Dutch Harbor: playing catch-up.

• Author: Touza, Ann
• Position: Alaska - Towns in Transition

This Aleutian Island port is changing from a fishing boom town to a viable community.

Dutch Harbor/Unalaska is a community struggling to come of age. The pollock boom is over, and as life on this last frontier of fisheries slows down, the community is entering a period of stabilization.

Since the mid-1970s, Unalaska's economy has depended on commercial fishing and fish processing. From 1990 to 1993, Unalaska was the top-ranked fishing port in the nation, in terms of both volume and value of fisheries product landed, and the pace of life and work was hectic.

Now the effects of greatly shortened groundfish seasons, a reduction in the opilio quotas, and movement of crab-processing capacity to the Pribilof Islands are being felt. Unalaskans are stepping back to take stock.

Ironically, as a shakedown in the fishing industry is under way, Unalaska is experiencing a construction boom as the community is struggling to play catch-up with community services and infrastructure.

"In some respects, definitely, we are going though a transition period, but in some respects it's almost just a transition between youth and middle-age," says Stephanie Madsen, executive director of the Aleutian Seafood Processors Association. "Unalaska is just now getting to the point where it is taking care of infrastructure and community-service needs and has the ability to sustain itself."

The past year has seen the construction of Unalaska's first Eagle Quality Center, a new Alaska Commercial Co. store, a new Key Bank, a new post office and a new city hall. Construction of a $6 million community center and upgrades to the water system and landfill are under way.

Bank of America also recently moved into the community, and plans are in the works for a postal-sorting facility, the first road paving, and even a small Burger King.

"I see that people want to compare us a lot to other communities," Madsen says, who served on the City Council from 1985 to 1993. "They kind of view us as backwards, as hicks, because we don't have what other people have ... and that's true, but it's just because we are young and haven't got to the point where the demand and the money are there at the same time."

In 1988, the city's general fund revenues swelled to $5.5 million. They more than tripled by 1993, reaching a peak of $18.2 million that year. At the same time, the population roughly doubled, reaching 4,317.

Although projected general fund revenues for fiscal 1995 are expected to be down to about $13 million, residents remain optimistic that economic conditions will stabilize in three to five years.

Fish managers say the groundfish resource is healthy and stable, opilio quotas are expected to rise in the 1995-96 season, and Unalaska's prime assets -- its location and harbor -- remain unrivaled.

"I think we will remain a viable economy," Madsen says. "The destination looks positive, I think we'll get there, but I can't vouch for the condition of the trip."

WAR-TIME ROOTS

In some respects, the build-up of Dutch Harbor/Unalaska began during World War II, when the site was chosen for a naval base as part of the Aleutian strategic defense. By May 1943, a peak population of 10,151 sailors and 9,976 soldiers was stationed at the base.

On June 3 and 4, 1942, the base was bombed by the Japanese. A month later, the Unalaskan Aleuts were forcibly relocated by the military to southeast Alaska.

Many died during the relocation, and those able to return years later found their homes destroyed and their lives forever changed. In 1950, the population of Unalaska was 173.

Between WW II and 1970, the community settled into a quiet existence. Other than a brief salmon fishery in the early 1960s, little happened in the community. The buildings and infrastructure from the war began to fall into decay.

When Unalaska Mayor Frank Kelty arrived in 1972, Dutch Harbor was just a layover stop for floating processors on their way to Adak. Then in the early '70s, the Adak stocks crashed, and crabbers began to explore for king crab in the Bering Sea.

The community began to build up again during the heyday of the king crab in the mid-70s, a boom that carried on until the fishery crashed in 1981.

Between 1983 and 1985, little if any fisheries product was processed in Unalaska. Many of the...