The Haines Borough Assembly’s Commerce Committee began chipping away at a plan to address the borough’s bear problem at a meeting Tuesday. The committee forwarded two recommendations to the full assembly for consideration—a proposal to loan Community Waste Solutions (CWS) $16,000 to buy 10 additional bear-proof dumpsters and a proposal to revise borough code to clarify what constitutes a bear attractant.
Commerce Committee members Gabe Thomas, Jerry Lapp and Carol Tuynman discussed a variety of proposals from the borough’s Bear Task Force, the Solid Waste Working Group and the Upper Lynn Canal Fish and Game Advisory Committee (AC) for improving solid waste management in the borough and addressing the community’s ongoing bear problems.
In the past two years, Haines has seen a surge in bear-caused property damage and, with it, a surge in bear deaths as residents sought to defend their property. In 2020, at least 28 brown bears were killed in Haines, 26 of which were shot.
Proposals ranged from stronger enforcement of bear-attractant laws, to the development of education and grant programs to help people secure their attractants, to a complete overhaul of the community’s solid waste management system.
Thomas, the Commerce Committee chair, said it’s clear, based on the past few years, that the community needs to change its approach to the bear problem. He advocated for tackling the issue a little bit at a time.
“I think if we continue to chip away at it, we can probably eventually get to something that everyone agrees on,” Thomas said. “In Haines, we seem to rear back as soon as we get huge, big changes, but small ones we seem to be able to accept.”
As a first step, the Commerce Committee recommended the assembly consider funding a low interest loan to allow CWS to purchase additional bear-proof dumpsters for the townsite.
Lapp questioned the wisdom of the borough taking on the role of a lending institution.
Interim manager Alekka Fullerton said she had initially had a similar concern.
“I don’t know of any other instances where we have loaned money to a for-profit organization, but I do think that certainly we can make a convincing argument that loaning money to CWS is still within the public purpose as the only landfill in town,” she said.
Thomas said he supported the measure due to the time-sensitive nature of the community’s bear issue and the relatively small size of the proposed loan. He said he had more reservations about changing the borough’s bear attractant code.
“I like the idea of some of these changes. Some of them I’m not a big fan of because I’m not a big fan of big government, but I do agree with you that the coming season, I think we should be able to enforce some things,” Thomas said, adding that bear-attractant enforcement is something that could change internally within the police department without the need for a code change.
Bear Task Force chair Derek Poinsette, who worked on the proposed code changes, said the changes are largely clarifications of existing code.
“The one increase, which might be kind of a big step, is including livestock and requiring that those are secure and requiring garbage at all times to be in a certified container (if not housed in an enclosed structure or behind an electric fence),” he said.
Committee members said the proposed code changes will likely be refined during discussion by the full assembly, which meets next on Jan. 26.
The commerce committee will meet again Feb. 16 to continue discussion of solid waste and bear issues.