{"id":448831,"date":"2026-08-31T13:18:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T13:18:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/448831\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T13:18:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T13:18:08","slug":"port-of-oakland-and-usace-sign-design-agreement-for-harbor-turning-basins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/448831\/","title":{"rendered":"Port of Oakland and USACE sign design agreement for harbor turning basins"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Stas Margaronis<\/a><\/p>\n

The US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) San Francisco District and the Port of Oakland commemorated the signing of the inaugural Design Agreement for the Oakland Harbor Turning Basins Widening Project.<\/p>\n

The ceremony took place on Aug. 27 aboard the USS\u00a0Potomac, the presidential yacht used by the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt.<\/p>\n

The $642 million project involves widening both the Inner and Outer Harbor turning basins at the Port of Oakland to better allow ships to turn around. Vessels routinely calling Oakland today are increasingly larger and longer and face spatial restrictions, resulting in inefficiencies that lead to delays and negative economic impacts.<\/p>\n

Construction is anticipated to begin as early as 2028.<\/p>\n

The ceremony included presentations by:<\/p>\n

Stephanie Dominguez Walton, Port of Oakland President and event emcee
\nCongresswoman Lateefah Simon, Representative of California\u2019s 12th District
\nBarbara Lee, Mayor of the City of Oakland
\nMaj. Gen. Jason Kelly, USACE Deputy Commanding General for Civil and Emergency Operations
\nLt. Col. Virginia Brickner, USACE San Francisco District Commander
\nKristi McKenney, Port of Oakland Executive Director<\/p>\n

The speakers made the following remarks:<\/p>\n

Barbara Lee, Mayor of the City of Oakland: \u201cWhen I was in the [California] Legislature \u2026 when we wanted to dredge \u2026 labor, the business community, the Port and the environmental community were at each other\u2019s throats. I mean, there were big fights going on. And so, I called everyone up to my office in Sacramento [the state capital], and we had this big meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cOut of that meeting \u2026 we made a commitment that we were going to dredge to 50 feet [to support deepening the Port of Oakland ship channel] and that we would create wetlands in Sonoma Bay as well. So, I carried the legislation for Sonoma Bay wetlands, and we were able to \u2026 get the environmental community on board, labor, the business community and the Port to begin that 50-foot dredging project to be able to create these wetlands with the dredge spoils \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want the Port to remain \u2026 competitive economically. We want to make sure that we protect the environment. We want to make sure that we create good-paying union jobs, and we want to make sure that the Port \u2026 continues to not just survive but thrive. That\u2019s an example of this community being persistent\u2014not patient, but persistent! \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cOakland \u2026 plays a critical role as the Pacific Gateway for the United States: exporting agriculture from the Central Valley, protein from the Midwest, and wine and beverages \u2026 And so, every box \u2026 that comes through the Port feeds our families, supports restaurants and small businesses across Oakland and throughout the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oakland Port Commission President Stephanie Dominguez Walton: \u201cI\u2019m the President of the Board of Port Commissioners here at the Port of Oakland, and it is an honor to be amongst all of you \u2026 generals, public servants, elected officials, Port staff and everybody who makes this possible. This is really a big day for us \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are honored to be aboard the USS\u00a0Potomac, FDR\u2019s presidential yacht \u2026 Today marks a historic occasion for the Port as we sign the inaugural Design Agreement for the Turning Basin Widening Project, which will keep Oakland competitive and allow us to continue supporting the thousands of jobs here in the East Bay and across the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

US Congresswoman Lateefah Simon: \u201cI\u2019ve just got to say, these women in leadership! Our Port Director, our Port President, our Mayor and our USACE San Francisco District Commander \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cThank you, members of our armed service community, for being here. Seeing you all \u2026 in your fatigues is pretty inspiring, knowing that we are coming together from federal, state and regional organizations to proclaim what the region deserves. And today, we are calling for all of us to celebrate \u2026 almost a decade of work, long meetings, a lot of advocacy and collaboration.<\/p>\n

\u201cBehind every shipping container, like the Mayor said, that comes through this Port, there\u2019s a job where warehouse workers and mechanics and merchant mariners and truck drivers and hardworking community members \u2026 make sure that the goods are delivered to our restaurants, to our hospitals, to our small businesses in our community and, again, throughout the global region.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lt. Col. Virginia Brickner, USACE San Francisco District Commander: \u201cI just want to thank the study team for maintaining their sense of urgency to deliver on these goals over many years and many phases. And that all brings us to today, the culmination of all this work \u2026 to celebrate the signing of what we call a Design Agreement between us as USACE and the Port \u2026 as our non-federal sponsor.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, sir [Maj. Gen. Jason Kelly], you already hit on this \u2026 What does that all mean? \u2026 We\u2019re signing a paper \u2026 but we\u2019re doing more than that. We are moving into the preconstruction engineering and design phase of the project. We are moving forward. We are showing progress. We are getting ready to put those dredgers in the water and \u2026 as Representative Simon said: \u2018Get to work.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, I can assure you, we are bringing all of our best minds and tools to the table as we develop a shared path forward on this project \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cMaj. Gen. Jason Kelly, US Army Corps of Engineers Deputy Commanding General for Civil and Emergency Operations, is with us from Washington, DC. Sir, thank you for making the time in your busy schedule to join us for this important milestone and sharing your vision \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that transforming our navigation infrastructure is an absolute priority for the Chief of Engineers and for this [Trump] administration, and we are laser-focused as a district on delivering this project on schedule and within budget.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kristi McKenney, Executive Director of the Port of Oakland: \u201cI love the remarks about infrastructure. Ultimately, as a public agency running a Port, we are all about the infrastructure. That is what we deliver so that business and economic prosperity and opportunity can happen in our community \u2026 and that\u2019s why this project is so critical.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd while you may never actually see much of it, because it\u2019s going to be under the water, it is mission-critical to the Port of Oakland staying at the forefront like it has been for over a hundred years \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Stas Margaronis The US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) San Francisco District and the Port of Oakland…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":448832,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[143,145,144],"class_list":["post-448831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=448831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/448832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=448831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=448831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=448831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}