was recently to give you an example of kind of what we're looking for. Their presentation was really successful, and and there was a lot of interaction between the city council, and the commission. So that's what we wanna do.

We don't want you, you know, coming into a meeting with the city council and everybody just sitting there looking at each other, like, why are we here? So, actually, you know, doing some work before that happens, is important so that you guys have a good back and forth dialogue, and that it you know, it's a successful, productive meeting. So there's that. So we'll run through that in a minute. As far as roles and responsibilities go, I've handed those out to you, and that's how that appears in the Valvese city code as the roles of this particular commission.

Has everybody looked at those? Everybody familiar with those? So, just just a reminder, as you work through doing the work to come up with your in preparation of your work with the city council, keep in mind what what those roles and responsibilities are and whether you feel as a commission that you're meeting those. I mean, maybe we need to take another look at those and do some code revisions if those are not, what you feel as a commissioner accurate. So when you start that work in preparation of that work session with council, maybe that's something that you want to look at.

But those are what, that's what is written in the city code so far. I mean, that's that's what's there. And, it's it takes a ordinance to revise those. But when you're when you're meeting in preparation and meeting with council, maybe that's something that you wanna look at. You know?

Is that is that our goal? Is that what we're, our purpose as the ports and harbor commission? It used to be called the transportation commission. And so I know it's it's it's been narrowed down to ports and harbor, but you still have in your in your description, you know, you still have the airport. I think I've gotten I think I gave Andrew my copy.

There you go. Yeah. So when you when you guys are looking at these, you've you have, of course, the Balthas Port. You have the Balthas Airport, Alaska Marine Highway, whatever that word means. Hustler, I can't see it.

Hustler and Cartage Service. So tariffs, integration of systems, general integration of air, highway, and water transportation systems. And, of course, about the small board harbor development design operation. And then, of course, it tells you how often that you have to meet. We have worked to, through attrition, reduce the number on the ports and harbor commission to five so that you guys can more easily meet, your quorum so that you can meet more often.

I cannot stress to you how important it is as a commissioner to show up for meetings. Because if you're not in attendance, you can't hold your meetings, and so that really is you know, it's a detriment. You know, things happen. When people sign up for a commission, you know, life happens. Things change.

And so if there is some reason why, you know, you as a commissioner is struggling, you know, to attend meetings or give it the participation that it needs, I would really encourage you to just let us know. You know? Like I said, life happens. And if it's a struggle for you to attend your meetings on a regular basis, then, you know, please let us know. We'll make a you know, we'll we'll tell you, you know, thanks thanks for serving.

We really appreciate your time on the commission, but I would rather have someone let us know that than, you know, just not be able to make meetings and then we can't get our quorum. So that's important. Really, really, really important. And, also, if you're not going to be at a meeting, please let your, staff know well in advance, that you're not going to be in attendance or that you'll be attending you know, you can participate online as well, and that will count for a quorum. So make those arrangements with them ahead of time so that they can, you know, help you do that as well.

Any question about that? K. And, you know, we appreciate you. We really do appreciate the time that you guys put in, to serve as a commission member and your interest in, you know, ports and harbor and, all the things that you're tasked with doing. So there's that. Before we go through the slide, does anything you wanna add, Elise?

No? I mean, I will I guess I will say as as someone who staffs a different commission, just the amount of work that your admins do organizing these meetings is a lot. And I know you guys all appreciate that. And one thing, I'm always a little bit, and what Sherry said is accurate. Right?

It's your responsibility when you're serving on a commission to be the one to say, I'm not available for these dates. It is not the admin's responsibility to chase down a quorum. Mhmm. So just that that's my only 2¢ is, you know, what you sign, when you sign up for commission, the policies and procedures I go over with everybody on, and the attendance, rules I go over with everybody, you know, it says very clearly that you will be the one to let your staff member know, not not the other way around. So just just a reminder on that. So

Okay. So let's see. Yeah. Get me back to where I need to be here, Elise. Where am I going?

Yep. On the bottom. So, like I said, recently, the Parks and Rec Commission met with council. I think, you know, it took them a couple months after I went and we talked I talked to the commission, and, took them a couple months for them to do the work on this, in preparation of that work session. But this is basically the presentation that they they came up with.

