Port of Hood River Seat No. 5 Candidate Forum

“So last year, on the Airport Committee, we’re constantly brainstorming ways for the airport to be in the black, and improve operations. Just about six, seven years ago, I noticed that the port had looked at possibility of building out solar panel infrastructure at the airport. It basically fulfilled all of the energy needs at the airport plus would have a surplus to be sold back. And potentially, those numbers that look like airport could be self sufficient just on solar energy,” said Bieker. “I’ve been doing the Airport Committee now for about three and a half years. And when I see a problem, my first thought is how can we solve this problem? And there’s just a lot of conferring about well, we should hire consultant to figure this out for us. I think a lot of times we can figure it out ourselves and move forward. So I feel like that’s what the port needs right now is people who are willing to get their hands dirty and find solutions.”

For his opening statement, Klaas focused on potential issues facing the port and how they can serve the community.

“And what’s going on at the port right now is big transition period, we’re about to lose the bridge. And they’ve got over the years. You got used to a money machine basically for the tolls that subsidize some of the departments in the port that were not breaking even. So that’s the big concern moving forward is how do you transition when the bridge gets replaced, because that’s coming up in 2031. The reason I’m running is because I feel at the Hood River’s future is also the future of the port,” said Klaas. “And really, when you look at the port and you say ‘Well, why do we exist at all?’ And in my opinion, the reason that port exists is because they have the expertise, and they have the political connections to get big infrastructure [projects] done. If you look at the port’s mission statement, it’s about livability. There’s always a livability component. And that’s great. But really, in my view, the port is economic development.”

Question: The waterfront and recreational facilities are very popular with locals as well as with others. How do you envision keeping these valuable public properties adequately funded, maintained and clean in the future?

Klaas: So we all know that park is wildly popular, and a lot of things in this town would not exist if it wasn’t people coming to that park. The problem with parks is they usually rely on high tax rates. So if you look at the port budget, they only get $90,000 from property taxes. That is not enough to sustain a park. And the reason that their tax base is so low is because when they applied for the tax base, which cannot be changed anymore, they were generating money from the tolls. So how do you solve that moving forward? You want to make partnerships with Hood River Parks. Instead of duplicating maintenance, you try to get a maintenance contract. And there’s just one and you take care of all the city and county parks. So you’re not duplicating manpower, you’re not duplicating machinery.

Bieker: Jim mentioned one good option, which is some sort of consolidated parks maintenance. We have five different entities in this county which have parks. Each one has its own maintenance department... That’s not the only solution, though, I think it’s important that the port look at all the different possibilities on the table. One of them is to do an operations levy, much like much like the parks do. The port can put an operations levy to the people and say ‘Hey, will you give us a little bit of money for your property taxes to operate what we operate for you.’ Another option is revenue bonds. About 17 years ago, the port did a revenue bond to create the toll plaza and such. That was later than paid for by toll revenue to pay that off. Now, a park is not really a great candidate for a revenue bond because there’s nothing there that’s really generating revenue. So that sort of thing would have to come from somewhere else. In the board’s purview. What I’m not super in favor of...is jacking up all the expenses to users.

Question: How do you foresee the port using undeveloped land to generate revenue in the future?

Bieker: So a couple of things to understand real quick is the airport is actually very close to neutral. If you take away capital projects, the forecast budget for the next year, the airport’s in the black The bigger issue is this waterfront suck of money. The port has a few different options. They’ve got Lot 1, which has been very difficult to develop for traffic reasons. And ODOT. There’s Lot 900 right next to it, there’s also the Lower Hanel Mill site up in the valley. All of these properties can be developed. Where does the money come from to develop them? There is some money for the next few years from the bridge as that tapers out. That can be strategically leveraged to develop these things. But also, I mentioned the possibility of a revenue bond, which for instance, the site up and Odell. If an industrial site were to be built up there, the port could float a revenue bond to pay for it. And then that would generate revenue and pay that back.

Klaas: You can do a levy to generate money. And you can do development. The problem I see with development is for the port is anytime you’re going to develop something on the port property or the port’s involved with you should be very careful what kind of development they’re in there to make sure that the people that work there can actually afford to live here. Or else all’s we’re doing is we’re getting some money but offloading the affordable housing problem to somebody else, because the port can’t be involved in affordable housing. So we could put a warehouse someplace that somebody wants to store something and hire six guys are working a minimum wage, but where are they going to live? That doesn’t help all the constituents throughout the county. And the port’s job is for economic development for everybody. Me personally, service related jobs are great, we’ve got a tourist related economy in some respects, but all we’re doing is offloading the affordable housing to somebody else. The port right now has trouble getting in maintenance people are hiring people, because it’s tough to afford to live here.

Question: What would you say are the three top priorities or problems facing the port?

Klaas: Well, you’re gonna have a hiring problem. It comes up all the time, you can’t hire maintenance people because they can’t afford to live here. I hope they (the port) don’t lose some of their political punch when they go back to Washington D.C. by offloading the bridge. But the transition is going to be the big one. I think the park is going to be solved. I think developing the Odell and developing the Lower Mill is also going to happen. I’d really like to work with the airport and see what goes on. That looks like a way of bringing money in, but I would say they’re going to have a problem hiring people for cost of living here. They’re going to have a tough time weaning themselves off of the tolls. They’re going to be closing huge sections of the port property just for putting supplies and when they start building the bridge, I think that’s going to cause a big problem. And I think that’s going to take a lot of figuring out how to how to get people to the marina, and how to have dock spaces still and whatnot. So I would say affordable housing, watching the pieces move around and weaning yourself off of the money machine.

