Earlier this month we asked you to help shape the Chilkat Valley News’ local election reporting by submitting questions for the candidates. We collected those questions, tossed out a few that were clearly spam, and took nine total directly to the assembly and planning commission candidates.
Assembly candidates answered questions about the Lutak Dock, the future economy of the Chilkat Valley, staffing, the cruise industry and the comprehensive plan.
Editor’s note: The candidates’ answers have been edited for style, grammar, and clarity.
Cindy Zuluaga-Jimenez asked: What are your goals for the future economy of the Chilkat Valley?
Clement: As a Haines Borough Assembly member, it would be my responsibility to represent all Haines residents and further the goals and objectives documented in the borough’s comprehensive plan and Haines Economic Development Corporation plans and white papers.
Dawson: I don’t feel like it’s the local government’s role to dictate what the economy of the Haines Borough is or not, but I do feel that it is our responsibility to provide basic services that support the diversity of economies that exist here and try to plan for what might be possible in the future. So, examples like – when you think of just basic services like internet connectivity, what does that look like now and are we doing what we need to be doing with AP&T and our partners in the region and beyond if Starlink comes in and that’s what everyone is using. Our local providers are going to have to increase rates because they’re going to have fewer customers. What’s that going to look like for people who aren’t using Starlink?
Schnabel: Of course I want a robust economy, but the particular character of that economy will be developed primarily through the rigor of the marketplace. The borough can, through community input, try to guide development, but I think it is a mistake to favor one sector over another. The borough should attempt to set a fair playing field for investment by people with vision and passion.
Smith: My goals are to foster a stable regulatory and permitting environment for the borough, ensuring the consistent enforcement of appropriate rules and policies. Creating a stable and consistent regulatory environment removes uncertainty, allowing for an opportunity to promote entrepreneurship to grow a diverse, year-round economy while also protecting our unique way of life and the environment.
Stickler: It’s vital for a healthy economy that we have a diversified economy. The bounce back from pandemic, COVID-19 years, the bounce back from tourism with our cruise ship visitors and our independent travelers, has been fantastic – so that part of the economy is well on its way back to recovery, but it’s seasonal. What do we have in our community, for year-round employment? In February of 2024, we had over 14% unemployment in our town. That’s amazing, because we have working families who are trying to get bread on the table and we have so many people in our community who are taking these jobs in Juneau or at Kensington and Greens Creek because they have to have a job to provide for their family – but that takes the mom and the dad out of the home for a period of time and how healthy is that?
I would love to see a diversified economy. We live in a vastly rich valley; resource development can be handled responsibly and stewardship of our natural resources doesn’t mean that we just sit and not touch anything. Stewardship says that we go in, we assess what the value is, we make a plan. How can we harvest the value of this product in a responsible way, according to state and national regulations, which are very stringent as far as any kind of timber harvesting or mining activity or anything like that. So there’s the natural resource development part of it, but then there’s also the small business part of it. What are some of the benefits and barriers that we have in our town for small businesses to thrive? Well, one of the main barriers is the high cost of doing business and the high cost of getting freight and a huge one… we don’t have access to child care. So the business owners aren’t able to fill their employment rosters because there’s very little childcare, and so as an assembly, what can we do to address that? Is it possible to propose a property tax incentive, if you do childcare within your home, can you get a break on that? Can there be a tax incentive so that we have more ability to grow the childcare portion, so that people can go and help these small businesses thrive?
Zimmerly: I think the economy of the Chilkat Valley would greatly benefit from more small businesses flourishing, more local food production, more cooperatives, and more habitat and resources for lower income workers who want to call this place their home. We could also restructure how we welcome tourism into Haines so that it is more profitable and beneficial to people who are not directly involved in tourism.
Sheri Loomis asked: Do you support acid rock mining in the Chilkat Valley?
Clement: No.
Dawson: I don’t feel like the borough will have a whole lot of say in whether or not this mine moves forward. There are just powers much larger than ours that will decide that. However, I do feel like it’s the borough’s responsibility to hold space for dialogues and try not to make every single issue in this valley be a proxy for the mine issue.
Schnabel: Well, I certainly have been supportive of mines in the past, our history is mining. But, I think the larger question of whether or not, you know – how does it fit into the whole global system? I need to have that answered. I don’t know that the world needs whatever it is that we’re mining. If the world needs what we’re mining, then yes, you know, I would support it. But for us to just simply engage in it, for the argument that’s often made ‘Oh, we need jobs.’ I don’t think that’s a good reason. Am I concerned about the impacts on fisheries? I certainly acknowledge that there’s that potential. So, I’m not a person, I’m not going to stamp my foot on the ground and say ‘No, absolutely not.’
Smith: Acid runoff occurs naturally worldwide due to rain and snow melt. Industrial agriculture is the biggest man-made cause of acid runoff. There is no mine in Haines Borough nor a possibility of a mine for a decade. The current exploration in the upper Chilkat is heavily regulated at the federal and state levels and the borough assembly has no legal authority or oversight of a potential mine.
Stickler: I think as an assembly, you’re very limited. It’s not the assembly’s job to say there’s no mining in the valley. It’s a business entity, a corporation, which has state and federal regulations, and those state and federal regulations would supersede any local regulations, although we could add to those as if we needed to. But, I believe that it’s the government’s job to stay out of the way of business.
