Displaced Beach Road residents will be allowed ATV access to homes until further notice after the Haines Borough Assembly voted unanimously to support the measure at a meeting Tuesday night.
“I know I originally said during (a Feb. 1 meeting with Beach Road residents) that I was going to press this. I started to back off and started thinking, ‘Okay, we probably should wait a little longer, wait for this (winter reconnaissance) report,’” assembly member Gabe Thomas said. “As this report got delayed further, it was really evident we have to be proactive for our residents.”
At the start of Tuesday’s meeting, Mayor Douglas Olerud said he’d been notified that the contract with geotechnical engineering firm R&M Consultants, Inc. had been finalized, but the timeline wasn’t what he’d expected. Instead of coming to Haines immediately to conduct a “winter field reconnaissance” to gather information about site stability, the company is opting to review existing data first.
“Right now, they are currently studying the data that’s already been collected. Next week, they’re going to have Zoom meetings with different stakeholders in Haines, and they don’t plan on being here until the week of February 22, going into March, for their on-the-ground survey,” Olerud said. At past meetings, borough officials have said they hope the winter field survey will provide information to inform decisions including the safety of continued road access to Beach Road homes.
Like Thomas, other assembly members said they had gone back and forth about whether to support ATV access via the temporary road put in by Roger Schnabel, which was open for a week before being closed with cement barricades on Jan. 29. Assembly members said they were ultimately won over by the way Beach Road residents managed safety during the week the road was open to cars.
“I’ve been kind of equally wishy-washy on this, as well, and what struck me the most was seeing how strictly the safety protocols were followed during the window of vehicle access. That gives me a little bit of confidence,” said Caitie Kirby, who originally opposed road construction due to safety concerns. Kirby added, “I also know that we’re a pretty strong bunch of people, so if we don’t come up with a plan to let them go in and do it safely, they’re going to do it anyway.”
A letter in the assembly packet, signed “the residents of Beach Road,” asks assembly members to consider ATV access to allow residents to cross the slide path more quickly and bring in supplies with greater ease.
“Access is a right as laid out in the preamble to the borough charter, is a constitutional right and, as demonstrated over the last two months, is something residents are going to pursue regardless of the hardship,” the letter reads.
After the assembly’s vote, Olerud said he agreed with the decision to allow ATV access but was unsure how he would have voted in the event of a tie. He referenced the behavior of some Beach Road residents as they’ve lobbied for increased access to homes.
“I want the access, but I don’t want to reward the behavior of some individuals. There have been missteps (by public officials) along the way, but none of them have been deliberate, as has been alluded to by some Beach Road residents. The abusive behavior and bullying was a conscious choice by some and has been uncalled for,” Olerud said. “Leadership comes from making tough decisions during tough times. Bending to the will of the vocal isn’t leadership. It’s pandering.”
At recent meetings, some Beach Road residents have criticized the borough, specifically the Emergency Operations Center (EOC), for ineffective handling of the disaster and subsequent decisions relating to Beach Road access.
“The EOC is supposed to be here to manage risk. Unfortunately, this is not what’s happened. Unfortunately, what’s happened is we have had an EOC that has done nothing to help us with our properties,” Beach Roadhouse owner Todd Winkel said at the Feb. 1 meeting between Beach Road residents and the assembly.
The EOC was in charge of disaster management until late January when the responsibility was turned over to the borough and assembly. Up until this transition, the EOC had denied requests for an access road, citing geologists’ assessments that the area remained unstable and putting in a road had the potential to create additional instability.
On Tuesday, Olerud stressed that, at the time, he and his fellow EOC members had made decisions as best they could with the training and information available. He said the EOC has begun a self-evaluation process to identify areas for improvement in preparation for future emergencies.