November 04, 2022 12:30 PM - 4:30 PM
And we have our overhaul schedule listed here and this is also available online on the website, but this is something we're updating weekly and we're sending it out through these playbooks to amhs subscribers. So we're trying to be extremely transparent about where things are at with accruing budget and our vessel schedules. So we're getting these updates and sending them out and if the board hasn't seen where this information is, please let me know. I'm happy to share that to make sure you can send that out to people that have interest in the system. We make recommendations here. This is where it would be good to add in some of the material that had come up with at the last meeting. For us it's this charting the course plan, we want to restore the system and restabilize it. So that's the main focus right now operationally offering reliable scheduling. The workforce development component continues to be really strong with a lot of staff involved in this. And then I'm still touching on the vessel and terminal energy management plans to find efficiencies where they exist and then act upon them to implement recommendations.
We have some details here on the metrics and this is something that we could go into at a later date. But, okay, so here we have a number of positions of, you know, through the years, what is our rate of key positions that have been hired or resigned. So you can just see the trend that goes not in the direction we would like it to see, but we started using these gas gauges, which is based on on number data. But this is showing, you know, are we, are we at the, we need to be and right now we know we're not and that's what this gas gauge is showing us. And we, we will have some additional graphs after this last couple weeks where we found a new report that we could get programmed outta one of our software systems that we're really excited about.
And this is on a more vessel by vessel basis, you know, how is our staffing level for these vessels and what may, what might that mean to others such as the talin, which is in layup right now. If everything was in green then perhaps the talin would have a greater chance of getting out in sailing. So this is something that can help folks maybe not as integrated into the details and nuances of amhs staffing. You know, what it looks like at a, at a high level and after crewing we get into the fleet metrics and, and you heard Cisco speak to some of this and this will tell you the information about these performance metrics that we are tracking. And so cuz part of the short range plan is performance metrics showing how we're getting to those goals that are set up in the long range plan. But in the meantime we can at least be collecting this data to show us where we're at and we have the cost data that's included, how much of deferred maintenance do we have, five vessels and then what is our priority one and priority two needs both from what we see in the fleet condition surveys and what the, this is incorrectly spelled up here. These are ship maintenance requests, not standard.
And I'm, I know we're running out of time here so I'm just at a high level showing you where this information is and we have information here about the budget as well that's been providing very regular updates on our budget projections and that gets put into this gas age again showing us where we're at financially. And that gets us to the end of our document.
Okay, great. Thank you. I found it easier to follow this time around this iteration, which was helpful. I think at this point I don't see hands up real briefly before we really run out of time. I think it appropriate to briefly stop and see if there's any public members of the public who have any questions or comments for the board based on what we've seen. We'll just do that first.
Okay, great. Anybody is listening and there are a number of callers on the line. If you could please press star three on your phone if you would like to provide public comment. Give it 20 more seconds, allow for a leg in the system, but if anyone would like to provide comment please press start three.
I don't, I don't know when this was posted to the AHA website, but people just may not have known we were having a meeting, so I don't know if this date was up there. I forgot to check, think. So I think a brief wrap up, there are several items that I heard that board would like to discuss in our next meeting in three weeks and there may be others, so let me know. The first one is a continuing conversation on the service levels for a fleet of seven vessels up to nine vessels. And this incorporates the budget discussion as well and, and gathering that information depending on members of, of the ports of people getting on and getting off. The second were private companies looking at routes or passenger only service and parts of the system, what we've done in the past and kind of a, you know, how that's worked, how many passengers, what it cost and were there benefits to that. That would be very helpful for the board. So I have those two as agenda items and I'd see Paul with his hand up for the, for an agenda item.
I would like to have an exec, an executive session to discuss personnel issues and, and just for people's understanding, because it may address it, it's not about anyone specifically, but because it may address personally identifiable information, I would, I believe it's necessary to hold it in an executive session.
I can, we can put that on the agenda, but we're going to need to know what, what the item is about what, what the discussion is going to be so that staff has a chance to prepare, to gather information or respond. So I can put it on, but, but what I'm saying is you'll need to let
Know. Yeah. I think it's appropriate to do that, to do it offline. Again, I don't know all the ins and outs of, of the state's requirements for executive session, but I know that the nature of the discussion would require an executive session, how to get there and all those particulars and who, what notices need to be made. I can follow up on,
It's time bound, but I don't, I wouldn't say it's time sensitive. Yeah. But I, I would like to have the opportunity for the board to discuss it at the next meeting because I think it relates directly to the board's responsibilities and in an advisory capacity to understand these personnel issues.
Thanks, Madam Chair. I was just looking at the, Tara had our next meetings on the fourth of, or 2nd of December, 4th of December relating to a budget recommendation. It, I mean, at that date, it's pretty much, and this was okay, It would just be, I think at that point it would be a recommendation to the legislature. The governor's budget will be virtually prepared at that point for the December 15th release. But that's not necessarily true. I mean, there's, budgets are always, it's just the very beginning of the budget process, so it's just something to think about how we want to time. That is all. Thanks.
Okay. Okay. I, I will add that too. What I'm hoping that we can do is, Well, I, I'm definitely gonna ask that we get meeting materials for the next meeting on the Monday before the Friday meeting because we're just, we're just not getting enough time to absorb and read through everything and, and understand how it's all connecting and, and, and I think that's causing all of us a little bit of heartburn, everybody. So we'd like to request that and to make sure that the meeting dates for the next, and they may be, and if they are then, then no harm, no foul, but that they are put up on the website at the end of, you know, very quickly after each meeting so people have time to go there and, and realize that there's going to be a meeting instead of in just a couple of days. They've got a couple of weeks put on their calendar. And also to wherever, you know, share the board materials that the board is gonna be looking at, put a link to that on the side as well so members of the public can see what we're looking at and what we're discussing before the meeting. And I think that might get us a little bit more participation in engagement in the process.
I don't, so is there, I mean, not to have more meetings, but if, if we wanted to give in the timing, have another meeting maybe before Thanksgiving. That's like two, three weeks. Two weeks. When that is shaking her head, that's shorter just to hit on some things, but apparently not. So
I'm, I'm traveling as well. Yeah, I'm, I'm not as well, unfortunately. Yeah. The week before. No, I appreciate that. But I, anything that is really time sensitive that you want us to be really on, up on, you know, up on top of at our next meeting, please send it out as ancillary information as soon, you know, as soon as you have it, you can, you know, Catherine, if you can send us items that we're gonna be talking about before the meeting, you know, if you have 'em next week and we can start, we can start observing those. I would say Cascade Point might be one that you might want to provide information sooner than later so folks have a chance to just kind of absorb it and maybe ask some questions. You know, email back before we have the discussion or the presentation. You know, we're, we're open to get information at any time and that's helpful. And then when we get to the meetings, we don't have to just kind of try to figure it all out, read it for the first time and, and figure it all out. So. And Catherine, I will email you my, the list that I have here of the four items and that I will also reach out to you and Winta on a time on Monday. I think Winta was looking at one 30 ish on Monday as an open time. And if that's good with you, I can send out a human invite.
Okay. Figure out a time that'll work. I'm open, I'll work around the two of you. Okay. Are we wrapped up? Do any board members have any closing comments? And if not, thank you Matt, Cisco, and Captain Fvi for, for sticking with us for the four hours. It was very helpful and we will just continue on December 2nd. So again, if you have any questions about any of the materials or anything, please get them to Catherine sooner than later so they have time to respond before our next meeting. And we'll be getting those materials preferably on the Monday before our Friday meeting. With that, may I have the motion to adjourn? Second. Second. Seconded by Ed. Thank you everyone. Thank you very much everyone. Everybody have a great safe, wonderful Thanksgiving. Thank you. Bye. Goodbye.
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Bridge Island Ferry. It's an eight nautical mile route. It's 5.8, 5.7 megawatt hours of battery to do that eight nautical mile run. So we're not gonna be using it in that way because that's really not our usages case. But we still can gain day over day efficiency for the TRV in operation, save the state money, burn less fuel, and admit less greenhouse gases in CO2 by having some batteries aboard.
No, no. The weight of the battery is three megawatt hours. Sounds like a lot, but it, it's not appreciable. I mean, it's a noticeable number, but it's so, not so much as, you know, we're changing the draft in all of our load states or anything like that. We've already run the numbers on that and, you know, by making some smart decisions in places, I mean, we're still honing in on what this vessel's gonna weigh by changing structure and lightning things up and reducing margins on structure here and there as we, we go through the AVS rules. So the, the batteries are not gonna make a drastic difference in the weight of the vessel.
Yes. That the, the, the proposed monies for this would be coming out of some of the, the grant efforts that Catherine was working through and that, that that would be instrumental in, in moving forward with this, but the design needed to include it and show it as viable in order to run that down as well. I think Catherine could probably speak on that more.
Thanks Madame Chair. So to that point, when we get the propulsion system integrator online, which should be about four weeks from now, we hope we have successful proposals come in. Their primary tasks will be evaluating the performance of the system and making recommendations which make sense for the vessel, both on the performance side and the cost side. What we've seen from other systems like Washington State Faires or BC Faires or down in San Francisco through WEDA as they're doing similar projects, the cost increase is actually not what you would expect because there's a lot of equipment that you remove. You don't need it when you add in this type of diesel hybrid system with the electric propulsion. And so perhaps that's something that we can again, kind of circle back to as we get them on board and they're proposing a design that works for our system specifically, I think we'll have a better handle on costs and then we can make a strategic look at, you know, where, what funding should go where.
