03/25/2022
Sand Point Community Letter from Trident:
Trident Fishermen and Aleutians East Borough community members:
With the summer season rapidly approaching, we wanted to update you on Trident’s recent investments in our Sand Point facility and our operational plans for 2022.
As we noted at the last Borough meeting, we are committed to keeping our Sand Point facility open and profitable. As fisheries change and markets evolve, we will continually adapt our operations to remain competitive, and to best serve fleet and support our communities. In 2021, we were able to ship out 750,000 lbs of fresh salmon from Sand Point. This year we are looking forward to consistent shipments of fresh salmon which in turn, will allow us to add fresh halibut shipments too. For 2022, we are making additional renovations inside the plant to help it run more efficiently. We have pulled some of our po***ck and fillet lines to create a more efficient plant layout and are in the process of upgrading our freezers to increase capacity. As everyone in the community can relate, we are still waiting on some materials for the upgrade to arrive, but expect to be ready at startup this spring.
For the remainder of the year, and the foreseeable future, we are concentrating efforts into running at capacity for a six-month season (May to October), taking deliveries of salmon, black cod, halibut, Dungeness, and jig cod. Outside of this period, we will continue to provide fleet services and route fish through Sand Point to Akutan. This allows us to pay better grounds prices and provide additional tax revenue to the community.
Our commitment to our Sand Point facility is also illustrated by the significant investments we have made over the past year. We recently invested over a million dollars into stabilizing the Sand Point dock and invested an additional $750,000 in upgrades to our fuel services. These upgrades will help ensure those services are safe for the community and surrounding environment for years to come. Trident is continuing to allocate additional funds in our capital budget to provide ongoing upgrades to our Sand Point plant for years to come.
Trident will also continue to be a good neighbor. We are in the process of cleaning up our yard. We have gotten rid of six containers of scrap and have another six ready to dispose. We estimate around thirty containers of cleanup by the time we are done. This cleanup is another way to measure the decades of evolution that we have gone through together, as fisheries and technology have changed. We are also working on upgrading our water system at the plant and have requested to join the City’s water system, which, if approved, would generate additional annual revenue for the City.
We are ever thankful to have the support of such a close-knit community and will continue our involvement through donations to school programs, graduation, and fireworks for the Silver Salmon Derby. We are looking forward to successful year together.
Trident will be finalizing retros with our salmon fleet in the coming weeks as we look forward to another successful year ahead. Thank you to our fishermen for your continued focus on quality. The plant’s opening date of May 1 will be here before you know it. Happy fishing!
