Port 1 acts on distillery, other issues

A Mill Creek resident with big plans attended the Wahkiakum Port District 1 meeting June 11 to ask the Commissioners to consider erecting an 11,000 square foot building to house a craft distillery.

In other business, county Commissioner Mike Backman was hoping for permission to place a temporary trailer in the parking lot at the Wahkiakum Family Practice Clinic and representatives from Smoky Waters Communications, a local internet company, wanted permission to install a tower to relay a signal from their office to a site on a nearby ridge.

John Kohler is opening a craft distillery to make vodka on his property on Mill Creek. He expects to double his business each month and is planning to relocate in December. The port was suggested to him as a possible site.

“Pick a spot,” Kohler told the commissioners. “It’s a long term proposition. I want to stay there forever. At full production we should be generating somewhere in the neighborhood of $12 million in sales and employ up to 40 people.

“I’ve been focused on what is the minimum to get started. If I’m going to locate here and want to stay put, we have to have a space that is big enough to hold me as we grow. My best guess is the minimum space we would need is 11,000 square feet.”

Kohler is still a month away from beginning production.

“If we build a building that large,” Commissioner Larry Bonds said, “how do we know you are going to be there next year?”

Kohler went back to his business plan and listed all the praise he had received from academics. He reported that he already had a distributor.

The commissioners discussed a couple possible locations for an 11,000 square foot structure but told Kohler that building on the old sewer pond site was still a couple years away.

“If you want to analyze this,” Kohler said, “and you think you might have a piece of property that might fit, great. If you don’t, I appreciate you letting me know that so I can keep searching.”

County Commissioner Backman shared that the Family Health Center is willing to allow a trailer in their northernmost parking lot as a temporary home for the Helping Hand Food Bank, which is currently housed in the dilapidated River Rat Tap.

The parking lot belongs to Port 1.

“We’ve kicked every rock and stone trying to find a spot,” Backman said. “The goal is to eventually get it out to the Health and Human Services campus in the Elochoman, but the River Rat doesn’t look like it has a lot of time.”

When asked how long the trailer might be in the parking lot, Backman replied, “There has been a lot of pressure to figure it out. I don’t know how long. We’re trying to figure out a solution. I don’t want to put a date on it because I don’t know.”

“If it’s open the day I have to go to the doctors’ office I’m not going to be happy about it,” Bonds said.

Port Manager Jackie Lea suggested putting the temporary trailer in front of the River Rat Tap.

“They have power,” Commissioner Gary Quigley said. “They have blacktop.”

Backman will continue his search.

David Blaylock and Pat Conrad of Smoky Waters Communication have been looking for a spot to place a relay site for their internet company, a tower that would allow them to send a signal from their office to their site on the ridge.

They thought they had picked out the perfect place for it on port property. They had to reconsider.

“I would like to see the tower,” Commissioner Bob Kizziar said. “I think it would be advantageous. I do have some problems with that spot, because we are talking about what we are going to be doing in conjunction with the city and the sewer ponds as a recreational park, so on and so forth.”

“I don’t know what to say because right now we don’t know what we’re doing there,” Bonds agreed.

The tower would be 30-40 feet and free standing, Blaylock said.

It would give us a clean line from our tower, up the creek to the tower on the ridge,” he said of his proposed location.

“It’s still a couple months away,” Conrad added.

Lea asked if they would be willing to rent the space for the tower.

“A couple of your tenants have wanted to get site surveys from us,” Blaylock said, “because the wifi down here wasn’t the most reliable. We could easily provide you with a wifi system that would cover the entire area here very effectively and have ample bandwidth to handle numerous people in exchange.”

The commissioners tabled the matter. Blaylock and Conrad will consider other spots on port property.

The port has been looking into replacing the fingers on Docks C and D. They received a bid from a company that manufactures docks for over $400,000. Nothing was decided at that time.

The commissioners decided to pay off the loan for F dock, the total of which was $14,300 more than the regular payment of $50,367.95.