Governor Mike Dunleavy and Senate President Peter Micciche recently made a surprise visit to the Silvertip Station. This follows a letter written to the Governor on December 18th requesting help to Kenai Peninsula residents suffering from poor road conditions by reopening the station.
Micciche states that the governor demanded that the station be reopened the following day, but it was determined that the station had not reopened so the surprise road trip was an effort to trust, but verify. “On Thursday the governor and I drove down from Anchorage, we inspected the black top, the pavement issues in the Portage area which obviously needs some resurfacing next summer. We drove through and inspected the Pass and we’re pleased to see all of the pullouts that have been plowed. We got the code for the Silvertip station from an unrelated employee and surprised the folks at Silvertip. We walked in and knocked on the door and I asked if we could come in and the guy was laying underneath the loader working on a bucket. You can imagine his surprise when a giant governor and the Senate President peered over the edge, but we learned about what was going on there the new effort on maintenance and getting all of their equipment up to snuff. The station is open. At least some of the positions have been filled. It looks like they’ve caught up, but our goal now is to make sure that we, the people of the Kenai, the commercial truckers, the families driving to Anchorage, the emergency responders, never have to live under those winter conditions again and I can assure you that that will be a part of the budget process moving forward.”
Micciche stressed the importance of that road connecting the Kenai Peninsula to Anchorage, “The Seward and Sterling Highways are the lifeline of the Kenai Peninsula, they’re like our ferries or airports, if you will. That’s how we get to doctor’s appointments. That’s how commerce occurs. It will remain open. One of my questions in the subcommittee was ‘how does DOT prioritize when they think about closing a maintenance station’ because that was clearly the wrong choice. Silvertip is a key asset to ensure highway safety to the people of Kenai and the folks of Anchorage that come down to do things in the winter as well. It must, and it will, remain open.”