Bieker: So I would characterize the top three challenges facing the port a little bit differently. I mean, I don’t disagree with anything Jim said. I would say the number one challenge is the transition of this bridge to the new bridge authority. And the reason why that’s so challenging is the bridge authority is a completely new entity. They’re basically like a mini new government, and they have to figure out how are they going to do their accounting? How are they going to do everything, they’ve got to figure that out, that’s a massive job, they are going to be relying on the Port of Hood River to help them. The negotiation of that relationship is very important. So that that’s a delicate relationship that needs to be arranged carefully, with a lot of oversight. Challenge number two, I think is Lot 1. This big piece of land that sat empty for years and years and years. I think it’s a tragedy to leave it empty, but there are significant challenges to doing anything with it. So choosing what to do with it. And then moving ahead with that is the second big challenge. The third big challenge I see is this waterfront park area that is costing the port $400,000 approximately a year. Those are the three big problems that I see facing the port right.

Question: Recently the Bi-State Working Group recommended the Port implement a toll increase. While this increase is necessary for the federal TIFIA loan, do you support the potential increase and what are your thoughts on a rise in tolls?

Bieker: Yeah, I do. When the bridge was first created in the middle of the depression, the cost across the bridge was about $1. And it stayed that way until 2018. The port kept the price to cross the bridge artificially suppressed, which is in line with the port’s mission of economic development, you want people crossing the bridge back and forth, but they kept it low for a very long time. And then in 2018, it went up to $2. And now it’s gonna go up again, I support it because we can’t build the reserve of money needed to get those federal loans unless the money comes from somewhere. Part of the qualification for those loans, they’re looking at how much skin to the locals have in the game. So I think we do need to, we do need to raise that. And it might even go up again before the new bridge is built. But I think it’s important that we accelerate getting that money and building the bridge, because we do not want to spend $90 million over the next 15 years maintaining a bridge that’s falling apart, I would much rather that money go towards building a new bridge than keeping this one up when we’re just going to have to demolish it.

Klaas: So my understanding on who has control over what the tolls are is going to be passed on to the new government agency. And what Tor said is correct, they have to you have to put so much skin in the game until the rest of the funds get released. For the next couple of years, the toll increases are going to be going towards doing that. But after 2026, it’s sort of my understanding is it’s not really in [the port’s] control anymore. That’s going to be up to the new bridge authority. And what happens to the The northern side the Washington, what happens to Oregon? I assume that we’re about to see Bingen. You know, if the toll is $20 to go across, I assume Bingen is going to start offering a lot more services. If it was me it’d be free to leave Oregon, but you had to pay to come in. I mean, that’s what I would do if I was running the race if I had the bridge authority, but we really lose control over that.

Question: What will the composition of the new bridge authority? And how much influence is the current port going to have?

Bieker: My understanding is that July 1 they’re creating this new entity, and that three representatives will come from Oregon, and three representatives will come from Washington. That group is going to make the decisions on the bridge. The the kind of the relationship is that the port keeps getting money from the bridge. And some of that money is arranged to go towards that group. But they’re going to be their own  little government, just like the port, they’re going to be running things. And they’re starting up here just in a few months. The tricky thing is that they will not at — the beginning — have the resources to do everything they need to do. So they’re going to be leaning heavily on the port to help them with legal questions, and arranging engineering and figuring out all sorts of logistics. And the important thing to keep in mind there is that they’re going to be getting all of this funding from all the sources, we need to ensure that the port is properly reimbursed for the contract work that they’re doing for this new bridge organization.

Klaas: So the timeline basically, is that it’s not as bad as it sounds, we all think of that as a bridge as being just a money machine just churning out money. I’m gonna make up numbers, but I’ll be fairly close. Let’s say that the bridge tolls accounted for $6 million. And they’re gonna estimate that it’s going to go to about $9 million. At the current rate of $6 million, it’s like $5 million goes back to keeping the thing up. So we’re really only running a deficit of about $1 million dollars. But as far as the new entity, it’s a new government bureaucracy that is going to do what it wants to do. And the port going to be in a transition period.

Question: [In regard to development of Lot 1] Where is all the parking going to come from?

Klaas: So everything I’ve heard about a Lot 1, which is a huge, vacant lot. It’s overflow parking during the Fourth of July. There’s always a big conversation, you hear everything from a let’s put an RV park in there and generate revenue. Anyhow, you hear community center, you hear a whole bunch of stuff. As far as the parking, if you look at a Google maps of the port, there’s a lot of parking lots. I hate to say it’s a waste, because I know everybody needs to get off and on and get down there. It seems like we can have better uses than parking on valuable real estate both as far as income and some recreation. So when it comes back to the locals option, and I know I hate to beat on the drum all the time, but we need to have a second entrance into the port property for safety, or everything else. If a train derails and Second Street, everybody out here is toast. So there should be a western entrance. And the reason I bring that up is because I call that the locals option. And I think that would somewhat alleviate the parking problem.

Bieker: Okay, so how do we solve the parking problem that already exists? And what’s going on a lot? Worse? You know, I was talking to one of the founders of pFriem the other day and he made an interesting remark to me, he said ‘We’re perfectly happy with all the parking that we have access to people come in to use this area use it.’ There’s all this other land. And I don’t know what sorts of relationships and agreements The port has with both its own tenants and other owners in this area on the waterfront. But that’s certainly an area to look into for potentially alleviating parking. With the development of Lot 1 should we be so lucky as to see that or make that a reality, whatever happens there has to account for the parking needs.