The commissioners also discussed the possibility of the port getting involved in telecommunications during their meeting this week.

The port plans to seek changes in Idaho law in the coming legislative session so that telecommunications would become a part of what ports could do, said Port of Lewiston Manager David Doeringsfeld.

State code isn’t clear on the issue right now, he said.

The port is putting together a question-and-answer sheet that will be ready by Nov. 12, when lawmakers from all parts of the state visit north central Idaho as part of a legislative tour, Doeringsfeld said.

The effort is a response to growing needs for high-speed Internet connections for port tenants and others within Nez Perce County, Doeringsfeld said.

Lewis-Clark Terminal is poised to purchase three acres from the Port of Lewiston that are immediately north of its grain storage and river barge loading facility on Third Avenue North.

The agricultural cooperative expects to pay $331,360 for the North Lewiston land that it has no specific projects for at this time, said Arvid Lyons, manager of the terminal.

It comes at a time when numerous efforts are under way in neighboring eastern Washington by the Port of Clarkston, the Port of Whitman County and NoaNet to upgrade the telecommunications infrastructure.

NoaNet is a not-for-profit company in Washington that received $140 million in grants from the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to bring high-speed Internet to rural Washington schools, hospitals, emergency response agencies and libraries.

The Port of Lewiston is a long way from making decisions about any details of what its plan could look like, including how much it would cost and if it would link into eastern Washington’s network, Doeringsfeld said.

A telecommunications feasibility study for the port is due out later this month.

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Williams may be contacted at ewilliam@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.

© 2012 The Lewiston Tribune. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Since at least the spring, the Port of Lewiston has been negotiating a deal to sell land for the project. But port commissioners and staff have declined to answer questions about who the tenant would be.

Commissioners are scheduled to vote today to decide if they will sell seven acres for $730,838 to West Moreland Company, a site selection firm based in Atlanta.

The vote will take place during a 10:30 a.m. meeting at the port office, 1626 Sixth Ave. North, in Lewiston.

Once the new center is ready, FedEx Ground will close its Clarkston location, wrote David Westrick, a spokesman for

FedEx Ground in an email.

“The new facility will be larger than an existing station in Clarkston, Wash., allowing us to continue to meet and exceed customer demands in the region,” Westrick wrote. “When the facility opens, positions will transfer from the existing station, and we will add to the workforce as necessary.”

Westrick didn’t answer a question about how many employees will work in Lewiston. Previously the port had indicated the number was less than 25.

FedEx Ground based its site choice on the land’s proximity to major highways, customers’ distribution centers and potential employees, Westrick wrote.

The Lewiston project is part of a nationwide expansion that has included relocating more than 500 facilities and adding 11 new hubs. The upgrades have boosted package volume capacity and accelerated ground service delivery by one day or more in more than half the United States, Westrick wrote.

FedEx Ground now has 18,000 square feet in a building at 908 Port Drive in the Port of Clarkston that has housed its operations for five years, Brad Styner, owner of the building, wrote in an email. The remainder of the 54,000-square-foot building houses Grassland West.

New tenants, perhaps a boat builder or retailer, are being sought, Styner wrote.

“FedEx has outgrown (its) existing space,” he wrote.

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Williams may be contacted at

ewilliam@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.

The Port of Lewiston’s most obvious success in the last five years has become part of the city’s skyline.

Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories’ new plant at the port’s Business and Technology Park – overlooking the city and next to the shopping complex that includes Home Depot and Safeway – manufactures the same products as SEL’s Pullman headquarters.

The port will pay a consultant $12,000 to explore the possibility of creating a connection that would serve Nez Perce County, said David Doeringsfeld, Port of Lewiston manager.

Lots of questions need to be answered to determine how feasible the idea is, Doeringsfeld said. “This is just the first baby step.”

An initial look indicated legislative action would be needed to give the port authority to be involved. The port has no idea how much it would cost, what the route might be or what need exists, Doeringsfeld said.

“Until we get more information, it’s going to be pretty hard to react to it,” said Jerry Klemm, president of the port commission.

That discussion occurred during a meeting where the commissioners also heard reports about streets, EKO, extra-long loads and a proposed package handling and distribution center.

Port commissioners identified unspecified street, sewer and water infrastructure in North Lewiston as their top priority for the Lewiston Urban Renewal Agency projects, after Doeringsfeld provided a five-item list that included repairs on Sixth Avenue North.

Sixth Avenue North is one of about two ways trucks go between U.S. Highway 12/95 and the port’s container dock. It is also where Swift Transportation, a trucking company, has a hub and the Port of Lewiston has its office.

“There’s a lot of truck traffic that goes through there and you can’t have it turn into a gravel road,” Doeringsfeld said after the meeting.

Klemm wondered if the Urban Renewal Agency should be involved in repairs on a Lewiston road. “Is that a good expense when the city ought to be doing it?”

Another challenge facing the Port of Lewiston involves one of its tenants, EKO, a business that makes compost from yard waste and biosolids -leftovers from treating sewage.

Odors from EKO continue to reach some Lewiston residents, said Dave Beuke, a Lewiston resident who’s a member of the Lewis-Clark Valley Air Quality Advisory Commission.

The issue could be resolved by moving EKO’s operations to the top of the Lewiston Hill and setting up more than one place in Lewiston to accept yard waste, Beuke said.

Smells from the process would dissipate more quickly if it wasn’t hemmed in by the canyon wall, Beuke said. A concern about moving EKO farther from the city has been that residents would dump yard waste instead of making a longer drive.

The city is talking with EKO about options, and the port will request the city tell the port what the plans are as soon as possible, Doeringsfeld said.

Earlier the city indicated to the port it would have no trouble reporting back by July 2013, Doeringsfeld said.

“I don’t want to just kick them out and say, ‘You’re done. I’m sorry. You’re homeless now,’ ” said Mary Hasenoehrl, a port commissioner.

As the port contemplates what to do about EKO, it’s expanding its container dock from 125 feet to 275 feet in a project that should be finished by the end of next summer, Doeringsfeld said.

The port recently had to turn away a company that wanted to move a 140-foot wind turbine through the port on its way to Montana, Doeringsfeld said.

Had the dock addition been finished, the port could have accepted the job, Doeringsfeld said.

Besides the dock upgrade, the port is in the process of selling seven acres for a package sorting and distribution center near the Nez Perce County Jail that would employ less than 25 people.

That deal is on track with a site visit scheduled at the end of the month to iron out issues such as where the sewer line should go, Doeringsfeld said.

The tenant that would occupy the property has not been identified. Fischer & Co. is the business that has a tentative agreement to buy the land from the Port of Lewiston. The corporate real estate firm identifies FedEx as a client on its website.

“We do not have anything to report as of today,” said Bryan Iams, a FedEx spokesman in Pittsburgh.

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Williams may be contacted at ewilliam@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.