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A project meant to improve security at the Port of Seward will get more than $380,000 in revenue derived from the state's tax on cruise ship passengers.

At its meeting Dec. 2, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly approved Ordinance 2008-19-33 (substitute) appropriating $383,652.50 to the eastern peninsula city. The money was the borough's 2007 share of the state's Commercial Passenger Vessel excise tax approved by Alaska voters in 2006.

The original ordinances would have given Seward 2008 tax proceeds as well, but Mayor Dave Carey asked the assembly to put off a decision on that pool of money, approximately $304,000, until the administration has had time to research and develop its own plan regarding use of the 2008 CPV funds.

According to Phillip Oates, Seward city manager, the 2007 funds would be used to defray the cost of constructing a security dock and associated upland improvements for use by various law enforcement and port security agencies. Specifically, Oates said a security dock would be built in the northeast section of the city's Small Boat Harbor next to the cruise ship dock.

"The dock will enable the U.S. Coast Guard, Seward Fire Department, Alaska State Troopers and the U.S. Park Service to relocate their response vessels and provide greater security, fire protection and emergency response to cruise ships and their passengers," Oates told the assembly in a memo earlier this year.

The total project is estimated at $6.5 million, Oates noted.

Two other ordinances enacted Dec. 2 were Ordinance 2008-19-35, appropriating $120,000 to cover costs exceeding budgeted amounts for the construction of teacher housing in Nanwalek, and Ordinance 2008-33, which amended borough code concerning design requirements for subdivision rights-of-way to eliminate an inconsistency between the platting code minimum road with and the borough's new road standards. The road standard calls for 60-foot roads to receive borough maintenance, but the platting code allowed for 40- and 50-foot rights of way.

The revised code matches the two at 60 feet.

In other business, the assembly:

* Approved Resolution 2008-091 establishing the borough's 2009 legislative capital improvements wish-list,

* Approved Resolution 2008-092 supporting a grant application by South Peninsula Hospital to the Denali Commission for partial funding of a new Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) machine. It is estimated that replacing the existing machine will cost $1.8 million. Constructing housing for the MRI would cost an additional $700,000. The hospital is seeking $900,000 from the commission. A required match of $400,000 would come from the South Peninsula Hospital Service Area fund balance. As for the remainder needed, the hospital is exploring other options for funding.

* Voted against Ordinance 2008-37, a measure that would have placed a moratorium on the issuance of plats, floodplain permits, and rights-of-way construction permits within the road service area and Seward-Bear Creek Flood Service Area outside of Seward.

Hal Spence can be reached at hspence@ptialaska.net