The Washington Public Ports Association named the Port of
Ridgefield the recipient of its annual Port of the Year Award at a December
ceremony in Bellevue, Washington.
Ridgefield, in southwest Washington’s Discovery Corridor
area, is a rapidly growing suburb of the Portland-Vancouver area. While the
port’s nomination application included a host of development projects completed
within the last year, totaling more than $9 million, WPPA cited the port’s
extensive, multi-year, $90 million environmental cleanup of the Port of
Ridgefield’s 41-acre waterfront site – Millers’ Landing – as the determining
factor for the award. The site was cleared for development late last year.
This site on Ridgefield’s Lake River was the location of
Pacific Wood Treating, which operated there for 30 years. When the company when
bankrupt in 1993, it left the port with the problem of cleaning up the
environmentally-significant site adjacent to a 5,500-acre national wildlife refuge,
and just quarter-mile from the Columbia River.
WPPA executive director Eric Johnson said the port’s 20-year
project is now winding down, with the final stages – the dredging and planting
of adjacent Lake River and Carty Lake – currently in progress. Project
completion is anticipated in late spring 2015.
“We have recognized the Port of Ridgefield for their extraordinary
work in cleaning up and revitalizing the Ridgefield waterfront. This port took
on a daunting challenge and saw it through to a successful conclusion,” Johnson
said.
The WPPA has given the award each year since 1987 to
recognize a member port that has demonstrated exceptional success in the
industry. There are currently 75 member ports operating within Washington
State.
Port of Ridgefield Executive Director Brent Grening, port commissioners
Scott Hughes, Joe Melroy and Bruce Wiseman, and key staff members and advisors
were on hand to accept the WPPA award.
“My fellow commissioners and I are proud and pleased to win
this prestigious award,” Wiseman, the port commission chair, said. “It was working
together over so many years on a project that were all passionate about that
got us here.”
Grening, who has been at the port’s helm for more than
sixteen years, voiced his appreciation for the recognition from his peers.
“Port staff and its commission, and many, many others,
worked long and hard on this effort, with a successful project outcome. That
the port industry recognized the good work we’ve done is very rewarding,”
Grening said.
Grening also noted that next year marks the Port’s 75th
anniversary, making the completion of the decades-long project especially
timely.
“Instead of dealing with problems of the past, we now get to
look forward to the work we can do as Ridgefield’s community port for the next
75 years,” he said.