And again, with the new ferry formula funds the rural fairy program through fda, it's a requirement that our new bills use low emission technologies or, or emission reduction technologies where possible. So we, we have to, to requirement that we figure out some way to address this and reduce our fuel consumption. And so we just look forward to having the propulsion integrator on board and they can advise Glosson and our own staff on what some of the options will look like. And I think that'll be another good discussion point for this. We'll have more information at that time to make these informed decisions.
No, I can speak to that. So there, there is no additional element. You know, as we all know, we, we did go out to RFP in March and, and you know, before a shipyard to kind of bring everything together and they would take on propulsion and the vehicle elevator and all this. We were not successful with that particular rfp. So we have taken a step back, reevaluated, talked to shipyards, talked to industry and come up with a, a different multi-pronged approach to the procurement and and contracting. So we are currently out on the street with RFPs for the propulsion system integrator that went out previously and is due back on the 16th of November. And we are also out on the street with the vehicle elevator manufacturer rfp and that is due back on the 29th of November. So those two RFPs are currently in process and we have completed putting together the RFP documents for the shipyard and we're just kind of holding onto those until we get back information on these two. So when we go to the shipyards we can tell 'em who those integrators for the propulsion system and the vets would be as part of that collaboration team.
I'm sure you will. Where do you see overall when you compare this to the, the current testing as far as the fuel efficiency over the other one, but would it be like a 10% overall fuel efficiency over the, I guess the two things I like to see metric wise would be the accruing of its a little bit less because some automation systems etc. And that the fuel efficiency better, that's what we'd like to see, that we're moving better, have the same capacity, same capabilities, same speed, but we're doing less fuel and less crew. Is that, is that, is that a safe assumption? Do you have some feel for that,
Yeah, so I mean we could work up some metrics I don't have, because again, we've just gotten the point, we got our finalized, so there we will probably be doing something similar to that in the future just to look at how we've done that. But we have worked up metrics for carbon intensity and the TRV will be the least carbon intensive vessel that AMH has ever run. And in fact it's, it plots very favorably against the international regulations or requirements for carbon intensity and comes in well below the requirements at the time that she's going to sail and will, will do so well into the future. And part of CII is having to make continuous improvements, but we're starting out on the right track with this vessel making her as efficient as possible and it will be carbon wise much more efficient than the the previous vessel which, which had no real regulations for emissions built into. Sure.
Kathryn? Yeah, thank you. And I just wanted to follow up on that point too, because part of the process with the propulsion system integrator is that modeling and we haven't had a lot of great digital data from the tuam that would carry over well into a TRV build out is largely what's needed to capture the, the fuel savings. So depending on how we run trv, you know, in the future with a combination of, you know, if shore side power does become available or if there's anything we can do while it's at port to reduce the heating load, you know, there's, there's a number of things that will come into play that as options once we can do more detailed modeling and then ideally we can increase fuel savings over time for this peak saving. The percentage of fuel savings might not be very high. It might be in the single digits and on the low end of overall fuel savings, which does account to a significant amount.
But other system designs as they move forward with diesel hybrid can be closer to 10% on up. So it'll be somewhere in the middle depending on the ultimate system makeup. And then the vice chair had asked a question when at, on the procurement process. So the propulsion system integrator is responsible for, you know, in a, in a teamed environment because it's a CMGC project, they'll will be specing out specific equipment as it's identified and then they will be providing that and working with the shipyard. So it, it's actually a great way to kind of do this ahead of time, especially with long lead items and navigating the Byer by American labor process. They'll be able to help us with this and hopefully expedite some of it as as we move forward. There's a lot of technologies that are coming out from different manufacturers right now, so it's kind of neat to see it be neat to see what they have to come back with timing wise, what will be available to us when it's time to put these in.
Any last questions or about the TRD update? Does it look like anybody has their hand up? Okay, thank you. And we look forward to think at the last meeting it was also suggested that maybe we get updates at each meeting on this process, how it's moving forward, what, what we're finding and what the timeline is.
And Madam Chair, while Greg Jennings is still here, I wonder, one of the items here was a ship update on the marine log conference was recently attended by Greg Jennings and Port Captain Dan Kins who had to leave and myself. But it may be helpful if it's of interest. Greg was, Greg was able to speak to some of the shipyards if we wanna have any update on, on what was discovered at that conference or if we could wanna move on, we're happy to do that as well and we can provide that in writing
Yeah, I can speak to that a little bit. First off, the Marine Logs conference was a fantastic conference to attend. I mean it really focuses it on our, our industry and the technology and advancement that's happening in it as far as policy and, and how we do things, where the money's coming from and what technology are available to meet those future requirements. A lot of good work, you know, electrification is part of it, Alternate fuel is definitely gonna be part of it and we're, we're gonna have to, we're gonna have to find ways forward but the, the good thing is, is it's all coming, it's all there. Other localities may have it a little bit easier to plan and take advantage of infrastructure, but you know, as they do and as continu things continually evolve, Alaska will definitely be able to take advantage of all this in the near term and long term.
But as far as shipyards go, I was able to meet with representatives of four shipyards that would be Nichols Brothers Boat Building has a large facility in Everett. Think can Terry Bay ship up in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, Bollinger and Conrad, they're down on the Gulf Coast. And I talked to representatives, business development managers at all four of those facilities. And all of them were very bullish. They were very much looking forward to our fee coming out. They were very excited to hear that we were out on the street for propulsion system integration and for that elevator. They thought that was a great idea and they very much look forward to being part of the design process cuz I mean their comments always are, you know, why'd you design it this way? We could have, you know, if you do this, it'll be easier to build.
So they're very happy to have the opportunity to engage in that whole entire process. The big hold up for them has been constantly this idea of cost. The CMGC system is new to marine contracting for government projects in, in many ways and they were just a bit leery about how we do the cost negotiation part. And I did get a chance to speak to that with all of the representatives that were there. And I think they came away from it a lot more comfortable knowing that it's in the state's best interest and it's required of the state in order to meet our agreements with F H W A and FTA under this innovative procurement that we need to negotiate with them. We can't just be like, here's a cost you must meet this cost. It, it's about collaboration with industry. So they came away from that very positive.
All, all four of those yards, in addition to the other two that I've been talking to are very happy to see the RFP and all of them were really sure to lay on how well they can build our boat and how their facilities are perfectly suited for our boat. So it's a good time. Contracts are a bit up and down for everybody. Several of the yards have lost contracts. A lot of contracts have been canceled because of various economic factors, but we're in a really good position with the I I J A funding and other sources that while others are struggling with funding, we are probably going to have funding and, and be able to stand up a project. They'd love to see us build more than one boat and maybe there's an opportunity for us to do that through contract options when we get there. Possibly to, to bring on the, you know, use their expertise with this hall form and our, our process to maybe, you know, work on the, on the main liner replacement. But they're excited and I think part of that's just gonna be staying in contact with them and keeping them excited and keeping them involved in the process.
Well that's definitely good news. And before we move on to the ija discussion, cause that ties into something that the board has been desires of for a while, which is building more than one vessel at, at at the same time. So we'll just hold onto that one for a minute. Alan has his hand up.
All right, that's good news. It's good to have interest, good to have some hungry shipyards. Was there anything you wanted to add to that, Catherine, or we will go ahead and move forward then to the I I J funding and I, I guess the main question there is there have, you know, there's been some concern and confusion of how much money we're going to be able to get, how quickly we could get it, which ties in with the, the two Mr Vs maybe being built at one time. You know, Matt New and Columbia both are well past their bed times and are going to be replaced. So, you know, is that even possible?
Okay, great. Thanks Madame Care. So I'm gonna just introduce a couple items and then I'll hand it over to our program development director, James Marks and he can answer some more specific questions. And of course Deputy commissioner is also available to talk on this topic, but with the infrastructure bill funds, we do not yet have any notice of award. As the board may recall, we submitted close to 300 million in requests for the Marine Highway system through the FTA rural ferry boat program. And then we also requested 50 million through their specific low no emission fair fund, which was a national
Discretionary grant. So on those, we look forward to hearing back what will be possible to be moving forward with and we'll learn more about the scoring criteria and how we can continue to be successful through this process. And then one point just back to the MRV and constructing vessels simultaneously, we are definitely talking with that with our legal team and our, the team working on the RFP right now, how it can be possible to add that in there and, and it is something we would like to do to increase the interest of the shipyards and to maybe help develop some economies of scale we are looking at, at how we can do that before that RFP goes out to the shipyards. Okay. So if it's okay, I'd like to hand it off to James.
Great. So yeah, that, that helps with the context and thank you again, You know, Madam Share, I did have some, some general updates but also some specific updates on the discretionary grants on starting on the formula side, you know, there's, there's a lot of opportunity out there and you know, we've got a, a really great administration and, and you know, a lot of support in the commissioner's office to push a lot of this I I J A formula funding out to the communities. We just closed our notice of intent to apply for our community transportation program and our transportation alternatives program in total. You know, right now we, we've, during this we've launched a new clearing house that's a MAP based and we got over 180 applications, which is kind of a record for the department and that's just the ones that came through the, the electronics.