It's simple. This was just basically the top of the timeline that they that they used in order to prep for the, for their meeting with council. So December to March, maybe four months of, doing that work. And, they have this on on basically, all of their agendas where they either did a work session or they just took time during the meeting to talk about what their goals you know, to work through their goals and and put this together. The first slide, of course, they talked about what their mission statement is, what their core values were as as a department.

Again, they talked about mission statement, vision statement. So they spent time as a commissioner working through that in order to come to agreement what that what that looks like. They talked about their organizations, that they, their staff belongs to. They talked about what their staff priorities were for that department, so they sorted through those and came up with this list. Like you, of course, they have a master plan that they work off of.

So this was the first goal that they developed. So they talked through this with the council. This was their second goal. And, of course, you know, when they put this together, they had these nice wonderful little pictures. This was their third goal and their fourth and their fifth.

So they came up with just basically five. Simple, easy, and they were able to talk through these with counsel. It was a good back and forth exchange, which was great. And then they came up with, okay. What were the next steps? You know? What are they gonna do in over in order to, you know, move forward to accomplish those goals? So, basically, this was it. It was, you know, pretty short. And, again, they just came up with about five goals.

So you guys are all looking at me. So what do you think? Do you think this is something that you, a as a commission, you know, can work on within the next few months? Gonna push you on it because like I said, counsel's pushing on on me, to work with you guys to, help make this happen. I'm probably Jeremy is not here tonight, but I'm gonna be talking to Jeremy about this as well so that, you know, staff can help put some of these things on your agenda.

But you guys have a master plan, so, you know, take a look at that, see where you're at with it. And if you feel like you're not, you know, you're not going anywhere with that master plan or it's like, no. We've got this master plan, but it's just sitting on the shelf, then, you know, communicate that. Communicate to them when you're putting this together, you know, maybe what are some roadblocks to us actually, you know, doing some work there. So be honest with yourself as a commission when you're going through and doing doing the work on this.

So and, you know, counsel will ask if there is something like that. They'll ask, you know, what can we do to help? Is there something that we can do in order to help facilitate that? So

questions? Is this something that we have access to just kind of like as a reference guide to keep it short, sweet, but concise? Mhmm. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I would I would prefer if we kind of stay with this same type of presentation that the Parks and Rec Commission did. It worked well. I have to admit that I wasn't at this meeting. Elise was. And so maybe she can communicate too, you know, what the interaction was. But this worked really, really well just taking about, you know, five goals that you guys are looking at, wanting to move forward, and how the council can help you guys get there. You wanna add it? Because I was

Yeah. I think that work session was and and it's posted online if you guys wanna go watch it to get Yeah. You

can watch it.

I mean, this this presentation is on there too. Okay. But it kinda started out just like, Ken gave their their director gave just a quick introduction, and then just basically walked through each of the five different goals and just gave the commissioners in the room a chance to discuss it with the council members present. It was down on the floor here, kind of more casual work session setting. And it was really nice too because counsel was able to ask questions about, well, ADA compliance plan, what's the cost point for replacing playgrounds in that?

And what's the actual timeline? And so questions like that could come up. And then just more the ability to have the dialogue to get at least some alignment of where we all going. I think it went well. Yeah.

Is there a timeframe for when council is looking to try like this month, next month, August? I know you said before the end of the year. I know Jeremy had plans to hopefully try and do a work session for full setting, but also to kind of see where we're at budget wise, what they expecting from us? I don't know if that could be a joint or if we just focus on goals like this and what our plans are and the budget is a separate work session. I'm just when when should we have this Yeah.

I mean in place by I mean, I think this has this has to happen first. I mean, you even start talking budget with them. And so I would say that that time is of the essence here, you know, to start working to put this together. And when you guys, you know, feel that you're ready, I mean, you you just let me know, Sarah, and we'll get it on the agenda. But, I mean, budget's coming up.

I know, like, on your agenda tonight, you have a dis you know, you're looking at, harbor fees, things like that. So, you know, if that's something that you're going to be presenting to them in the future, so, you know, give them a heads up by you know, if if that's one of your goals, if that's something that the commission supports, and you guys can have some discussion about it. But these are just things that they need to know. I mean, you know, I've I've heard different council members say, you know, what are we what are we doing with the the

Sea otter.

Sea otter. You know? What's going on there? And so there, you know, there's questions about that that they have, and and the public asked them as well. Right? So having this information from the commission, I think there's just so much going on. They're looking at whether or not the city should take over operation at the ferry the ferry terminal. You know? That's a big thing where you guys could, you know, possibly weigh in on that. So there's things happening out there that have a lot to do with this particular commission.

