Operations will resume at a long-dormant Sterling gravel pit, which will supply materials for planned safety improvements to the Sterling Highway. That’s after Kenai Peninsula Borough planning commissioners approved the property owners’ permit last week, with conditions.
The approval came over the protests of more than a dozen neighboring residents, who said reviving pit operations would create noise and air pollution, hurt property values and disrupt the area’s livability.
And the property owner, Coalaska Inc., doing business as QAP, says they’re aware of the community’s concerns. Spencer Newins is a project manager with the company and presented the permit application.
“We think you'll find our application complete and thorough,” he said. “We recognize there are impacts from construction to the surrounding community. We hope you understand that these are temporary and serve the purpose of improving our communities.”
Materials taken from the site will be used to widen the Sterling Highway between Sterling and Soldotna. That stretch of the road is recognized by the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities as having higher-than-normal rates of serious vehicle accidents driven in part by busy summer traffic patterns.
QAP isn’t new to Sterling. The company has owned and paid taxes on the roughly 30-acre parcel off Robinson Loop Road for decades. It existed before the borough began regulating gravel pits in the 1990s. But commissioners deemed it inactive after five years of dormancy. Under changes to the Kenai Peninsula Borough’s material site code, that means the company needs to get a new permit to start work back up. QAP’s permit application is the first subject to the revised code.
Borough Planning Director Robert Ruffner says the public review process for QAP’s application is more robust than it would have been prior to the code overhaul.
“So prior to just a couple of years ago, I think it's really important for the public to remember that a prior existing use, they didn't have any rules at all,” he said. “I mean, there wouldn't have been a public hearing, there wouldn't have been any discussion about buffers. There would have been any discussion about going into the groundwater. It just would have happened.”
The new permit is good for five years, but Newins says they estimated there’s only enough gravel left in the pit to keep crews busy for two construction seasons, which roughly run May to October. He says the company also won’t process any material on the property, meaning no rock crushing or asphalt production. And the company plans to leave a 30 foot buffer between the deepest extraction point and the top of the groundwater table.
Still, planning commissioners were inundated with public testimony opposed to the pit.
Don Douthit has lived next to the gravel pit for forty years. The last time the pit was operational, he says the activity shook his house and clouded his well water. Now at retirement age, he’d hoped to sell his home. But he’s worried the pit will lower the value of his property.
“I understand they need to make money off this pit, but they've already made money off this pit,” he said. “They have made their investment back in spades from the previous excavation.”
Donald Scott Vermilya has similar concerns. The land owned by QAP and his residence share a property line.
“I know what happens when excavators, bulldozers and big-trunk dump trucks are backing up and hearing that damn beep, beep, beep, is going to be more than enough aggravation, and hearing it 24 hours a day in the midst of summer, when my family comes up here to vacation?” he said.
QAP says its operations are dictated by when the highway safety project crews are working. That will mostly be at night to avoid disrupting daytime traffic, necessitating nighttime gravel hauls to and from the site. But Commissioner Jeffery Epperheimer said allowing crews to work day and night is too disruptive.
“I honestly think I can say that this will be harmful to the welfare of those around the pit,” he said.
Commissioners voted 8 to 1 to approve QAP’s permit after some amendments to address the concerns. Those included barring nighttime operations, increasing the minimum berm height around the property and requiring noise mitigation efforts. QAP will also have to go through another public hearing if it wants to renew its permit again in five years, rather than having it only undergo commission review.
Commissioner Karina England was one of the votes in favor.
“It's obvious that there's a lot of strong feelings that are shared here, and I do respect that. I just kind of wanted to reiterate our role in this and how it's to evaluate this application based on the standards and borough code,” she said. “And that, from the record before us, including the staff findings, the technical documents and the proposed conditions, I feel that the applicant has met those standards.”
Commission approval kicked off a 15-day window to appeal the decision. But the borough said Monday no appeals have been filed.
