PORT GAMBLE — The Washington State Department of Ecology announced Thursday that Port Gamble Bay will be given special attention in an attempt to restore it to its former glory.

The cleanup with be facilitated by Pope & Talbot, Inc., which is working in conjunction with Olympic Property Group to cleanse the waters near the historical mill town.

“Pope Resources, our parent company, and Pope & Talbot are related by family blood,” said OPG President Jon Rose. “We came to an agreement awhile ago about who would do what to clean up Port Gamble.”

It was decided that Pope Resources would take care of the mill site and town, while Pope & Talbot would focus primarily on remedial landfills and the bay, he said. Both companies approached the DOE together to discuss strategies for improving Port Gamble Bay.

“Basically, what’s happening is that possibly today there is a test dredging to remove woody debris,” Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribal water resource program manager and hydrogeologist Dave Fuller said Friday. “This work will continue into 2007. All five tribes in the area have been watching this closely, and I think they are all happy it’s happening.”

The bay became contaminated from the Port Gamble Mill, which was the longest operating mill in North America, opened from 1853 to 1995.

During the first part of the cleanup, 17,000 cubic yards of sediment and woody debris will be removed from the bay. Bark now resting on the bottom of the body of water is considered a hazardous material, Rose said, and needs to be removed as soon as possible. The process should cost about $770,000, and will be evaluated once completed to determine if more work is needed, he said.

“Pope & Talbot have cleaned up five remedial landfills so far, and they are working on the Port Gamble Bay,” Rose said. “We still have a lot of work to do on the mill site, but we’re getting there.”

OPG will be providing support during the dredging process, and the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe will also be paying attention to the cleanup, Fuller said.

“This work will be done for the next two or three months, I believe,” he said. “This is just a subset, a small subset, in work that will take place beyond 2007.”

“Every year, the area around Port Gamble gets a little cleaner,” Rose said. “We’re always happy about that.”