And so this for me, probably my advice would be the sooner the better. So because you get you know, if things are gonna be coming to them with the port, they are always going to ask, what does the ports and harbor commission think? They want to know what your opinion is and what your recommendation is. So staff can bring these things forward, but they wanna know what your what the ports and har harbor commission is recommending.

So,

it's important that's important to them. So they want to hear from you. So spending time on that and meeting with them before you start come you know, staff comes with some big decisions for them to make is gonna make a really big difference. So any other questions that you guys might have about it? You know, it's gonna take some work. And, again, it's gonna take it's gonna take all of you guys.

K? So

I think that's really about all I had. All I can say too is be respectful of your chair when you're running your meetings. I mean, yeah, I I I don't hear I don't hear bad things about this commission as far as, you know, about parliamentary procedures or things running up the the rails. So I think all of you are pretty do a pretty good job of that. So we don't we don't I don't ever hear issues with that.

But I am more than willing to come if you guys need me to, you know, help facilitate some of the work that you're gonna be doing or just come just sit and listen. More I'm more than willing to do that. So if you like, but I'll be talking to Jeremy when he comes back as well. So just to let him know what I talked to you guys about tonight. So maybe maybe at your next meeting, something on the agenda you guys can talk about is putting together a timeline for when you could do the work on this. Yeah? Okay. I'm gonna let you get on with your meeting if you have no more questions for me. But that's really about it.

Anything else from you guys? Thank you, Sherry and Elise. Appreciate it. Thank you.

And next is public business on the floor, but

I don't think we have any.

So moving on to new business, which is a discussion item for Harbor budget trajectory.

And I'm gonna let Sarah take the lead. So, ultimately, back in March, myself, Jeremy, Andrew, and Sarah Cox was there also, and then Jamie, Vince, and Ed Day all participated participated just to kinda do a small little task force, if you will, get together to kind of spitball, ideas regarding the harbor budget specifically because we have been having trouble having our revenues, cover our operating expenses. And so it was kind of ideas on how we might mitigate that. Obviously, as I've put in here is we've talked about, do we take over the Tide Land leases? Currently, community development has been monitoring them, managing them forever in a day.

As I stated also, talking to finance, if we did take that over, it would be about roughly $235,000 annually. But ultimately, it would come down to working with the city manager, city clerk to see if a ComDev would give them to us to manage. And can we get that money out of the general fund to go directly into the harbor. The other thing has been short term rental opportunities. Right now, obviously, we don't have any upland space really for that unless we start using some of our parking areas or, say, food trucks or whatever, but that would obviously have to be run by generators because we don't have power supply available for them.

But that's also another option. I know we've had people ask about it in the past couple of years. We've kind of said no to that, at least just on the staff wise because, again, we've had so many complaints about just there's just never enough parking down at the harbor. I know that during that meeting also, the three commissioners were not in the mindset of wanting to up the mortgage rates, which is fine. We're already in a three year period anyways.

This year was the first year of the next three, which it can be zero or you can up it to, I think we had 10%, five or 10% is the max. I forget now off top of my head. But ultimately, you can either raise them or just leave them steady status quo from year to year. And that can be up to you guys to recommend to counsel when we go into the budget season. The other thing would be review of, waterfront lease funding, which kind of was already mentioned before, but we just really don't have the space to do it.

You're giving something up. Right. So, again, other other revenue opportunities would be, operational efficiencies. So either a, we like I said, maybe we close the office at five, and we don't have the other services to offer people that are coming in after hours that wanna get mortgage, you know, 6PM, 7PM. What other services do we call back, you know, like take away essentially?

Do we not do as much landscaping? Do we not provide precomp out service? Do we not you know, there's all these other things that what can we what is everybody willing for us to take away in lieu of us not being able to cover our operational expenses? So that was part of the conversation that they want Jeremy had asked about having with the during a work session with counsel is what are their expectations? Do is are they willing to just let the general fund subsidize us if we can't meet that?

If they want us to cover our own operational expenses, then, again, what services do we cut back on? Because, obviously, you can't just really start putting positions. But do you just not have temporary staff in the summer, like, in the office, and we close it? And it is what it is, and we just run lean and mean. So that those are kind of the things.

