This week Puget Sound area voters will elect several new port commissioners for both the Port of Tacoma and Port of Seattle. Those new officials will face daunting challenges, including declining port revenues, increased competition from ports in Canada and the U.S. East Coast, and massive environmental costs associated with new technology and cleanup of former industrial lands.

 Almost immediately after taking office, new Tacoma commissioners will need to hire an executive director to replace Tim Farrell, who will leave the port at the end of the year. Tacoma commissioners also will face the need to market and eventually develop 160-plus acres of land on the Blair Peninsula that was initially intended for NYK Line. Last month, NYK decided against a dedicated terminal and opted to move into Tacoma's existing APM Terminal in 2012, when the carrier is slated to leave the Port of Seattle.

 Even though the Port of Seattle is posting positive container growth after 18 months of decline, the port will need to replace volumes lost when NYK leaves the port in two and a half years. In the meantime, Seattle's commissioners are grappling with ways to pay for a number of deferred maintenance projects, such as replacement of deteriorated wooden wharfs that have been left unfunded for several years.

 - The Cunningham Report