Kiewit, unions inform on workforce needs for port expansion

With the first phase of the Port of Nome expansion beginning next year, representatives of Kiewit — the general contractor for the project — along with Bering Straits Native Corporation and the Teamsters and Operating Engineers unions held a meeting last week to inform the public of their needs to develop a local workforce for the project.

Earlier this summer, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers awarded the contract for Phase 1A of the larger port expansion project to Kiewit. The entire project will take eight to 10 years to build. 
Phase 1A, a three-year endeavor, entails removing the spur of the existing causeway, extending the causeway 1,200 lineal feet of and installing 600 feet of open cell sheet pile to put in there for a berth location.

Daniel Petersen with Kiewit presented the timeline for the first phase. Kiewit plans to begin work next year with the hopes to be finished with phase 1A in the spring of 2029. Petersen said Kiewit had been in Nome this summer to harvest rocks from Bering Straits Native Corporation’s subsidiary Sound Quarry at Cape Nome, for a seawall project in Utqiagvik. In addition to mining rocks for Utqiagvik, Cape Nome rock production will be significantly ramped up to also stockpile different sized rocks for the causeway extension.

Petersen said Kiewit will come out in April to begin what he called “rock making” at Cape Nome.

Kiewit will begin their main mobilization in June when big barges bring large amounts of big, heavy equipment and camp modules for the crew camp to Nome. Nomeites will need to get used to the sight, sound and dust kicked up by huge trucks hauling rocks from Cape

Nome to laydown areas at and around the port as Kiewit continues barging rocks to Utqiagvik while stockpiling rocks for the causeway extension. “2026 will be a big trucking year,” Petersen said. Trucks range from side dumps used to haul medium to small sized rocks to large flat trailer trucks to haul single large armor stone rocks.

Besides trucking, stockpiling rocks and setting up operations here in Nome, the goal is to remove the spur of the causeway in 2026.
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n 2027, the plan is to extend the causeway with the stockpiled rock and to bring in big derrick barges to do the heavy lifting of installing the sheet piling. In 2028 Kiewit aims to finish the open cells, bringing the rock fill to final grade and for 2029 the aim is to finish the road surfacing on the causeway.

The workforce needed ranges from laborers to skilled blasters, drillers, truck drivers, welders, office workers and camp employees as well as engineers and highly trained and skilled workers with specialized training for heavy equipment operation. While the promise is to hire local as much as possible, the workforce needs to be professional, skilled, reliable and trained.
“We will see quite a bit of individuals from Anchorage or from wherever that will come in here. But the intent is, if possible, we want to find help and resources here locally,” Petersen said.

Teamsters Local 959 representative James McMilon of Fairbanks reiterated the need for a professional workforce that they can help train people. BSNC Vice President of Nome Operations Larry Pederson added that BSNC offered three CDL classes recently and in cooperation with UAF Northwest Campus and NACTEC plan on welding courses taught in Nome next spring.

McMilon said that key to landing a job at the project is to get on a list for but the union also offers training as well as structured apprenticeship programs, generally ranging from 4,000 to 8,000 hours of paid training and job placement.
While the aim is to hire locally, Kiewit assumed that most workers have to be brought in, which raised the question of where to they would be housed. Petersen said that by July, there could be up to 100 workers plus 25 to 30 office staff. The following year, he expects about 130 workers.
“We did size our camp assuming that nobody is local,” he said. “We assume you have to house everybody.”

The U.S. Army Corps stipulated that the City of Nome supply a 4-acre property where a temporary man camp could be constructed. In 2023, the city solicited requests for proposals, received eight and a committee initally recommended the 6th Avenue/Steadman proposal by BSNC. The proposed annual lease amount was $41,817 plus an option to lease lump sum of $2,500. The city as the non-federal sponsor of the project would have to bear the cost. Port Director Joy Baker also cautioned then that the parcel is smaller than the stipulated four acres and that there were right-of-way issues that may cause problems with the strict federal leasing requirements. In September 2023 the Nome Common Council objected to the location due to the close proximity to residential  homes and in a special session passed a resolution to lease a portion of Satellite Field, west of the Softball Field, from Alaska Gold Co. also a subsidiary of BSNC.

However, Kiewit’s Dan Petersen said in last week’s meeting that they prefer a the 6th Avenue/Steadman location.  “We are working on getting it permitted right now, and so I’m not sure until it’s fully permitted and approved, but we are trying to get it here in town,” he said.

Petersen said Kiewit submitted a conditional use permit with the city and will get in front of the planning commission.
Larry Pederson added that BSNC had purchased a 16-unit housing module, currently sitting at Lester Bench, to temporarily house BSNC employees and that they as well have submitted a conditional use permit to use the 6th Avenue/Steadman location as a preferred location for that 16-unit crew camp.

Questions from the audience mostly centered on preparing young people for the well-paying jobs that the port expansion project has to offer. Pederson said that a workforce development office in the BSNC building can assist with inquiries, have information on the unions.

“We’ve agreed to try to get local applicant lists to the unions and to Kiewit, so they can start prioritizing and getting locals on that list and in their system,” Pederson said.

Petersen said that a long-term project like this port expansion poses a unique opportunity for the local job market in terms of training and professional development. “For a project like this, individuals are going to have years and years of being well vested and retirement and everything coming out of something like this. I think this is a perfect opportunity to the join the union and get those benefits,” Petersen said.