So if you guys have other ideas on revenue sources, ideas, We have currently one person that is we had a discussion earlier last year regarding initially short term rentals, and it was originally brought up about being an Airbnb, which that then mix. We don't wanna do that, again, through legal's recommendation. But the way that the code currently reads is you can rent a watercraft. It doesn't say that it has to be operational. And so we have one gentleman who is looking to he's got at least two boats.

One, he's planning on living on board himself, but another one that he is looking to rent out. And as long so long as it's thirty one days or more, it's not considered a short term rental, which then falls within the current code for him to do that. So we are going to have another conversation once Jeremy gets back about tightening up the way that the code reads. I know a few of you guys have heard me talk about tiny home houseboats, whether the city does it or a third party investor wants to come in and do it. Obviously, this would kind of open up that doorway a little bit more.

So in the event that we did that, that's more research needs to be done on Like I said, I don't know if the city really wants to get into into that so much to speak. One other thing that's not really listed on here that I was talking with Elise earlier, and I brought it up before for budgetary constraints is possibly moving our evening meetings to daytime meetings instead. That way nobody's coming in and getting overtime that's that they don't need to have if we can have, like, a lunchtime meeting. Most of our meetings usually don't run more than an hour. I know we've all had meetings outside of work that take place during the day.

So my question to you guys is what would your schedules allow for? I know, at least, absolutely, Wednesdays are completely booked. Mondays are wide open. The first or fourth Tuesday of each month, and this is assuming, like, around, are open. The first, second, or fourth Wednesday and Thursday are open, and any Friday is open.

A lot to digest, but, if you guys are and, you know, I I don't even think it has to initially be noon. We could probably look to do a one or an eleven or whatever works for schedules. Obviously, in the summertime for you guys, I mean, specifically after when the boats are Unless there's a ship important, then not until three. You know what I mean? Right. Right.

Right. It's variable too much for me. So I think you should lean to what's best for the masses. And then if I think he's there, I'll be there. If not, you know, if I share for that reason. But he will also be out fishing most of the summer. So, anyway, that's, I think that's, I think, the natural challenge of daytime, but it gravitate and work from there. And only one of five.

And, I mean, I I think it's kinda one of those where we can set it, but it can be flexible. It's kind of like when we went from having trying to have two meetings a month to one meeting a month. You just have to know

Yeah. Publish this time. So

Vince, you said you're before, the last time we talked about this, you were you're pretty flexible. Right? Okay. Jamie, you were pretty flexible too? Okay.

Yeah. It just has to do with shipping

for me, shipping her her boats Gotcha. In the summer. We'll we'll play it by ear, but, yeah, that's at least one way for us to try and tighten the purse strings a little bit more as well. But, yes, any other ideas that you guys have? One thing we have also talked about, it wasn't on here. It still has to get approval from the city manager. We need to do some more recon is the possibility of us taking over management of Allison Point and Glacier Campground. Homer took over their city campground on the spit and it's actually been pretty productive for them. It's first come, first serve. As far as I know, they do not have any kind of a camp post down there.

If we try this in recon this year, which is kind of the second year, am I doing it? I was looking to start maybe with Allison Point first and foremost because they really don't have anybody out there monitoring money the way that we have seen stuff. And the way that they're being run is after looking at the contract that they have with the city, not being adhered to. So we met with Parks and Rec two weeks ago now, AJ, myself, and Russell, and

then

Cole and Bridget. And they are very, very amenable to it. They would love to have it back within the city. They would prefer it. It sounds like not to necessarily run it, but they would be more than happy to help us out to facilitate and and manage it and do what we need to do just because of the way that it's been managed recently by the contractor. So that's another option. Obviously, we try and we're not gonna go out there on a daily basis, but, you know, on the weekends, try and collect numbers and because they haven't even been reporting, even have that information to see, is it is it worth it? You know? Is it cost effective? Right.

It's all great to roll

in as long as you're making sense of Right.

You're not creating it. And then

the revenue source, it takes more investment to collect them. So hence, another year of recon for us. But, again, open open to any ideas you guys might have or if you think there's services that we probably could back on that maybe we do too much. Are we are we doing too much for you guys? Any ideas or comments from the whole commission?

Where does the free forget what pump out come from? Or how does that get taken care of?

