Cody Cowan is a fifth-generation Ketchikan fisherman. He’s standing in front of an old boat that his father built on the Bar Harbor North floats, the city-owned dock for harbors and talking with other fishermen on a sunny and snowy day. He’s furious.
“It’s getting worse,” Cowan says, to echoes and nods from the men around him. “And there are a lot of people who are done with it. Like me. Truthfully, I’m finished with this.”
In the past few weeks, Cowan was standing behind an open podium, speaking to the members of the city council on their plan to increase the rates for harbors. Cowan anticipates that his moorage fee to rise from about $1300 to around $2,400 per year. He claims that if he makes the other changes he proposes the total cost of keeping the boat that his grandfather constructed in Ketchikan will more than double.
“This isn’t sustainable. This isn’t sustainable,” he adds.
At an meeting of the Jan. 4, city council session, the plan to increase harbor rates was approved. There was some ruckus from harbor residents like Cowan both in and out of the council chambers.
The rate change was initiated through a study that was commissioned by Ketchikan Port and Harbors in 2023. The study on harbor rates revealed that basically, for harbors that are owned by the city to reach a point of profitability the annual revenue had to be in the region between $2.5 million. That’s about 60% higher than annual revenues in 2022.
However, this isn’t exclusive to Ketchikan.
The majority of public boat harbours in Alaska were built and financed by the state in the 1960s and the 1970s. Over the past 30 years, the state-funded subsidies have been cut off to municipal boat yards. Since oil production has decreased and the cost of operating the harbors fell on the individual communities.
A resolution from 2023 passed adopted by Valdez City Council in 2023 City of Valdez urged Gov. Mike Dunleavy to fully fund the state’s grant program to municipal harbors. The resolution, published in the Alaska Association of Harbormasters and Port Administrators and Port Administrators, continued to state that municipal harbormasters had inherited the burden of a huge financial burden their local governments were unable to afford to.
“So there’s no longer a big brother within the oil companies of the State of Alaska who could provide subsidy for those infrastructures,” Ketchikan City Manager Delilah Walsh explained. “And this is what was happening previously. In essence, the state constructed these power dams and the state constructed some of the infrastructure for water, the highways, harbor infrastructure, and there’s not any oil money to build the same thing any more.”
The Ketchikan harbor is run by the basis of a specific revenue fund, which means they are entirely financed by liveaboards, fishermen as well as recreational boaters who utilize the docks. According to Walsh the most important thing to remember is that the cost of living in Alaska on land, as well as on the water, is becoming more expensive.
“Inflation increases, fuel prices rise, supplies increase, rises and we have to pay electricity and water bills as a harbor organization,” Walsh said. “So these prices will go up and rates will increase because that’s the way it operates. Anyone who uses the harbors is required to cover the cost of using them.”
A member of the community during a recent city council session suggested that the expense be spread across the city in general. For Walsh it is here that the issue gets more difficult.
“That means we’re essentially sharing the harbors with other people, basically,” Walsh said. It’s an idea which she described as different from other municipal services with socialization such as firefighters, police, and museums because the users are smaller. But what benefit can harbors offer Alaskan communities in general?
Walsh stated that she doesn’t have an economist that has come up with a method for doing this calculation.
Another question frequently asked, particularly for Southeast Alaska, is if city officials could find a different source of money for the city, like tourism. The city is able to collect the “head tax” which is a set amount for each cruise ship passenger, which is dependent on the locality. The Ketchikan’s tax is $11. The money is put into the city’s Cruise Traveler Vessel Funds or CPV.
Legally, the funds given to the city through the CPV cannot be used for direct benefit to companies operating cruise vessels. Walsh explained that it is currently looking into ways in which improvements to the city’s harbor could meet this condition. As with many city officials in Ketchikan Walsh, she’s careful when discussing ways the city will make use of cruise ship money.
“We need to be extremely cautious, extremely, very cautious about what we do and make sure that it’s justifiable,” Walsh added.
However, how affordable should it be to gain access to the waters of Alaska when you are an Alaskan? What is the way that the state will determine the financial value? This is a question Bryan Hawkins, the port director in Homer is for years.
“It’s taken us many years to come to understanding the meaning of ownership and what our responsibilities are,” said Hawkins, who also serves as vice president for the Alaska Association of Harbormasters and Port Directors. Homer purchased it’s harbor in the year 1999 from state for just $1 which brought years of unmaintained maintenance. Hawkins claims that for the majority of communities in Alaska harbors are vital to the survival of communities.
“It’s not just the end of a road and the connection to water for those who are on the land,” he said. “It’s the start to the roadway for everyone who does not have a road connection.”
There’s an old saying from harbor masters that should you wish to build an urban area in the middle of nowhere create a harbor and then the city will develop around it. In Ketchikan the fishing entrepreneur Cody Cowan stands on a dock that’s less rusty than one that his grandfather used to use and is trying to determine what he can afford to remain.