There's also a stack of, of paper applications that are gonna be entered in there. The challenge there is gonna be really, you know, the, the at first blush, these are all good. A lot of 'em are very, very good projects and they're gonna be competitive. The level of funding for CTP is about 110 million. TAP is about 25 million. So, you know, given that, you know, we're really gonna be getting down to around 20 to 30 projects that are really gonna be able to fund. So there's gonna be a lot of work on over the next couple months in, in evaluating those. Right now the, the project evaluation board is kind of being targeted for quarter one of calendar 23. Moving forward, we're getting into a series of rolling solicitations because there's a lot of new in I I J A, not just new programs but also new eligibilities Also going on right now is our, what we called the Safe ice roads for Alaska.
That one's gonna be and has been so far a very popular program and can do a lot of good in rural Alaska. That one will be closing on November 11th. Here was the next week coming up in quarter one of next year is a community bridge investment program. This is a new program in I I J A, it's called the Bridge, the Formula Bridge Investment Program. And that one will be coming out with around roughly around $54 million for communities to be able to bring their bridges forward. There's a lot of benefits with some new flexibilities from local minor, you know, off, off system bridges where there's no match requirements, which is gonna be very important is in terms of not being a barrier to entry, you know, for local communities. After that rural ports and barge landings program, this is also a new eligibility where we can fund things like rural port stocks, barge landings.
This is, we've never been able to, to do this with federal funding before. That'll be coming out quarter two, quarter three. Resiliency and coastal protection. This is really getting into the new resiliency programs where we can do some, you know, good work along our coastline. Obviously there's a synergy there with what's going on on the West coast. And so we're taking a look at that pretty strongly and can we leverage some of these funds to, as we're rebuilding, fortify some of these areas and, you know, put put some of this, this money to work now. And then at some point, you know, hopefully sooner than later we'll also be working with Director Keith to develop this sustainable transportation and energy program. That's a step, There are a lot of new eligibilities that are kind of sprinkled among all of the formula programs that include things like EV and method mechanisms to reduce greenhouse gas and more active transportation.
And so this, this program stands to try to make a unified strategy for, for doing that. And, and again, Catherine is taking point on that, which is gonna be, you know, another pretty exciting program. But, but that's, you know, that's, that's not probably, you're probably more interested in some of these discretionary grants. So I did want to also talk about our partnership with AML and, and maybe, you know, just, just say how, how good it has been. I mean, so typically when we're working through these, these grants, it it is, it's a hustle to try to find the right thing with aml. We've been able to expand our, our reach in reaching partners in working with communities over the past year since we've, I I J A and more specifically the, the omnibus was passed since, you know, April and March. We've submitted over 900 million worth of discretionary grants through this opportunity, through this, this, this partnership.
And a lot of these, you know, while, while they might be D o T projects, it's the ones that we're being successful on is not d o t in the primary. So you've heard, I think last week, you know, Alaska did pretty well on the P I D P. There is the Gene and Cordova bundle that got 28.2, but there's also the Port of Alaska, they've got 68.7 port of adac, got 10.3 and Sandpoint got 5.3. You know, in total it's about 112 million coming in through the port Investment development program. Put it in comparison, wash.got about 148.5. California only got 93.9. So Alaska's doing relatively well compared to some of the other predominant states. Florida only got 19 million. The other one where we're being successful is some of the bridge invest, the discretionary side of the bridge improvement program right now. They, they staged that so that they took planning grants first and then they're going with the, the mega, the mega bridges.
And we were successful. Again, this was one of a, a planning grant that the south coast region wanted to pursue. This is for the Kodiak, Russian and Sergeant Rivers bridges and we worked with AML and it was no, let's let's put the community on on front point and it was successful. So we're, we're pretty happy with a lot of this and I'm meeting with NIS on a biweekly basis to see how much further we can take this partnership. So that, that's pretty exciting. In terms of the ferry grants, so the NOFO went out July eight applications were due September 6th. So when, as we're watching the, the rest of these grants we're on about a three month cycle from the time we applications are due to, we're in the awards are being announced. So that's putting us right around the end of the month or the very beginning of December 12, six there and abouts when we'll be hearing about the, the ferry grants and they, they all came in together as a bundle. There is also, you know, when we're talking with the FTA administrator, a delay from the time the award's given and when, you know, we can, can actually obligate the funds and use them. So that would probably put us out, you know, closer to February, you know, late February for, for cash to start the work. But I, but I was told to keep a brief, I I can talk all day about this stuff, this is exciting, but I'm willing to have certainly happy to answer any questions if there are any.
Okay, thank you very much James. Yeah, there's a lot going on with, with that money within the state of Alaska. It's absolutely incredible. Could you just very quickly refresh our memory for the rural sherry boat funds, the 300 million there are maybe Catherine what that was going to, was that one replacement vessel, one MRV replacement or how, where did that minute go or what is it being requested for?
Yeah, that's a great question. So obviously there's, there's a lot of opportunity here. So we're working with our communications team to develop a communications strategy. Some of this, you know, the, the traditional method of, you know, just posting something on OPN or gov delivery isn't enough anymore. And that's, or actually seeing that come back in some of our grants, the languages that the typical public involvement process isn't good enough and that we need to be actively outreaching to communities. So, you know, it's great because that, that's where we're headed anyways with this partnership with aml. So to your question, yes, that's, that's exactly the strategy. We're also exploring some new tools actively on, on top of the fact that, you know, there's, you know, trying to, trying to put some press behind it and, and I'm, I'm very hopeful that our, our communications director and her staff will be able to help us get this. But, but all of these programs are gonna be, I think, high visibility and, and we want to make sure as many people know about it as possible.
And, and great question Cynthia and James, I know we, we were gonna have a meeting and talk about this in terms of the Swanee region and communities, and I was late coming back from a doctor's appointment and I missed it and I apologize again for that. But the information that you were putting together, kind of the, it was for discussion purposes at that time, a slide deck that really walks when you get that finalized, is that something you would send like to aml, to all the order orders to city municipalities and tribal organizations?
Oh yeah, yeah. You're you're, you're revealing my secret. Yeah. So the short answer is yes, is, you know, we're having direct conversations and this, this, you know, for, for context for everyone else, this, a lot of this ties into more partnering and also regional planning organizations, which is kind of tangential to this conversation, but it's, it's how do we, we partner more what, you know, what are some of the opportunities out there? So right now, you know, we've met with Southeast Conference, we've met with Prince Williamstown economic development, I've got a meeting with Tim over at ked, so we're making our rounds to try to get some of this information out, solicit input. And then yeah, we're, we're come up with a kinda a shared strategy and, and maybe it even even comes in the form of some type of convention among the artists and other interested parties to kind of talk about some of these things. But, but yes, that's, that's absolutely right.
Yes. I can just touch on the projects that we did apply for the mrb we have listed here for design and then it's broken into total project cost and then what we've requested from federally from fta and then what the match would be. So the MRV functional level engineering, the Kennecott missions and exhaust upgrades project, that's for the construction of it. The TRB is listed here. And we did a phased approach with the TRV requests and the, we actually requested just full construction on a specific component of it, the TALINA construction of Crew quarters, the MATANUSKA project as a safety improvement project, including the dead end corridors and the safety center installation. We requested funds for ferry terminal upgrades in a number of communities. These, we had bundled these together ultimately for Pelican Tenga to TI Cordova. And as we know with Cordova and Tenga, because they were recently awarded successfully through the Mead's P I D P program, those are now we've reached out to FK to let them know of this award and I to be put consideration into other projects.
And then we also, as had requested funds for operational support for partial support that goes towards one year. And I wanted to share also if anyone is interested in looking for the specific applications for the most UpToDate information, you can always go to the website here, the AM HO website and for anyone in the public that's listening, that's D O t.alaska.gov, that's or slash am ho. And then you go to the strategy section and there we have a section that's specific to the i i funding and discretionary grants. So here you'll see hyperlinks to things that we have applied for and including the, the rural fairy program and the appendices are listed here for our project schedules, the estimates that we currently have and what the cost was the match. So it's all broken down here and if you click on any of these, you'll actually see the application itself. And on the table that I had showing you, we had a couple of projects broken out like talina for example and Matt nuco. But ultimately we had combined it into one bundled project to make the processing simpler. So we had a number of vessels that were tied into one and then FDA has the option to scale that based on what is of most considered the most eligible from their perspective. Huh. I'll stop for questions.
Yeah, I think originally we were looking to build that out with our ferry boat discretionary formula money was, and I, I think it was probably an oversight given that we wanted to go after grant money on it as well. But we are working on that could, well maybe James could speak to it, but we are working on another step amendment for things that need to happen and adjustments, et cetera. So maybe that can be an addition just to give us more options.
Good question, Madame Chair, let me, let us get back to you on that. I know it's, we, you know, every amendment goes up for public comment. We, and we would definitely make sure the board had that full opportunity. So let me, I, I know it's in the works, so to be determined. Okay, let me get back to you on that one.