So we actually have four stand alone pump out stations. One is at the the North Fuel Dock, one is also on the end of V Dock, and then we've got two in the South Harbor. It's all free. You can come and pump out your boat yourself. But we also did get a grant, I wanna say, four or five years ago, where we actually got a pump out cart and a pump out boat. So in the wintertime, if you need to have your boat pumped out, we do come down and it's free of charge, and that was all through the Alaska Clean Water Act.

Anyone else? Fantastic ideas. My only fear with the Tideland lease transfer is whether the city is it's not new revenue to the budget. It would be anyway, that would be my only is is would council see that as just a transfer of funds? And so it's not really a bottom line change to the overall budget, and it it it would be allocated. So it would be designated hardware funds, but it would be going away from somewhere else.

This is true. I mean, it it'd be we would love for community development to keep managing them, but and get the revenue. But at the same point in time, they would rather not do that for us to get the funds, yes, it would still come out of the general fund. It's kind of like the fish taxes currently. They come in, but they are designated to the harbor fund. Would be the same thing. But at least our budget would see the difference in revenues versus expenses in that respect for budgetary purposes.

My guess is that some of this conversation is gonna roll into some of our priorities. And and so I guess we probably have time to think on our own and get back to you. Is that the better way if no one's opening their mouth right now? And maybe I I don't know if I know you've looked at other harbors for other opportunities, and and kind of sharing some of those results too might help trigger some thoughts for all of us.

Is what are some other revenue sources?

There a standalone harbor that's completely supporting themselves with our general fund? And I think that would be the other beneficial thing to be able to bring to counsel with this issue is what are sure. We could function as an enterprise fund as that's typical for a harbor in the state of Alaska. Is it not? And not that we have to do the same as everyone else, but that would be ammo

in our pocket to use in that discussion. Appreciate that because I honestly had not even looked into that specific question. We'll do some research on that over the next meeting.

Anything else for

folks? Anything else there on that? And

I know Sarah was hoping Ed was here to

give a report from that group

with a little passion from some issues he had, but we'll have to get filled in from Ed at a later date. So do you guys have there's no more on the discussion. Do you guys have reports from Harbor or port that you wanna share?

No. Only report from the port is that, we have transitioned back to, utilizing Kelsey Dock. The vessels have slightly shifted their position. They've gotten sign off from the Southwest Pilot Association to more and whatever, or not whatever, but the diagram in which they're currently configured at. And like Sherry had alluded to, city administration and the port director are working on a long term solution with the state of Alaska, potentially taking over operations at the ferry terminal. But I have not been in those conversations. So I cannot update you there.

You know they exist.

They are happening. Andrew, I have a question. Who is Phillips Cruises? I saw them recently get put on the schedule. So Phillips Cruise, they are, kind of partnered with Princess Lodge. And so what they do, they board over in Whittier, and then they they take a two to three hour trip across the sound. Roughly, it's anywhere from, like, 60 to a 150 passenger. Right? I guess their boats only get to about 90 or less than a 100. So less than a 100 passengers coming off and then less than a 100 passengers going back on.

And so, yeah, they'll they'll come in every other Wednesday and every Saturday, from late May to the July. And they'll spend a couple of the during the passenger exchange, prior and just after the people that are deep boarding are, getting a couple hours in town. And then the people that are arriving are then also getting a couple hours in town prior to them, being bused up to the Princess Lodge at Copper Center. Oh, okay.

Basically, they're getting off ship and they're just rotating

Okay. On

their land program for their first night or their last night.

Right. Mhmm. Yep. I really don't have much from the harbor aside from if guys you have been down there, you'll see that we're trying to, revitalize the San Steven's Plaza a little bit slowly but surely, getting there, and then some boardwalk repairs and pretty much just fixing what got broken over the winter and working with, I guess, some kind of upcoming intermittent electrical issues with an h three k replacement that there's, I guess, still some kinks to work out. So we're we're dealing with that, but the the yard's buzzing.

We've got our annual servicing going on for the travel starting tomorrow, so that'll be down if anybody needs that. But feel free to come by and take a look. Talk to Levi. He's here almost every other year besides the other guy, Rory. And I think we've got one of the best well maintained machines within the state. We're making sure that we bring somebody up every single year. So, yeah, it's it's good, but it's a little bit late getting them here this year, unfortunately. So it's pushing into commercial season wanting to get started and everybody wanting to haul out and do work. So hopefully, we're gonna schedule a year out this go around. Any questions for the commission for reports?

Is there any commission business from the floor? Anyone? Alright. Then we can, officially adjourn. So thank you all.