The Ketchikan Gateway Borough may hire a local logging company to selectively harvest some of its Gravina Island property.
Eric Nichols of Alcan Forest Products already plans to harvest timber on about 500 acres of University of Alaska property near Blank Inlet.
“We’ll be there with barges and helicopters and all of the mobilization it’s going to take to get into that. So it’s sort of a one-shot deal for the borough to monetize some of their land and be able to pick up some value for it.”
Nichols said no more than a quarter of the timber would be cut.
He asked the assembly Monday whether it’s interested in his company logging borough property adjacent to that land, on southeast Gravina.
“This timber harvest will be set up as a helicopter selective cut primarily targeting red cedar, some larger spruce. It’ll fly to a barge, the barge will come to Ward Cove, offload it and processed there.”
He said the university harvest will begin this week or next. If the borough’s interested, it would have to decide soon.
The assembly directed borough staff to draw up the paperwork needed to move forward with the sale. That will come up for discussion at a meeting later this month