Well, that's a little bit challenging. I think our intent would be to, once it's completed to, I mean you, the board itself would be part of the, the public process for commentary and we would make it specifically to the board to have that opportunity. So we can talk about that. I, I don't know how we can do it without it being public, so anyway.
Well, okay. And we did talk about this a bit at our meeting three weeks ago because the language and the statute that we brought up says the board shall annually submit recommendations to A D O T and public facilities regarding the preparation of the step. So, so again, it's, you know, it answers not ready now. That's fine. I'm just suggesting that we start thinking about that and I have a couple of other, but I'll go to one editor who's hands up.
Thank you Shirley. Yeah, to that point, I guess that, trying to find, find the right words here, but in order to have faith and confidence in the board process and loyalty to this board, I think it's important that, well, first of all, that there's a marker laid down just now that, that there's a request from the board and that somehow these requests are, are tracked and that they're fulfilled because I'm, I'm, I I have a sense that we've made requests that have been not responded to. And so as a fellow board member sitting around a virtual table together, we have, I hope a commitment to each other to follow through on the information requests. And you know, you know, just to this point, Rob, you know, you're in a position that none of us, the rest of us are in to be a gatekeeper on that process.
And so I know as a fellow board member that I would appreciate knowing that you have a commitment within not only your role as a board member, but, and your role with B OT and your role with Amhs to in, in fact provide that information to the board. And you know this because it is specifically spelled out in statute, it's, it's something that I do feel a personal commitment that we have to do. And, and so from, from that respect, having a process by which, because we've missed things even from the last meeting, things have been missed in terms of scheduling and follow through. And we had great momentum coming out of that last meeting, but it all just kind of came and hit a brick wall just prior to this meeting. And so I would appreciate knowing that there is some commitment for follow through, for, and tasking for who is supposed to be doing the, the follow up based on board member requests, board scheduling, other actions that flow from these meetings.
Because I, I most certainly have a sense from the last meeting where we had a lot of consensus, a lot of agreement that then nothing seems to happen until maybe about 48 hours ago. Now I know that may not be the case, but that's how it feels as a board member. And I cannot be, I cannot follow through on my commitment in accepting this role if that information isn't going to be available timely. And the meetings are not scheduled in accordance with what the board asks for at the prior meeting. So this is not, this is not the first time this has been discussed or requested. I'm just asking that when there are things like this a request that we get information about how we as a board are going to follow up on a legislatively mandated action that we know that a, there's a marker that is being kept either a schedule, a calendar, some item that indicates there will be follow up and that in fact information requests are followed up on and information is provided in a timely manner so that we can be prepared for these meetings. And I, I I, I understand and recognize there are many challenges with this process, but I, I'm just, I'm feeling not, I'm feeling as if I am not doing my role because of these challenges. And so I just want us to get back to the momentum that we had at the last meeting and a sense that progress is made when we meet and that requests and actions will be taken as a result of things that happened during the meetings. Thank you.
Yeah. Speaking to specifically the step request, I, I think the best process would be once we have it completed, the amendment and it goes to public comment that we can walk through specifically with the board at a board meeting, everything that is proposed and take public comment in that manner, if that's a, an alternative that the board would be comfortable with is to just walk through every change we've made or planning to make and why. And then you guys or we, sorry, provide recommendations, et cetera. So it, it's, yeah, once did that. Thanks.
I, I guess I'm not understanding that because we take, when we go, when it goes to public comment, we take every comment very seriously and we adjustments all the time. So it would be, again, reaching out to the board, we, we did it last time with the last step amendment and getting as much input as we, we would like to provide. And we could, like I said, we could have a meeting specifically about that or as, as an agenda item to walk through all the changes. Otherwise there's no benefit to us working through a step amendment together before it's public. As, I mean my team is all the, you know, planners, everybody's trying to figure it out and put it together and make sure it works before we can even be report something. You can even look at it. So I guess I would just say is, you know, again, it's part of the public process that we work together and, and work, you know, here it is, let's hear what you guys think and here's why we're doing it, et cetera.
I, I think the first part of what you said is exactly what we're looking for. And that would be, we don't want to, we don't want this board to be a part of putting together the step. That's not our role. However, when you have that step together and it's ready to go out to the public, it would be helpful to, to bring it forward to the board as a board meeting to say here's what we're gonna put out for public con and here's why. Here's why these, you know, items are in here because you know, there, there's always quite a few questions. So to me, I believe that gets to the intent of the language and the statute, not us putting together making a step with you, but just being able to, when the step is ready to go out to public, have it go before the board first so we can have that discussion and understanding of what it is we're supporting or not. Is is that better, Rob? Is that clear?
In other words, as you're preparing the document, the step as as you have those prepared and you're ready to go out to to public comment that before that occurs it should go to the board because you may very well find that the board has a different idea and recommendations. I, you know, maybe
I tell you what this is, the end goal is to get your input chair the board's input. So we'll talk about it internally and see if we can, maybe we can have a, it's, I would worry timing wise, if we're needing a board meeting and we're ready to go out for public comment that there could be some problems there. I'd hate to say well we're ready to go but we gotta hold up because we have to have AHA meeting to get the public comment when the majority of the stiff amendment has really nothing to do with the marine highway operations or the marine highway system. So, but it's something we'll talk about internally and see if we can figure it out.
Okay, good enough. Okay. Did anyone have any further questions on the I A J funding, which is actually where we kind of were, Oh, I had one last question. I'm looking at the demeanor replacement vessel. The SINA was listed under request from A I I J monies for that construction of that vessel. I thought that that vessel construction money was secured a couple of years ago, or at least a year ago to federal highway funds. But now we're asking for it from I I J A. And then the second question that I had on that is that I see we're still looking for operation funds from that money instead of construction funds. And the board is, has said several times they think that is not a good way to spend that money, that the state needs to, just really needs to be clear that it's their responsibility and role for the operations of that system and it's part of, you know, the public service of the state and use those monies instead for capital investment replacement. So those, those are two things that really jumped out at me but
Oh yeah. So on the trv, I think we've said it many times that we're going after every funding source we can possibly get to build that ship with and we have absolute 100% commitment to build it. But it, again, grant money is great and because it it, it allows us to not utilize our normal state money, which has incredibly amount of statewide needs pry for it. So that's why we went after this grant on the capital side for the trv. If, if of course we were to not be successful, we would program it into our stip to make sure it got funded. As to your other comment or question, the operating, i, I do realize the board's general direction or advisement is that the money be fully used for capital. However, that is not the intent of the administration. We had it programmed in last year's operating budget to the tune of $90 million and that has been our intent all along is to fund that operating portion with this I I J A money. Whether it comes to fruition or not is still again to be determined. But that has been our goal from the beginning since last session.
Okay. Looks like no one has any questions or concerns, so let's just go ahead and move on. We've got more to do and I'm gonna go right to the recap of the in-person meeting from October 14th and you all have a copy of that that we got Wednesday I guess, and I know that it wasn't given to D O T till at least Tuesday, I think Tuesday evening. So we got it fairly quickly as soon as they got it. You've all read through the recap, it's just very brief. You Ed you wouldn't be familiar with most of this these, but you can basically look at the time we spent, we spent a fair amount of time on the long range plan, just a framework looking for overarching umbrellas of which would be populated with, you know, short term plans, projects and goals. And I will say that we all agreed that the number one goal or priority of the amhs is always, it's always going to be safety, safety for crew safety for passengers and everything, everything falls under that.
Every decision under that umbrella. When we looked at the seven different, basically columns of elements that we had and you know, we, we had to kind of number them, they, we went through a a practice where we individually decided which were priorities and quite honestly the first three or four or five were really were all priorities together because with without a fleet modernization, it's going to be extremely difficult to recruit and retain crew, which is a huge priority. And a vessel maintenance and replacement plan was very high on the list and we're looking at that right now with Matt News, with the confusion around the Matt news and changes. So we, we had a lot of very good discussion, deep discussion. We got to meet the new Amhs planner, Joanne, is it Joanne or Joanna? Joanne I think. And it was really good having her there at the meeting. And a question that I had on that, what's, what is Joanne's role with Amhs is 50% of her time going to, to planning within the system or is that a hundred percent or 80 20? Is is, is she focused directly on Amhs?
Yeah, I can answer that now. Yeah, Joanne has, as we move forward, we'll be working on understanding the needs of the system as the planner is managing the long range transportation plan and other elements of the system. So there's a lot of folks that are working on planning right now and Joan is also the only other program that will take up some significant time in ports and harbors program. Joanne's been the lead in that for a number of years, so we're really appreciative of of that. So they'll be a bit of a split in time for both, but I know Joanne will be capable of handling the priorities as they come and making sure that the needs of amhs planning is getting accomplished.
