Adams, Kevin (OST) 

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Dear Mr. Adams, 

Olen Harris <olen@nprha.com> 

Friday, June 28, 2013 5:55 PM 

Adams, Kevin (OST) 

David Totemoff 

RE: Request for Comment on the 2nd Round Proposals at Tatitlek 

North Pacific Rim Housing Authority is the Regional Indian Housing Authority for the Chugach Region of Alaska and 

provides affordable low income housing, community infrastructure, and related services to the community of 

Tatitlek. NPRHA currently manage 6 affordable rental housing units, approximately 20 homes under a homeownership 

program, and the two community docks in Tatitlek. One of the docks is an Oil Spill Response Dock for a major section of 

Prince William Sound and also where the Alaska Marine Highway ferry berths when it serves Tatitlek. NPRHA is also 

planning on construction of a single family home and renovation of a youth activity center in Tatitlek this summer. Due 

to the remote nature of Tatitlek, being only accessible by air and boat, requires that the community has reliable, 

reasonably priced, and frequent enough air service that the essential functions of the community and organizations that 

serve the community can effectively be delivered. 

I would like to offer North Pacific Rim Housing Authorities full support for the proposal submitted by J&M Alaska Air 

Tours, dba Alaska Air Transit, marked Proposal A. NPRHA has had a long and very positive relationship with Alaska Air 

Transit and regularly utilizes them for both passenger and freight service to Tatitlek, having scheduled service with them 

would greatly enhance delivering our services to the community in a cost effective manner. NPRHA many times has to 

send out staff to Tatitlek to perform tasks that require a higher skill level than our local staff possess as well as perform 

tasks to meet all of our obligations under our federally funded programs and these trips usually are 2-3 days in 

length. Having service at least 2 times weekly would enable us to obtain seat fares for both legs of the trip, and with 

Alaska Air Transit the provider is also the main passenger and freight provider outside of the scheduled flights which 

would greatly reduce logistics difficulties and coordination for times when we need service outside of the scheduled 

times. 

NPRHA also has to ship all of the supplies, materials, and equipment necessary for maintaining our facilities to the 

community and every, there is no local store located in Tatitlek and everything must be shipped to the community by 

air or boat. All of the residents in the community are in the same situation and if they need a part, often for a critical 

system of their home such as the oil fired boilers in most of the homes in the community, they must order it from 

Anchorage and wait for the next available flight to receive it. This creates a very dangerous situation if the home is 

without heat and in danger of freeze-up in the winter time. The majority of the residents of Tatitlek are low income and 

do not have the luxury of maintain an expensive stockpile of parts to account for anything that might go wrong with 

their heating systems. Having flight available at least 2 times per week would make the delivery of these parts much 

more timely and potentially save homeowners thousands of dollars in repairs from having a home freeze up. 

' 

Please let me know if there are any additional steps that I need to take to have North Pacific Rim Housing Authorities 

comments on the proposals part of the record for this solicitation and selection. 

Sincerely, 

Olen Harris 

Executive Director 

North Pacific Rim Housing Authority 

8300 King Street 

Anchorage, AK 99518 

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