Nome showcases port expansion at harbormasters conference

By Julia Lerner
Representatives from the City and Port of Nome traveled to Anchorage last week to participate in the annual Alaska Association of Harbormasters and Port Administrators conference.
The conference took place from Monday, October 25 through Friday, October 29 and was sponsored in part by the City of Nome. Representatives from the community had the opportunity to present information about the ongoing port expansion project through interactive sessions and exhibitions.
“We’re showcasing our expansion project here,” Nome’s Port Director Joy Baker told the Nugget. “There’s a lot of misinformation, rumors, and people wondering ‘What stage is it in?’or is it even going to happen. We’re able to get the real, factual information out there across the state about the Nome port.”
Baker was joined by Mayor John Handeland and City Manager Glenn Steckman, among others, and presented updates on the proposed Arctic deep draft port in Nome on Thursday.
“I know that there’s still some skepticism as to whether the project is going to happen, so right off the bat, I’d like to resolve that,” Baker told a crowd of about 50 attendees Thursday afternoon. “We’re building this, just so everybody knows. Tell all your friends and all the naysayers we’re building this just because we absolutely need it, and so does the country.”
Baker, Handeland and a representative from PND Engineers, the group contracted to design the Nome Port expansion, shared timelines, anticipated construction costs, existing community needs, current design models and the history of Nome during Thursday’s presentation session.
“We can’t emphasize enough the fact that this project moved from a pipe dream to reality,” Handeland told the Nugget at the conference. “Our congressional delegation, Sullivan, Murkowski and Young have all been staunch supporters for 10 or 12 years or longer on this. They see that this is something that is needed, not just for Nome or the state, but as a national need. This wouldn’t be possible without their support.”
The proposed port construction, which involves doubling the size of Nome’s existing port and deepening the basin to allow much larger vessels into Nome, is currently in the design phase, which typically takes around two years to complete. Last December, Congress authorized funding for the design and planning phase of the project, though more work is necessary before construction can begin.
Baker told conference attendees, that phase one of project construction will occur over three distinct stages in the coming years, will go out to bid in 2023 and will be completed by 2025.
The third and final phase, she estimates, will be finished in 2027.
Construction costs are currently estimated at $642 million, with the City of Nome shouldering $225 million over the three construction phases. Nome representatives stressed that the current cost estimates are “heavily padded” and may be less in the end.
“We’re not going after the users, the residents or the taxpayers for the money to fund the port,” Baker said. “That’s never been the plan, and I don’t see how that would change.”
Steckman says the City is exploring grants, federal funding and public-private partnerships in order to cover Nome’s share of the bill.
“The grant sessions [at the conference] were the most informative,” he told the Nugget. “Where there are potential pots of money, not that one grant is going to cover everything, but the port development is a multi-phase project where there may be some additional funding coming in, especially if Congress passes the Infrastructure Act, which is frankly very necessary for infrastructure not only in Alaska but all throughout the United States and will bring thousands of people back to work.”
Nome’s leadership is also exploring state funding options and working with Governor Mike Dunleavy to push the project to completion.
“The governor is staunchly in our corner and is working with us to ensure various state agencies are working to figure out how to back the rubber check I’ve written for this,” Handeland told the crowd during the Port of Nome information session Thursday. “We’ve told the [Army Corps of Engineers] that we’re going to come up with the money for our match, and they ought to go full steam ahead.”
Dunleavy visited the Port of Nome on August 30, where he had the opportunity to ask questions, look at timelines, and discuss the project in more detail.
“The governor wanted to know enough about it and is involved personally,” Handeland told the Nugget. “He came to Nome to come to talk to us, and his chief of staff and commissioner of transportation are also continuing to work on opportunities and options that the state can support to assist in the completion of this project.”
Most importantly, though, Handeland says the significant cost will not be a deterrent to the project.
“It’s been a long road, but we’re close to the end, and a few dollars aren’t going to kill this thing,” he said. “We’re not letting these numbers get in our way, scare us off, or anything else. We are going to build this damn thing.”
Baker explained the growing need for a deep-water port in the region, as the port of Nome sees more and more use with each passing season.
“We had a banner year for gravel export back in 2013 or 2015,” she told the crowd. “One of those years, we shipped 131,000 tons. That was a good year. Well, last year, we shipped 170,000 tons and this year, we’re over 300,000.”
Baker says a deep-water port doesn’t just benefit the businesses utilizing the port, but the entire region.
“It’s trickling down to benefiting the regional communities, too,” she said. “These projects are in the regional communities that the material goes through, and contractors are there. They’re hiring locals. They’re buying groceries. They’re renting the housing. Economic activity, building, constructing, and repairing is always a good thing, in my mind.”

The City of Nome, the main sponsor of the event, spent about $10,000 to cover the cost of the Anchorage conference, which featured about 60 attendees, a dozen vendors and several days of presentations from local port and harbormasters, representatives from federal government entities and interest groups.
Nome will host the conference next year in Nome, COVID-19 permitting, in the fall. The City was initially slated to host the conference in 2020, and then again this year, but the event was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We hosted the conference in 1994, and we pulled it off quite well,” Baker told the Nugget. “There have been some building changes and hotel losses in there, so we’re evaluating that now.”
The City is not just exploring hotel and lodging options for attendees, but also conference session topics, presentation spaces, and activities for participants.
“Generally, sessions will be the types of things that are of interest to the group,” Baker said. “Things like the Coast Guard, maritime administration, marine exchange, grants, vendors and suppliers that make and sell things that are pertinent to our group, that sort of thing.”
Handeland said the conference is not just a learning opportunity, but a chance to connect with other industry professionals and exchange advice.
“The sessions are certainly interesting and germane to what folks are doing,” he told the Nugget. “But the bigger part in my mind is just being able to interact with others that are in a similar business, or in the same business. Now, if something comes up, we get an opportunity to call someone up and say, ‘Hey, how would you handle this,’ or ‘Have you experienced this?’.”
One of the next steps in the process, Handeland says, is updating infrastructure around Nome to meet the new demands of a massive port. Housing concerns, amenities, port support services, and city infrastructure is a key part of port development.
“We’re coordinating and trying to ensure that we’re advancing everything that we need to simultaneously and being able to keep the project moving on the short term,” he said. “We haven’t lost focus on these other things- they’re just another thing on the list and the timeline that needs to start bubbling up higher.”