Council hears of gas station renovations this summer

Aug 20, 2023

The gas station at Bonanza Fuel will undergo a major overhaul this summer, necessitating a temporary lease of land from the City of Nome to put up a temporary gas station. An ordinance to lease a lot to Bonanza Fuel for up to 16 weeks at $500 per week marked the only action item at the Nome Common Council meeting, on Monday, April 24. Bonanza is rebuilding its fueling station and replacing the underground diesel and fuel tanks this summer. Since there are only two fuel vendors in Nome, the loss of one fueling station would harm local economic activity and inconvenience Nome residents, the city determined that it's in the public interest to lease the city-owned lots across from the NAPA auto parts store to Bonanza to set up a temporary fuel station. In a subsequent interview with Scot Henderson, Bonanza Fuel's CEO, he explained that the gas station's underground tanks and its parts are getting close to their end of life and are being replaced with brand new tanks that are to arrive on the first barge. At the same time, other improvements will be made to the gas station. Henderson hopes the project will take between four and six weeks. While the gas station is shut down, the leased land would be used to set up a temporary fuel dispensing tank on a skid platform to allow customers to fuel up. This temporary gas station would have an attendant to fuel cars and take payments. The hours would be limited to 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. and they would only sell gas, not diesel. The ordinance allows the city manager to negotiate and enter into a short-term lease agreement with Bonanza Fuel and the duration of the lease shall not exceed 16 weeks. The ordinance passed unanimously through the first reading, with Councilman Henderson recusing himself from the vote. In other business, the council was informed that the annual Spring Clean-up week will commence on May 30 and go through June 2, to culminate with the raffle day on Saturday, June 3. The city will run the U-Call We-Haul program again and continues to pay a bounty of $100 to haul off to the landfill broken cars or trucks and $25 for ATVs and snowmachines. Dump trucks for trash collection will be stationed at the Icy View Fire Hall, the Recycling Center and at the Rec Center Parking lot. NJUS manager Ken Morton reported that NJUS has begun to procure fuel purchases with an initial order of 750,000 gallons at a dollar to $1.50 less than last year. "We still have quite a bit left to go, but we’re looking at the market," he said. The line crew is out at the Rock Creek feeder, pulling down the systems, Morton said. City Manager Glen Steckman said in his report that repairs to the swimming pool will commence on July 10 and should be done by September 1. The overhaul will remove the salt treatment system and replace it with a chlorinated system, for which the pool was designed in the first place. Steckman said that work will begin to replace insulation and sheetrock at the Public Works Building, after the March fire damaged much of the third floor. Steckman raised the possibility to add the construction of a new youth facility as a legislative priority. Since the closure of the Nome Youth Facility a few years ago, youth offenders are now transferred to a correctional facility in Anchorage and if a flight is delayed there is no holding facility in Nome that separates youth from adults. Mayor John Handeland thanked Kawerak and the Child Advocacy Center for organizing a month of activities to bring awareness to April being Child Abuse Prevention Month. On April 23, first responders held a ice cream social as part of the activities. The council went into executive session but didn't take any action after coming out of it. On April 27, and May 8 the council will hold additional budget work sessions.

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