Basically when we left that, that meeting, we all felt that it had been a very good exercise to be able to have a less formal discussion. It's far easier to talk to people around the table than on a small little zoom square and that's, we should do that at least twice a year and maybe even more so. But I think I'll leave it at that board. You, you were there and if you have anything that you would like to bring forward to the table about the meeting, anything that you thought went well or, or that we could build on or capitalize on that would be helpful and if not then I think we should go straight into the short term plan. Okay. I don't see any hands, so I'm gonna turn it over to Catherine
Absolutely. How about it's three o'clock guys, shall we come back? It's three 10. Just everybody leave their computers on and don't do anything weird. Thank you. We'll be back in 10 minutes. Okay, looks like everyone's back. We'll go ahead and get started. And before I turn it over, Catherine are, is this, is this copy of the short range plan as of November 3rd, is it demonstrably different at all then? The one we got several months ago?
No, Madame Chair. It is not significantly different. There's a few graphics that have been updated and then we also have an update of the, we've added in the winter schedule, which wasn't there before and some information on the operating costs which Matt McLaren can speak to.
Okay, great. And I guess I would, I would ask one question back to the board and that's, as we discussed going through this, we thought to prioritize a few areas and so I just like your advice on the approach on how we go through this. I can go through the table of contents for example. Captain Page was not able, he, I do not believe that he was here the, when we went through it before. So it may be helpful to go at a high level through it and then, and, and then if we wanna dig into the op, I think it was the capital projects and the operating budget, is that okay with the board would be like a different approach?
No, I think, you know, we had really anticipated that most of this four hours would be on this plan, but we, we had so many questions about so many other things, presentations that, that didn't occur. So I I, I am gonna suggest and if, if the board is okay with this, when you're looking at the contents that we start short term plan and we have obligations to weigh in on the budget and short term projects here shortly for the next legislature. If we could start with the overview of the short range funding opportunities with, we kind of have gone over that but, and then the capital improvement goals and the operating goals and then there may be some time for us to dig into a few more items. Does the board have any objections to that or do you, would you wanna go through each item individually? But I, we'll run out of time so I don't see any objection to that. So please go ahead Catherine with the overview, sorry and the capital improvement goals and the operating goals.
So, and you know, maybe just a quick review because you know we're going to get into it a little deeper in terms of operating budget for the next area and then the short range plan, the capital projects. So if board members have questions about specific capital projects, let's hold off on those and wait until we get through just the plan, the review of the plan, how it's been put together, and then the presentation by Matt on budgeting and then we'll get into the capital.
Okay, great, thank you. So at this point what you're looking at is the word version of the short range plan of what was emailed off was just a pdf and it would be great as we go through this, I opened up the Word document so I can easily add in comments that the board has areas that you wanna highlight to go back to at a later point. So if you wanna do that through chat or just mention what you want us to highlight, please do so so we can capture it as we go to make sure that we're, we're getting the content. And then also as you just got through that, the eight hour work session on goals, you see areas where we can be updating this document to reflect the goals of the board. That would be great to call that out as well.
We haven't yet done so looking forward to doing that together as a moving forward. So what this is as a short range plan, you know, historically we've all had information we, we've discussed the difference between short range plan ahead of a long range plan or vice versa. So D O T does have a draft 2050 plan and that was used to as to understand our strategic investment areas that the marine highway system will wanna be paying attention to. So that was used as that guiding light for this document. And this document was largely intended to create a baseline of information about key points for the marine highway system. Just getting the data in one has was considered to be of great value so that we could be making data driven decisions as we move forward. And as just a, a reminder and to recap for the last two or three months now we have also had Elliot Bay design group under contract to help with an evaluation of the Alaska Marine Highway system.
So they've been working very closely with staff and you know, they've, our staff, the folks that are on the line, Matt, Cisco and others, Captain Foy have been spending hours on the phone with folks trying to find good ways to put data in one place about all aspects of the system. So that information is making its way into this document. So it's intended to be a snapshot in time of where it's at. And then as we develop that long range plan, then we can build in that connection even better between the two. So that's the use of this. And so the information is at first is pretty general and I'm just gonna look here at the table of contents where we're talking about an introduction of like what is the system, how would you describe or quantify the marine highway system. We talk about the funding and also the technical legal financial capacities of the system and some operating principles.
From there we just break it up into capital improvement program and the operations of the system and the capital improvement program. We talk about the vessels and what's needed there and then we talk about our shore facilities, all of the terminals and what's needed there. And then we do propose some recommendations on the operation side. What we look at is considerations, what our factors right now that the marine highway system is needing to be concerned with. And then where is our operating budget at, what's our schedule, our operating schedule for the winner? And then ultimately the summer schedule will be added here and then we start to talk about, you know, through the charting the course program, which is currently underway, what are the metrics that we're following for staffing for the fee and budget. So from there I think we can decide what we want to do if, if there's additional information that that's needed at this time. But I can start with the capital improvement program and if there's questions please let me know.
I guess as we get into that, all of the cal, the capital improvement side and the operating side, we're really hoping to have these principles and this is something that would be great to get feedback on from from the board when it's the right time. But things that help us make decisions on a day to day basis, if we understand, you know, what are our principles, it can help moving forward. And so these are the ones that we've been using for the past, maybe since the beginning of the year. And on the capital improvement goals, we break things out into themes. Our themes across cot statewide are safety, state of good repair, economic vitality, resiliency and sustainability. So all modes in all areas of the state, we're focused on this and in the short range plan, we break that down into focus areas so that, you know, what does it mean if we're working on an economic development project versus a a state of good repair project. And this a good area for discussion moving forward is what percentage across these different themes do we wanna allocate when we do have funding opportunities available to us?
The goals that we have just listed here in absence of others at the time were for all terminal and vessel capital projects on budget, the vessel out of service time, we want to reduce that to what's strictly necessary. Another example of a goal that we are following or working to build into the system is, you know, all goals, all docs. So ideally having a lot of flexibility and compatibility and as we're making decisions for investments, making sure it's as common to all vessel types in all docs as possible. So we have a graphic here, which is describing the average age of our system or the fleet and you can see where what the average age is at 34.1 years and what the maintenance needs are by vessel. Sort of the is according to our fleet condition surveys that are completed by Blossom. This indicates that his vessels are getting older, there's more out outstanding maintenance requirements.
And so as part of that, we included a table here, which is just summarizing information that Glosson does prepare with its executive summary on the flea condition survey, where they list out what is recommended for work and they base it on priorities one through five. And priorities one and two are things that are of high urgency, that's safety related. We're gonna have outdated certifications. And so we broke that out here as to what's recommended versus what's an urgent need five vessel. And then that is all added up and goes into what is, you know, sort of a five year capital plan. And while this isn't necessarily a financial analysis, it's a high level document showing with these different projects, where would they fall within what years based on where they're at with the design.
So this lists out kind of a combination of all vessel design work, what is that gonna cost. And then the MRV is pulled out that's a bit more expensive than all the other smaller design projects. And then we have a number of vessel construction projects listed here and their current cost estimates. And then below that we have our overhauls. So what is it that the state has been appropriating for overhaul and rehabs, which is 15 million a year. And then beyond that, the next role here is what is the outstanding maintenance means? So it's something we should be asking ourselves, are we getting enough money and allocating enough money towards our maintenance needs or do we need to increase that?
Below that, we provide a little bit more detail on each project. So if it's a current project like the Columbia CTP Controllable Pit propeller project, then you'll see the federal ID here. If it's in the stiff, you'll see the stiff ID number, the scope of work for this project. And then you see some cost estimates, which is for design and then construction. And we've broken that out separately. And then put the status of each phase of the project listed here. So for example, Columbia CPP project, the design is complete. And then we haven't anticipated construction date of when it would be completed. And I also list a date here of when the scope schedule and estimate document was most recently completed. With the way that materials costs are escalating in certain sectors, it's helpful to know, you know, is this an outdated estimate or not and do maybe need to increase it. So this is just in table format and this is something that could be pulled out I think, pretty easily as an appendix, but it's just information that's here. If you were looking to know what projects, I'm sorry, Captain Hill, can you please ask a question? I didn't see your answer.
Yeah, that's, that's a good question. I be pretty, it'd be hard to say to be honest with the cost escalations that we're seeing. It could cancel it out. But I would, I would hope that'd be the goal. Is there a way to find efficiencies and if so, we should be making that a priority.
So yeah, the schedule completion date for the, the functional design, which is what Boston is working on right now, that is scheduled to be completed in full by no later than June 30th. There'll be an overlap between when they finish that and when the shipyard begins their production, engineering and design work. And then this says that the project will be completed that the end of 2016, so it's ready for service 2017. And then once it gets outta the shipyard, there'll be months of, of work to go through its paces to be ready to sale as well. But 2027 is, is the date, This is the estimated completion need.
And we weren't ready with the functional design at that point, they were still not gonna have the functional design done until that point. So we were, we were being not necessarily ahead of schedule, but we were bringing on people, you know, nice and early. When the shipyard gets the award, they're still gonna have to go through a period of time, depending on, on the, the shipyard, it could be, you know, hopefully just six months. But they have to go through their production level design work, which is a handoff from the functional level that's currently being done.
Yep. We are seeing significant cost escalations across all of our projects statewide. So as there really isn't much to say about that, we can, we do have the cost estimates, if you're curious to look at them. It's what we've been applying with for funding in the grants that we've been producing. And so if you'd like to see the detailed cost estimate, it's definitely available and we can share that.
