Host: Sault Ste Marie has been talking about building a deepwater port for decades, but could now finally be the time. Matthew Shoemaker is the mayor of Sault Ste. Marie, and he joins us in our studios. How are you doing, mayor?

Matthew Shoemaker: Thanks for having me. I'm doing well yourself.

Host: I'm doing great. Let's talk about this deep water port. There has been talk about this in Sault Ste. Marie. We go back to the 50s. We can talk about the 70s as well. Why is the time now?

Matthew Shoemaker: Well, what's changed is a number of things. First off, that land, it provided the. We can reach an agreement with Algoma steel has always been used as slag storage for the blast furnace. And now the blast furnace. No longer operating at the steel plant, they've converted to electricity based steelmaking, and so they don't have the need to continue to add slag to that storage area. So it will be surplus to the needs of the steel plant. And there is opportunity for them. And we say for us to develop an asset that will help attract other businesses, commercial, industrial, to that site.

Host: When we talk about what exactly is going through this port, what are we going to see?

Matthew Shoemaker: So it's already an existing port. Algoma Steel runs it as an export dock for themselves. And then there's a secondary users as well. But there is more demand on the port than there is capacity currently. So what we would do is expand the capacity by adding another slip, and then it would help existing industries to beef up their ability to bring their product in or ship their product out. And that's our Tenaris tube maker that that makes pipe for oil exploration. It is the aggregate industry, aggregate industry that already is using it to use slag in concrete, by-products or to, or to extract iron from. Slag, for example, is one of the uses. And then there is growth sectors that we think could be using it more. Intensely. And that's the forestry sector, the mining sector. Obviously there's lots of growth and gold exploration up north of us in Wawa and d'Iberville, and there is the opportunity for all of those areas in the, you know, in the in the north of North Algoma region to use this port as an import or export point for them.

Host: How do we know the demand is there? Have there been early conversations?

Matthew Shoemaker: More than that, in fact, there is a demand that already exists on Algoma Dock more than there is capacity for. So that that demand is pent up. And then there is commitments from other organisations the mining industry, forestry industry, agricultural industry and aggregate industry that have all said we need it for this capacity. And so we don't just believe our projections are accurate. We know that there is at least four times growth of the of the existing tonnage that goes through that port today.

Host: All right. The project is expected to cost between 200 and $250 million. I don't want to look into the city's pocketbooks here, but that's close to what your operating budget is for the year. How are you planning to cover the cost?

Matthew Shoemaker: So this is where I think it is a creativity.

Host: I imagine.

Matthew Shoemaker: Some creativity for sure. But also this is why the timing is perfect for this project. Today, the federal and provincial governments have talked about nothing but nation building infrastructure. For the last two years. We've been planning this port. I mean, you mentioned it back to the 1950s, but for the last four years, we have been in earnest planning this port because we knew that as Algoma Transit transitioned from coal based steelmaking to electricity based steelmaking, that would mean a reduction in the number of jobs at Algoma Steel. And so we planned the port as one of the offsetting factors. Now, we thought we had until 2029 for that transition to happen. That's what Algoma had said for a number of years. But the tariffs meant that the American market, the bottom fell out of it for steel products, and therefore they had to accelerate their transition to electricity based steelmaking. And we have in turn accelerated our planning of the port. This dovetailed dovetailed perfectly with the federal and provincial governments, saying they wanted to invest in this type of infrastructure, and the federal government's put together a trade diversification fund that would, in our opinion, that this project fits perfectly within to. And so that's what we're applying to for the bulk of the money. But the city is going to be putting money into it as well.

Host: All right. What else needs to be in place to get shovels into the ground right now?

Matthew Shoemaker: Well, two things. The land and funding, I think are the two critical aspects. So negotiations continue with Algoma Steel. There is a funding application deadline date of June 26th, I believe it is for the Federal Trade Diversification Corridor Fund, and we are ensuring that we are working diligently and around the clock to try and get this application in with the land secured. And so we could be considered and hopefully be successful. The feds have said that they're expected funding timelines. Are there announcements on funding would be end of September or October?

Host: There is. The folks here in southern Ontario sometimes like to say, you know, the North, and we like to blanket some of the communities here, but I want to look a little bit west of where you are. Marathon sound of marathon. The township of Red Rock are also working on their own ports. I'm curious, there's going to be a little bit of competition, I imagine. What sets your port apart?

Matthew Shoemaker: What sets hours apart is we haven't developed it with the eye to the funding that has now become available. This has been conceived of, planned for and attempted to be carried out since the 50s. There was a strong effort to do it in the 50s. There was a very close to successful effort to do it in the 70s. That was at the, you know, final stages until there was federal election in 1979. And then the former operator of the steel plant in 2015, before they went into creditor protection, had a port expansion plan in place. And the city has been working on this not just to capitalise on the federal government funding programs that have become available, but because it makes economic sense to have a port there, because there is demand for port there. And so we are using it to try and offset the job losses at Algoma, and we are using it to attract other industries and commercial activities into the Soo. And the fact that there's federal government funding now available simply makes it more realistic. Not doesn't make it a viable project. Because of that.

Host: You talked about the growth sector and where there is potential for opportunity there. Would you not be in competition with marathon and Red Rock for those same, same areas?

Matthew Shoemaker: We know that there is demand to increase capacity in the Soo with existing industries. Tenaris specifically Aruko, which is a flake board maker, and others in the area, including the gold mines in Wawa and D'urberville. And so we know that with or without those other ports, and they may have viable business cases on their own. But with or without those additional ports, there is the need for a port in Sault Ste. Marie. It's at the heart and at the at the intersection of Lake Huron and Lake Superior. And so it would be until you get to Thunder Bay, at least in the interim, the last public access port on the Great Lakes, unless those other ones go ahead as well.

Host: Fair enough. If all goes as planned, when would the port be up and running? What's your hopes here?

Matthew Shoemaker: We can start constructing it as soon as there's funding announced. It is not turning a green field into a port. It is turning a slag storage area, which is a brownfield into an expanded port. Because, as I said, there's already an Algoma steel port on site. And so within two years it would be fully operational, both slips with the added capacity. So we think that the timing is good for actually getting projects shovel ready that are shovel ready to market. And it also helps us offset those job losses as quickly as possible from the Algoma employment reduction.

Host: All right. I'll mark that down. Two years. Here we are. All right, Matt Mayor, really appreciate it. Thank you so much for taking the time and appreciate you dropping into our studios.

Matthew Shoemaker: Thanks for having me.