Tom Morphet submitted an application for a ballot initiative petition this week that would require planning commissioners to be elected rather than appointed.

A controversial planning commission meeting last December motivated Morphet to seek turning the commission into an elected body after the seven-member commission, operating with only five members, voted 3-2 to permit a heliport at 24 Mile Haines Highway and recommended filling two vacant seats with incumbent commissioners over two professional engineers. The decision to permit the heliport was later overturned by the assembly.

“Considering how much is at stake in planning commission decisions, I think this is fabulously overdue,” Morphet said. “There’s thousands and millions of dollars wrapped up in the decisions this group makes. People affected by those decisions deserve a direct say in who is making them.”

Morphet circulated a petition in 2018 that got on the ballot a question about whether or not voters wanted to elect members of the planning commission, port and harbor advisory committee, public safety commission and tourism advisory board. The initiative failed 592 to 277.

Current planning commission chair Diana Lapham said the electoral process would be a barrier to volunteering to serve.

“Because someone doesn’t like the outcome of a certain decision now we are going to make (the planning commission) an elected body to be accountable to the public? This is a misguided thought process. I am just as accountable to the public as a person elected to the assembly. We have a hard enough time getting people to volunteer to put their time in as it is.”

Morphet described such criticisms as “baloney.”

“The commission historically has been stacked by developers, construction interests and other people who have a real financial interest in how this valley is developed,” Morphet said. “Those people or their representatives will not be deterred by an election system. However, the public under this system will have a chance to agree or disagree with seating those candidates.”

Former planning commissioner Sylvia Heinz opposed the proposition in 2018, and still does. She said she doesn’t think electing planning commissioners will solve the problems Morphet identifies because she sees the same issues at the assembly level.

“If we’re talking about lack of accountability or special interests, or group think, or allegiances, or lack of trust, I would say that implementing an election process is not going to solve the problem,” Heinz said. “Have we fixed that problem by electing assembly members? We have the same problem at the assembly level. This will cause problems without fixing the actual issue.”

Heinz said the appointment process provides necessary checks and balances to the system.

Currently, the commission reviews applications and holds an internal election to recommend new members for appointment by the Mayor and approval by the assembly.

All Haines Borough advisory boards are appointed bodies. Petersburg is the only community in Southeast that elects their planning commission members. Haines assembly members in the past have discussed making boards elected but haven’t taken action.

Morphet’s application included 10 sponsors who will now have to garner 250 signatures to get the question on the October ballot. The sponsors include Patti Kermoian, Burl Sheldon, Gershon Cohen, Jim Stanford, Sara Chapell, Becky Nash, Richard Buck, Heather Lende and Jim Green.