Something missing from the discourse around why so many people resign from the assembly is the question of compensation. Your elected officials get a stipend that works out to $300 per month to do the toughest jobs in town. Being in elected office in Haines is a 24/7 experience. It permeates every interaction. In some ways, it becomes all you are in the eyes of others. That being said, paying the folks who walk that path more fairly might encourage them to stick around longer. In my own experience, hard realities like inadequate compensation and shifts in my professional life were more salient in my decision to get off the bus than anything else. The harassment and horrific interpersonal stuff sucks, and is profoundly stressful, actually dangerous even, but on some level it’s just noise. Folks who get elected know that or they wouldn’t be there. But as time goes on, and you realize you basically have the world’s worst unpaid internship, the perspective just shifts. We will be told we can’t afford it. That isn’t true. We have enough. We could pay our leaders more.
Tyler Huling