Harbor-Works plans to hire director in December
By Tom Callis, Peninsula Daily News
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The authority, created by the city and Port of Port Angeles in May, wants to acquire the Rayonier pulp mill site, oversee and hopefully speed up its cleanup and eventually market the property.
On Wednesday, the five-member board voted 4-0, with Karen McCormick absent and Jerry Hendricks participating via telephone, to begin the search for the permanent director position.
Interviews for the position are set for about Oct. 20, and the position is expected to be filled around Dec. 1.
Harbor-Works has budgeted $12,000 a month for a permanent director, but Orville Campbell, chairman of the Harbor-Works board, has said that the exact salary hasn't been decided upon yet.
The advertising for the executive director position is expected to cost $2,000, and will be done through Pacific Northwest publications and on the Internet, said Bill James, port finance director.
City to be reimbursed
Since an accounting system for Harbor-Works has not been set up, the advertising costs will be paid by the city of Port Angeles, said Jim Haguewood, interim director.
Harbor-Works will refund the city the money once it has an accounting system in place, which is planned to be done by the end of the month, he said.
Since public funds are involved, Harbor-Works has to meet requirements and checks and balances as determined by the state Auditor's Office, Haguewood said.
"It's not like you just open a bank account," he said.
"It's like creating a whole financing system like the city of Port Angeles has."
Haguewood said Harbor-Works has been speaking with state Auditor Brian Sonntag about setting up a meeting to discuss the creation of an accounting system.
Since the city of Port Angeles officially created Harbor-Works, it will have to report the public entity on its finances to the state Auditor's Office, James said.
Rayonier
Harbor-Works is expected to work with Rayonier, the state Department of Ecology and the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe, which are the three parties supervising the cleanup of the 75-acre mill site. The cleanup began in 2000.
The City Council, on Aug. 19, the and port Commission, on Aug. 11, approved funding Harbor-Works through the rest of the year with two separate $150,000 loans.
Revenues from sale of the mill site, which is still owned by Rayonier, hopefully will pay back the $300,000 in loans, Campbell said.
Haguewood — who is being paid $8,000 for two months work as interim director — is also the director of the Clallam County Business Incubator and the former head of the Clallam County Economic Development Council.
In addition to Campbell, McCormick and Hendricks, Harbor-Works board members are Howard Ruddell and Bart Irwin.
Harbor-Works' operating budget for about $195,000 through December was developed by Haguewood.
The Rayonier mill site — which includes a buried Klallam village on its eastern half — is contaminated with pockets of PCBs, dioxins, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, lead and other hazardous contaminants left by a pulp mill which operated for 68 years before closing on March 1, 1997.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2000 called the Rayonier site "moderately contaminated," perhaps 2 or 3 on a scale of 10.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
Last modified: September 03. 2008 9:00PM