So after that we do break down the shore facility considerations, and here's where we take information from the South coast marine engineering section and, and they do their condition survey reports. They do one, they do 'em every year, but they split 'em half and half. So every site will get one every two years. And they have a ranking system so that for state of good repair, it's easy to calculate how we're doing. Out of nine you can see their scores that are provided here. And that helps give us an indication of where we should be focusing some infrastructure improvements. We also list, the owner here is with our port facilities. A number of them are owned by either an authority or the city.
And then from there we take information again in pretty high summarized table to show what we need for design over the next five years and then what would be constructed over the next five years. And then for greater detail, we do have 'em broken out here for information that is available with the scopes of work. And then again the design and the construction cost estimates. And just wanted to mention, you know, there's a lot of change going, not change, but a lot of work that's being done on these pretty regularly. There's a lot of work for our marine engineers to do at a south coast, and so it's, things are kind of constantly being outdated. So this may continue to be a living document for a while as we come up with improved estimates and, and schedules and lots of projects. Okay. So overall we have a few made an attempt to come up with a few program recommendations. One was replace and upgrade aging infrastructure. Two is invest in technology to support the management of the vessel and terminal assets. And then the three is design a fleet that is future ready or future proof as the common term is. So looking ahead at what the IMO regulations may be if they apply to our vessels, and then being sure that we're able to meet those requirements.
And we haven't put a lot of work into the capital improvement metrics at this time. It's something that would be good as we moved forward to continue to work on performance metrics. And that the metrics that the board is interested in tracking, we would put here. So this is more of a placeholder, then we get to the operating program and our engineering manager, Cisco Flores, is on the line. And so if there's any further questions about our capital program or the overhauls as it pertains to the short range plan, he's happy to answer.
No, no. I, you know, know, I, I'm, I'm here, I'm at, we're at the day plate level at the shipyards and working all these projects and, and they're, all, the federal projects are moving along pretty good. Just yesterday we submitted the ca crew, quarter PDA and the Ken County missions PDA hits already a project control on the way up, up to fiscal to James Mark's team. So we're moving overhauls going good. You know, the fleet condition survey is, is doing his job SMRs? I don't know, I, in my opinion, I think we're doing real good with SMRs. We're accomplishing quite a few. I mean, Keith is with us, he's off the mad news guy. I would like to think that we're getting a lot done. Mad Nuka, including the, including the, the hub and, and of course we, let's not forget the Aurora. We, we we're up in Jag right now.
I just send a, a body up there, a port engineer team member up there to Jag and spend time up there in Seward. Went up to Homer, wrote the ssam and or visited with the Ssam and, and getting ready for the la for overhauls. So we're, we're, we're doing real good, you know, just, just myself and a, and a team of two, you know, so we're doing real good keeping up with, with all the overhauls capital projects. Same thing with capital projects. Federal a team of two and they've got about six, eight projects on, on, on in the hopper, you know, and that's a lot, that's a lot of federal projects for two people, you know, and, and, but, but we're keeping up with everything. Everything's moving, moving along real good.
Yeah, I've got kind of a, I don't have a good understanding about the Cascade Project in a short term plan, it says that we've made 8 million payments in 22, 23, 24, 24 of them. And yet for the Cascade Terminal, it says the new DACA Cascade Point may be built in 2026. Well, shouldn't it be, shall be, have been built by 2026. What is this May and have we have we made payments already?
I I can address this at least at a summary level and if we wanna go into more detail, you know, we can, we can certainly do so at the appropriate time here. But to answer your question, it is may because at this point there's pending commitments to work collaboratively towards this project with Gold Belt. And so our first step, because there hasn't been design on this, is to see if this is a viable project. That's why there is a may in here. And if the project moves forward, then we have a dollar value for estimated lease payments if that's the arrangement that the state and, and Gold Belt decide to pursue. But at this point, what we are working on and would like to work on if all parties agree is to evaluate feasibility through initial design and to see if it's something that makes sense to pursue and then what the cost of that could be.
This, Our long range goals and priorities include safety, economic vitality, resiliency and sustainability. And there's a number of benefits to this project that fit all of those criteria. And so it would fit into d o t statewide long range transportation plan. And what's listed here are all of the projects that are under consideration that the state may be involved with, whether it's an AMHS asset or a project of interest that would support amhs. I think I saw Captain Hiller raise his hand.
What you're That's correct, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Anything would be premature to, to say and so only that we would like to evaluate this further and look forward to doing so in collaboration with Gold Belt as a partner in that. But until we get to go through this analysis and feasibility, be hard to come up with a concrete strategy.
Yes. Yeah, so it, so would I, And I think as we get reports from any of these projects, it would be great to get feedback and then the board's, you know, collective recommendation could be provided. It would be wonderful to have that regardless of, of what it is the board is stating.
I've been, I've been asking a lot of questions just to people I know and the community and people in Haynes community reach out to me because they know I'm the highway officer, the operating board, what have you, and there's a lot of questions that come up, issues and, and just evaluate, you know, the viability doesn't make sense as the pencil out, et cetera. So I will, I'm compiling them and I will send that to the AM h o b to, to see if they're comfortably moving on to, you know, the amhs to kind of answer those questions. Cause a lot of questions. Nobody really has all the answers and I think there's a lot more work done on it obviously than, than we are aware of as far as discussion, exploring and, and then maybe some of these issues haven't been addressed yet and we'll help decide the appropriate action to take.
So there's, there's some a lot of apprehension for the people I talk to, but I don't think we know the whole picture and, and the questions they raised are good questions and I don't have the answers. And so, you know, someone can dig in if they don't have the answers already, they can dig into it and then help evaluate the final which way to go, you know, positive or negative. I'm sure there's positives and there's negatives. The question is what do they balance out that with the scale ends up with end of putting 'em all on a scale, what's it go? So, so that's why I, I plan on do, I know it's very loose stages and we'll have for a couple years but we will get some questions out there so they can be, you know, addressed ahead of time. So, and I guess the only other thing I wanna say, which is not totally on the mark at the moment, but I look at the stabilization recovery full steam ahead, which are all really good, good concepts, but sometimes I wonder if stabilization is what we want.
We don't want stabilization what we have right now. We want to continue to improve the service to our communities. So I I, I think there's somewhere we don't talk about and this really that closely in these goals is the goals of keeping the fairies running, but it also think the goal to make sure they're running the best serve the needs of our communities. So if they keep running reliably up and down a community but there's nobody there but one person steps on the board, not at every time while other community's not getting as much service, then we should be constantly looking at the goal at the end of the day is that our communities get moved A to B whatever our transportation needs and they can't be met by other other means efficiently that we can satisfy those needs. So I think need to keep that somewhere as a goal and objective or incorporated in those one of those discussion themes as bullets and this entails full steam ahead means we're constantly reevaluating the needs of our communities and fulfilling those needs. You'll have to add another bubble to it, but I think it needs to be there somewhere that, that's all I got for the moment and I'll take my hand down and I'll go back on mute obviously.
Yeah, that's a really excellent point and I, and I think if there is ever a time that the board's interested in a little bit more about the information that's resulted from this, there's a lot of excellent data like on this program and because right now we do feel that our, our system is in the stabilization phase and we define that because it is at critical status where we're having disruptions because of our accruing shortages especially. And so it's hard to improve service when we still feel we're kind of losing ground. So we're, we're trying to think outside the box and being in the stabilization phase means we're looking at all available options utilizing supplemental services if necessary when we have agreements with LOAs with the unions to do so and working on needing this basic some service for as needed in collaboration with communities. So that's where we're at now and then we look forward and hope it doesn't take too long before we are at recovery and and doing exactly as you say where we're gaining ground across all aspects of the system and having those positive trends and then ultimately running the system full steam ahead.
Meaning that we have the budget, the crew and the fleet to meet our scheduled service. We were given a budget authority by the legislature, the governor approved it to meet certain service levels and we'd like to be able to do so. So that's sort of the progression of this program and we have some of the metrics here as part of this short range plan that goes a bit into more of how we actually do that. And did I see a hand raised?
Yeah. Okay. I just can address it the last time you mention and to meet our schedule, our schedule, I guess the issue is the schedule should be a dynamic schedule and so not our, our schedule we have today but the, the schedule that the communities need to meet their needs, that's all. So I think that's a little bit wordsmithing would probably fix the problem and say that we're real looking at, it's not what a schedule somebody came up with but the schedule with what the communities need and develops a schedule or the needs of the community are incorporated into a schedule that meets their needs was the schedule that came out and that addressed their needs. So I mean I think many communities will tell you that they're not happy with the schedule. So if you met the schedule, they're not happy. Okay, the schedule have right now, you know, today, you know, of course you're not at the recovery, you're, you're in the stabilization mode so to speak.
The schedule they have today, they say they're not happy. So just to meet that schedule doesn't not, we meet success that means you just have the schedule doesn't meet the needs of the community, you know, so a little bit of play words but also just kind of recognize that ultimate goal is keep the C communities happy, get the transportation needs fulfilled. Your needs are to make sure you can have the equipment and the people to run a system with the end goal. Meet the community's needs. I don't mean to get too fixated on just to the only thing when it jumped out me, that's the only thing that jumped on me that was really focused on your needs and other community needs. I know that's not really the case but that's, you know what I read, you know, that's all. Now I'll pull my hand.
