Five Haines Borough Assembly candidates outlined different visions for the future of Haines during a public forum Monday where they discussed recent issues such as police response outside the townsite, balancing the budget and fixing the Lutak Dock.
Michael Fullerton brought up the Lutak Dock in his opening remarks and said repairing the infrastructure should the borough’s first priority. He said the borough has a tendency make “expensive mistakes” due to lack of forethought.
“I am shocked at the seeming indifference at the state of our dock,” Fullerton said. “It’s extraordinary to me that this is now a crisis and it’s been something that’s been on the horizon for ten years.”
Fullerton, Brenda Josephson, Diana Lapham and Andrew Gray all agreed the borough should pursue additional grant funding for the dock and not settle for a scaled back design plan proposed by borough manager Debra Schnabel earlier this month.
Sean Maidy held the only dissenting view on the issue. He said the borough should consider a scaled back version after a federal grant proposal was rejected.
“I don’t think it’s foolish to think if we get shot down for a grant that’s an exorbitant amount of money that we should immediately think that going for a slightly lesser amount is crazy,” Maidy said. “It’s typically how negotiations work.”
The candidates differed on how the borough should provide police protection outside the townsite. Fullerton and Gray both said an expanded police service area should be established.
Fullerton said providing police service is the borough’s “moral obligation.”
Gray said police protection is a borough-wide problem, not one limited by geographic region.
“If there’s a meth lab set up out the highway that affects all of us,” Gray said. “It’s not just a geographic boundary. It’s not as constrained as that I don’t think. Thankfully we don’t need much response outside the townsite but I think we should do it and do it as an entire borough district.”
Josephson said the Alaska State Troopers have jurisdiction outside the townsite and emergency calls should be routed through the agency.
“I believe the calls should go to the trooper and it should be at the trooper’s direction how it’s followed up on,” Josephson said.
Lapham said she’d like to see some form of police response to residents outside the townsite.
“I like to know that I can call 911 at any given moment and have a police officer there,” Lapham said.
When it comes to the borough’s roughly $450,000 budget deficit, Gray and Fullerton said the borough should look at increasing taxes on the cruise ship industry.
Gray and Lapham disagreed with the assembly’s decision during this year’s budget hearings to increase funding for the library and for pool to stay open for additional hours.
“To take taxpayer money and to line item it specifically for a facility I don’t agree with no,” Lapham said.
Fullerton wouldn’t comment on the library but disagreed with funding the pool.
“It’s not really an appropriate time to consider spending to open the pool another day because a small group of people want to use it that day,” Fullerton said.
Maidy and Josephson both thought the facilities were worth funding.
The candidates also differed on excise taxes the current assembly has advanced on marijuana and tobacco.
Gray did not support excise taxes on marijuana and alcohol. Maidy supported a tobacco tax but not a marijuana tax.
Josephson said the new marijuana industry should be allowed to take root but, because marijuana was legalized in part for revenue generation, some level of taxation is appropriate.
Fullerton supported both tobacco and marijuana excise taxes.
Lapham said she believed in “priority based budgeting” and that “taxpayers pay for service that the government is responsible for sending back to the taxpayer.”
Maidy questioned the $95,000 set aside in this year’s budget for the new Haines Economic Development Corporation.
“It might not be a good idea to spend $95,000 on a group that’s still deciding what their mission statement is,” Maidy said.
Maidy said the money could be better spent elsewhere. He said he’d like to see the borough invest in a community greenhouse to foster local agricultural production.
Fullerton said while he’s “generally skeptical of these organizations,” he’d like to see the HEDC fund a marketing campaign that encourages entrepreneurs to open new businesses here.
Gray said he approves of the HEDC and would approve the funding if the organization can prove its future self-sustainability.
Lapham said while similar efforts have failed in the past, she approves of the current organization and is encouraged that the “people that are behind it are some of the biggest stakeholders in our community.”
Josephson also recognized that similar economic development efforts had failed in the past and that the funds weren’t used effectively. She said the HEDC should provide accounting and administration assistance to new business owners.
“I think this is a role an economic development corporation can fill, to provide marketing expertise,” Josephson said. “Offer trainings to people who want to start businesses or have businesses.”
The Haines Chamber of Commerce has scheduled another forum at the Chilkat Bakery Sept. 26 at noon.