Norton Sound Economic Development Corporation has opened a new halibut-processing plant in Savoonga, replacing an aging facility that supported St. Lawrence Island fishers for three decades. The corporation built the original facility in 1996 in partnership with the City of Savoonga.
At a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Aug. 6, NSEDC celebrated the opening of the new facility and officially named the plant the Orville Evekaan Toolie Halibut Plant.
The name honors Orville Toolie, who has worked with St. Lawrence Island fishers since 1992. The corporation said Toolie helped convert an old Head Start building into the initial plant and then managed and maintained its operations for the next 30 years.
In an email, NSEDC Chief Operating Officer Tyler Rhodes told KNOM that organizers surprised Toolie with a sign at the ceremony.
“One great aspect of the ceremony was presenting the sign to Orville with the plant’s official name,” Rhodes said. “We had not told [him] up until that time that the facility would be named after him. He was touched, and it is an honor well-earned.”
Rhodes said about 40 people attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony, and over 200 joined a community luncheon at the school.
NSEDC began planning the replacement facility in late 2024 and described it as “under construction” in a newsletter that winter.
Rhodes said in addition to new equipment and upgraded infrastructure, the new plant sits closer to the local landing area, making it easier for fishermen to move their catch from vessels to the facility.
NSEDC invested 4.7 million dollars in the project. Rhodes said the new facility is expected to last “several decades” and will cost about 1 million dollars each year to operate and maintain.
The former facility received an average of about 32,000 pounds of halibut each season over the past decade, with a peak of 70,000 pounds in 2019, according to NSEDC. Rhodes said he expects the new facility to support similar production.
“Our operations in Savoonga remain as they were, just in a newer and better facility,” Rhodes said.
The plant supports about a dozen seasonal jobs, all filled by Savoonga residents, including a plant manager, office manager, and processing positions, according to Rhodes.
The facility primarily handles halibut caught by St. Lawrence Island fishers from the island’s two villages, Savoonga and Gambell. Rhodes said the plant may also process Pacific cod, though fishers deliver little to none each year.
The facility sits next to Savoonga’s new USDA-approved reindeer processing plant. The Finnish company Kometos Oy helped develop the modules for both projects. The company, which specializes in food industry equipment and modular facilities, said they designed the eight modules that comprise the two facilities specifically for Arctic conditions.
After fishers deliver gutted halibut, plant employees wash, ice, and package the fish before air carriers transport it to Nome. NSEDC ships most of the headed and gutted product to domestic markets in the Lower 48 and sells some locally through its Nome-based retail operation.
The new plant has already been operating this halibut season. NSEDC says its first delivery was July 17.