I really appreciate that and I think we'll go back and look at that language to be sure that that's more clear cuz that is really what we're working towards. And so the playbooks that that we mentioned in the short range plan are attempts at doing so where we can have this bidirectional feedback with the communities and making that schedule more dynamic. For example in Prince William Sound where we're now just starting supplemental service to address our gap. We're only putting that schedule out a couple weeks at a time right now because we're not sure how this is gonna go and we don't wanna promise what we can't deliver on. And so in that way it does become more dynamic but it does make it more difficult for communities to plan on and we have other gaps in the winter schedule across most of the system which we need to work in that same way to do. And so we're looking at what's happening with Prince William found and then hopefully can, can make that happen moving forward.
It's a great effort by the way I think. I think that's class example that the schedulers meet the needs, the community and you couldn't, weren't stabilized or even had a recovery or other assets inhouse to do it. So you grab someone other assets are available and met their needs. So I think that's a great story and a great message is that, you know, you can't say, well I'm sorry I don't have many more boats. We'll go find some other boats, we'll rent some boats, we'll make it happen. So kudos to Amhs as far as dressing needs. So it's not like you're not addressing needs is not necessarily verbally covered I think would be what I'd say now would be quiet.
So what we're looking at here is just the breakdown of crew fleet and budget. And again these are sort of placeholders of performance metrics as the board defines additional ones that you would like for the system to track. We can be wrapping that into these systems. But on the crew we're looking at our staffing levels and also the health of our relief pools with budget. We're looking at our allocated funding and and how much of that we have spent and, and if our projections are, are indicating that we won't need to ask for additional funding. And then on the fleet side we're looking at the modernization of our fleet, you know, our control systems digitized, you know, how is our propulsion system, what's the age? All of those factors go into this. The vessel availability, the shipyard forecasting, you know, are we meeting our schedule in in the shipyard and sometimes we're coming out sooner and sometimes we're later. So this is averaging that. And then we have our maintenance profile, what's the outstanding maintenance and then the SMR backlog, which is what Cisco had mentioned, our our ship maintenance requests, how many, you know, are they outstanding and what's the cost cuz that can add to the total maintenance needs of the fleet.
And so I think if we start, there are a few goals here where we mention reliable and predictable service, having sufficient crewing levels to avoid holdovers and overtime. And then a third one is the vessel operating or the energy management plans. A couple of the vessels are required to have them in January 1st, but those will reduce operating costs as well. And I'm gonna go down towards the operating budget cuz we do have Matt McLaren here on the line. We offered here just some timelines for when things happen. Looks like these are some dates that are for last year, but it does go through up to the c y 23 operating budget. And I think what we would like to add here now is what needs to happen for c y 24 timeframes, which is what we're looking at now. And so Matt, I have your scenarios here if perhaps you could speak to them a little bit.
Okay, Yep. I can go through those. So right now we're in the process of, of working with the governor's office o and b on the 24 budget course. We know the governor doesn't put his budget out until mid-December, but at the board request we wanted to put some scenarios here just of different high level what what different scenarios would look like for operating weeks and what the cost of, of that service level would be of how many ships running. So the first part there we've got nine ships running. If we did that, the total cost would be 166 million. We'd be able to provide 370.5 weeks port calls. We'd leave a range here on port calls cuz it depends a little bit on how we finalize a schedule and mix up the service. But it'd be anywhere for, you know, between 6,200 to 6,500 service weeks. It's a little bit, having all nine shifts running all year is a little bit of, of overkill. We're not even sure we'd be able to do that as far as port conflicts and you know, we'd have Aurora, Lacan, Hubbard and Talina running essentially the same areas and it'd be tough to dock them overnight and keep them going. But so the next next scenario we look at eight ships, which is a little more, definitely more manageable. The cost is lower on that 158 million for the year 336 operating weeks and 5600 5800 poor calls.
Essentially what that does, it's, it keeps our main liners running. We have, we would still be running the Aurora la Huble all at different times during the year, but we'd be able to have those ships available to cover for overhauls and you know, have mainliners to cover routes and essentially back up, up service for when vessels are in overhaul. So with this mix, there wouldn't be any service gaps in the schedule. We'd have, we'd have ships to cover for breakdowns if overhauls go long or anything like that. So then we get down the next one to seven ships operating, which essentially with that, we'll we'd take out likely the Columbia out of the schedule and run with two main liners for Bellingham, the costs would go down around 140 million a year. We don't have 301 operating weeks right around 5,000 port calls. And we would then start seeing gaps in service as, as ships go into overhaul.
Cause we don't have any backup ships to cover for overhauls, Prince Win Sound, Homer Kodiak, those areas when the Tus Aurora goes into overhaul, we wouldn't have a ship to cover for those areas. And Prince Roofer would be a big challenge as well because we, you know, the, the ship that service Prince RU would either Kennecott or, or Mad Nuka would be on different routes. Like they have the kenco on the cross go route and the man Nuka going to Bellingham. So we'd have to figure something out with that. But it would be challenging to, to keep, keep good service, good regular service to Prince Rupert with, with only seven ships running six ships. This kind of gets down to our, well I'd say kind of our bare minimum service level, $134 million, we'd run about 253 weeks of service closer to 4,000 4,200 port calls.
And then we see the same gaps we have up above in the seven ships. But the difference is we, we wouldn't be able to have that other Alaska class ferry running Inly canal. So we'd need to use the, well either the Alaska class ferry or one of the 2 35 length ships, the LE would have to service both Lin Canal and Northern Panhandle, which would reduce service, although they'd have service in those areas, it would greatly reduce service to those, to the Lincoln Canal and, and the villages and the northern panhandle. So I know we're running short on time, I kind of want to just run through that quick and then I guess we can see if there's any questions.
Well, service level, the best service level would be eight ships that, that eliminates gaps. So I mean that, it just depends I guess what the, the board wants to recommend there. But that at eight ships is where we start getting to the level where we can, we can have backup vessels, we can have other ships running. We don't have any service gaps in our, in our schedule.
Yeah, crewing is, is gonna be the challenge for sure. Yeah, I mean hopefully by 24 we're getting, you know, this, this would, we do have a budget right now for the calendar 23, so through the end of December. So course this would start January 24. That's coming up quick I guess, but we're 14 months away. Hopefully we can turns around before that time. That's, that's the hope for sure.
Yeah, that's correct. The, yeah, the 23 budget, well taking out the support services, yeah it's right around 143 million. So yeah, it's, and that's is budgeted 362 weeks of service and that schedule. So yeah, crew is gonna be a challenge in 23 for sure. We're coming up close to that
Yeah, thank you. We've skirted around this issue on several different occasions talking about level of service and how much we would expect to see, I would hope. Well first off, is this the type of information you're gonna leave in the short term plan or are you trying to get an idea of which one of these you wanna leave in the short term plan? Maybe that's a question for Catherine.
Yeah, I think on the, well we'd definitely get more detail I think when we get to the short term plan. What, what we wanted here from my understanding from the last meeting that we had an anchorage was I thought the board wanted to look at just different scenarios for the 24 budget to try to come up with an idea of recommendations as far as service levels and if there's, you know, we can live with some gaps or no gaps, a recommendation before the governor comes out with his budget. But as far as a short term plan, I think, you know, Rob may have some ideas too, but I think we can look at four to five years and, and give more detail on what's here. I think we'd want to show poor calls to communities and what, what that would look like to each community and what they've gotten in the past would, that detail would probably help I think what, what the board wants to look at.
Okay, thank you. And Matt, I think that also, could you give us kind of a snapshot of the last five years, forget 2020 because that was a disaster in 2021, but going back from 20 19, 3 or four years, what is the, the general number of operating weeks and port calls that we had, cuz when I'm looking at the eight ships operating and even the seven, those are, those are more weeks I, I'm remembering 240 weeks of service and fewer import calls and maybe that's just because all of the vessels were broken down, but
Yeah, we, we had fewer in, I mean in fiscal year 20 and 21 we were around 200, 200 service weeks and 3 30, 200 3400 port calls. So, but those are low years because of Covid we had a lot of cancellations because you know, we didn't run the ships cuz of Covid, but looking back at 18 and 19, we were three 20 to three 30 service weeks and 5,600 poor calls in 18 and 5,700 poor calls in 19. So I can go back further, I just don't have further back on my screen right here. I mean, but I can get that information too if you wanna go back further than 18.
Well I, I think it's just helpful because the board has really struggled to figure out what is that service level, what is the perfect service level and it's fluctuated so much over the past decade or two decades because of the health of the fleet. And now with accruing it's just, just good to get an idea of, you know, when like when you, when you grow in the Aurora or the ante for Prince Williams sound duty, she's crude for two weeks, so you're gonna run her for two weeks and you're gonna do the Whittier Cordova, Vals maybe and then on the summer to Tittle, maybe Chinga. So they're kind of used to a level of service and, and I guess that that's the question for the board to realize when they're looking at something like the dollar amount for running eight vessels, a budget that reflects eight vessels, if we can crew them then that the service levels there are going to be at levels that have been traditionally enjoyed by communities and they're happy with, they're happy with it when it's running and when it's consistent and a lot of these routes, they just don't need a lot of stops that you can go in there and just, you know, nobody gets on or off.
So I, I think that's what we're trying to get the, the understanding of when you start, you know, modernizing and resizing the fleet and you're looking at different levels of certain weeks of service and ports call, are you still staying basically where, where traditionally we've been, I hope that made sense.
Yeah, it makes sense. We're, and that's why I think it'd be important to look at poor calls by community. I mean the, if we go back far enough, we go back to 1415, we were over 400 weeks of service, 8,000 port calls. I mean we were running a fast ferry up in Prince William sound in addition to the Aurora and you know, we've run the Vena, I can't remember it's ma or matte, it's a day boat in Lincoln now, I mean we, so we've had a lot of service places, but I think it's good to look in combination of the poor cause to communities and then the traffic levels those same years. Did, did adding more service to those areas increase traffic or did we just spread it out? Yeah. Or did we just provide more convenience so that that will help too And yeah, I know that's one thing Catherine's looking at some of those metrics as well. Yeah, it looks like she's pulled it up so
That, that would be helpful to know and that it be more helpful to even understand what that means. I probably understand this but I'm looking at it not confused, but yes, that, that's generally the direction the board has been trying to get a better understanding of when they're talking about the service vessels service level, I'm sorry, the sleep.
And then can, can we do this out of the next meeting or a work session or something and actually have it all together in front of us and then kind of drill it down and see if we can't come to some consensus on among the board. I mean it's an important issue we're not gonna be able to do, it's two and a half hour sitting here without all the information in front of us that
Yeah, I was going to just mention the fact that somewhere in, maybe in the short reach plan, which they didn't see and maybe it's a buried away, is this, this concept of using some commercial service on occasion to fill gas when vessels aren't available because of either casualties to it or maintenance or something else that comes up such as, you know, Prince William sound, obviously we don't have a vessel that meet the needs, so they recently came up with a contract with Phelps to, you know, to fill that gap. And I think we still have some gaps in southeast Alaska currently. And I, I suspect we'll always have some type of gaps where we may not we'll have Optum fleet if, if 90% of the vessels are operating as it's supposed to be and you know, phase them in, move one out into service and bring another one in or type of thing.
But it always seems to be, there's these little hiccups in the system where we have to get some other past vessels service to fill the gaps. And I know we've done down here in a lower southeast Alaska a lot with Allen Marine, I prince's down there doing Phillips and I know what else is going on. But, so I I think that somehow that should be incorporated, have discussed or explore is that we, that we, we we consider using them or have a mechanism to do that fairly easily and and maybe inject them into the system to even enhance service in some areas by having passenger only to better meet the, the needs of the community. So I I think that that should be discussed and as we get into, you know, short range and long range plan and especially if the yeah, I'll stop there
And, and yeah, that, that has been done and passed with the system. There are union contracts that allow for some of the very much smaller outlying areas to be for the, the state to contract out with the, with the private carrier to do that. They're, they're very small and they're primarily passenger only. There may be one or two, one or two of the vessels that are available that can haul a vehicle or some lumber, but it's, it's generally been done when amhs vessels were just couldn't make it. They had, they had big maintenance problems or over overall whole problems. So just kind of a, a short background on that. I'll put that on the list of just that can be ancillary information that we could get sometime within the next three weeks, the next two weeks to just kind of get an idea of how those have been used in the past, why they've been used, what the results were, just kind of as a, a refresher. So we'll put that on the list
So I can add that a little bit. I, you know, I've had some over the years I've had discussion with a Marine, which has always been interested in having some piece of that and has explored ways that could address some of these gaps and I wonder if that's somewhere along one of our meetings we could have a half hour presentation what their vision is, they have some interesting perspectives on how they could be a part of the whole system and address some of those aspects. So maybe and anyone else who's in that line of work that feels like they could provide some capabilities, maybe we have these short presentation or give a white paper in 15 minutes to answer any questions that that kind of consider that as far as meeting some needs because I think sometimes we, we have a very large vessel that's very inefficient.
It's not, doesn't need to be that type of vessel could be, you know, a pass vessel only. And you know, our goal is to be efficient, less carbon footprint, you know, not a huge ship to take a couple people, but a a right size type vessel in certain cases would be the, the better solution and, and especially when we got personnel remaining challenges with these days, these smaller vessels, they're not putting cars on 'em. Well there's a lot less crew involved when you have, you'll have those needs and they're going a little faster so they don't have more than 12 hours. They have a eight, you know, eight hour watch or 10 hour watch or 12 hours, but they're not double crude and, and so the cost goes down and I, I think that maybe even meets in some cases meet the needs of communities better anyway, I think that should be looked a little bit more, it's not anywhere discussed. I think it should be kind of addressed maybe before we put in a plan. We have us look into it a bit. But that's some my thoughts on that one.
Thanks, Ed. And, and again, I I think if we get an update from D O T NHS of what they've done in the past with all Marine and the other vessels, how that's worked, where they've been needed, when they've been needed, it's been difficult to get them in the summer because they're very, very busy with their tours as well. So I, I would suggest that the first step is that we allow amhs d o t to put together that information of how they've been used and how it worked and then go from there. Alan you have your hand?
The question may be better. Well, how do I say this? Sooner we can get a recommendation I guess to the governor and legislature the better, but there's not like some deadline, I mean the governor's doesn't release his budget until mid-December, but obviously decisions are made much before then. So I would at that, I mean if discussions from a while back, I was hoping we could have a recommendation in October, but it's now November, so
As you, you know how this process is Madam Chair, we're we're, we have to work with OMB on the budget that's, that lines up with the governor's priorities. So that's what we're doing right now. And we would, as we work with, like we do with the legislature, we provide scenarios and then the board can choose on a scenario that they think is they could support and then they would submit that to the, to governor and the legislature as a resolution or comment or however you want to do it.
Surely you're putting me in a hot spot here. We, I get, I can't reveal that information necessarily. We, we again are working with OMB on a, on a budget for the governor's submission, but we're more than willing to provide scenarios that the board and marine highway can speak to the benefits of all the scenarios and then a board can make a recommendation.
Okay, Matt, if, if you could get that to us, I know it's a lot of work in our next meetings in three weeks, but if we could have that the Monday before our Friday meeting so it gives two weeks to give us a chance to look at it and, you know, I guess we'll make a recommendation
Rob, and, and I guess kind of the point I was trying to make a little earlier was to re 2024 is so far off it's hard to to know but like for 2023 a realistic what's even a realistic service level we can provide with our crewing. Yeah we have 143 million, which is like seven ships I think Matt was showing, which would be a definite goal. Whether we can do it or not is to be determined and I, I think that as Matt said, 2024 or I'm sorry an eight ships scenario was was a, or was it seven ships? Which is kind of ideal Matt. I mean as far as yeah, I mean eight chips eight chips will get rid of the gaps. Yeah. Yeah. So that would, that would be, you know, a dream scenario or, or great scenario if we can actually crew it. Okay. So yeah, something to talk
That's helpful. Thank you. I, I guess I, I just had one last question and looking through, getting down to the bottom of the short range plan and I, I don't know if this is Google is for, but there are several new categories and in, in the short range plan and I'm assuming they came with federal funding dollars and I'm just wondering if there, that is going to change our operations cost and I'm specifically talking about environmental justice, racial equity barriers to opportunity and justice 40 initiatives because it seems that all of those are, are, are very strong push to, to provide service to those smaller communities that do are not revenue drivers for the system. So you know, when we're talking about the budget and the number of vessels, I'm assuming that this all has to be taken into consideration and somehow I don't know what it means to be honest.
I think whether there's federal money or state money for operations, these are important considerations that as a state we wanna be sure we're doing a good job of and providing fair and equitable service and, and meeting all of these strategic objectives is, is important. So whether or not they impact our budget, I, we're not at this time planning on adding a position specific to any of these things but rather it forms a kind of a backbone of operating principles.
Okay. I mean yeah, that's kind of what we've been doing for decades. So this is new and it's a language and it, so it just leads me to believe that some of these, you know, it could change the way we do operations and from an operations plan perspective, I just don't know. It's all new. Just the language is new. We've been, the system's been doing this for a very long time so
Yeah. Okay. So the last few things in the document just to point out, we have included here the winner operating plan. This goes through a little bit beyond what we would consider winter. May and June are also added of 2023. This is available online and I believe people have seen it before. We can spend more time going over it though, if that's helpful. The following item here, which could be of use to the discussion perhaps for next time is just this gap analysis. This is something that wasn't included previously in the short range plan, but something that we're using as a tool throughout the charting the course initiatives where we can see what is the service that we're currently offering this winter and then what is it as a base that as a baseline that were used to in previous years. And these are an average on the right hand side is it says 2017 service, but this is an average of a number of years of service at that time.
So it gives us a bit of a comparison when we get comments that it's not what it used to be. We have numbers and so if this is the type of analysis that would be useful as an appendix to the short range plan, if it could help inform any budgetary decisions, we're happy to add that and could go into more detail at another meeting when we have time to, I should just mention the reds or just the gaps where there isn't service and then the orange boxes are significantly less than previous years and the green is similar service levels within a percentage of of what was offered.
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