Zimmerly: No.
Sheri Loomis asked: Do you currently support the Lutak Dock encapsulation design or the rip-rap with no bulkhead design?
Clement: As a Haines Borough Assembly member, it would be my responsibility to represent all Haines residents and listen to current residents and follow the goals and objectives listed in the Comprehensive Plan. I do not have a personal preference, yet one design must move forward to meet the needs and provide a safe working environment at the freight dock.
Dawson: As a sitting assembly member, I still don’t feel like I can make a specific design recommendation to the community. However, I hope the assembly will continue the hard work of figuring out what we can afford to build and maintain that is supported by the majority of this community.
Schnabel: If I’m asked, I support encapsulation. I think it’s the best design. We gain nothing by duplicating the roll on-roll off. And, to me, regaining the uplands at the Lutak Dock is an extraordinary thing that we need to do. I mean I grew up on the Lutak Dock – for crying out loud and to me that’s what a dock is.
I … did introduce to the [environmental assessment] an alternative and quite honestly I did that because I perceived that … every time there was a public hearing on the Lutak Dock, there would be anywhere from 30 to 75 people who would come in and speak against the existing design. And, I’m somewhat sensitive to the accusation that a lot of people make ‘You’re not listening to us.’ So, I thought to myself, you know what harm would it be to say ‘OK,you want another design? Let’s put that in the mix.’
Smith: I support a design that meets the needs of the community, is safe, meets environmental requirements and requires no further expenditure of money beyond the MARAD grant.
Stickler: The encapsulation design is the adopted and approved design submitted to permitting agencies and the design-build contractors. Any other design will result in further delays and negation of contracts.
Zimmerly: Rip rap! Encapsulation will be super high maintenance and costly in the long term. Low-tech is better.
Sheri Loomis asked: Do you know how many cruise ship passengers called at the Haines port this year? Do you support more cruise ship passengers? Less or the same? If more, how many total?
Clement: As a Haines Borough Assembly member, it would be my responsibility to represent all Haines residents and listen to those affected by cruise ship traffic, both positive and negative. Based on these sources, I would vote with the majority opinion.
Dawson: I don’t know the number of individuals who came into town, but I have been working with our tourism director to understand more about the needs of the cruise industry, and I do believe that there is a need for this community to decide what is the right-sized cruise ship industry. And, to have that dialogue here as soon as possible because the industry is growing and they’re looking for more ports to put more people, if I’m understanding what I’ve heard from our tourism director correctly. So, I do think it’s important for us to have that conversation as a community. I’ve heard that we’ve had it before, but I think we need to keep having it and say “Okay, this is the per-passenger threshold. This is the per-boat threshold,” whatever we want that to look like.
Schnabel: I would like to see … us put a limitation on the size of ship that we want. And, I’m very concerned, I will voice that at the meeting tomorrow when we talk about the cruise ship survey. I would like to see as many cruise ships as we could get that have less than 1,000 passengers. Those small ships where our tour operators can make a living, where we can satisfy that but we’re not inundated with this huge impact. You know what’s going to happen if we continue to invite cruise ships that have 2,000-3,000 people aboard? People are going to figure out that there’s going to be something to do in Haines, and we’re going to have people buying up the retail businesses – whatever’s left of them – we’re going to have outrageous tours. You know, we’re going to have to step up to the demands that the cruise ship makes because its volume is so big. I also think we could do a much better job of managing the Chilkoot corridor to our advantage. Now it is managed to our disadvantage.
Smith: Final official statistics aren’t available yet, but after my interactions with business owners and tour operators, it appears to have been a healthy cruise season. A healthy and vibrant cruise ship industry is vital to the Haines economy.
Stickler: So I was talking to a couple business owners about this just recently and I said, “How do you feel, as a business owner, about the current level of cruise ship visitors?” And they said, “What we had this year felt comfortable. It felt doable.” And one of the business owners said, “Yeah, if we had more, it would just help my business. But what we have, what we had this year, was comfortable.” And so I think that that’s something that Reba [Hylton] will be looking into with the chamber and [Haines Economic Development Corporation], you know? I think it needs to be healthy and I agree with what we had this year. I loved seeing all the visitors. I just loved them. It brings new life and energy and exuberance into our community. It was very comfortable, but I want to caution us to not put all of our eggs in the tourism basket. We can’t all stand on the pedestal of tourism and say that’s going to pay for what our community needs, because if the pedestal falls over, then where are we?
Zimmerly: Too many. I was out fishing most of the summer to avoid the tourists. That being said, so many folks who I know and love depend on that traffic for their bread and butter. I would support less cruise ship traffic, but there would have to be a compromise between the tour companies taking the hit and the town having less traffic. I don’t have an answer but am willing to explore possibilities if that means taking some of the pressure off town and the ecosystem.
Reba Hylton asked: Do you believe it’s more important for the borough to fill positions quickly, even if the candidate may lack relevant experience, or should the borough prioritize waiting for applicants who have the necessary qualifications and experience for a specific role?
Clement: That’s a tough one that gets to the point of how hard it is these days just to get any help. I wish I was a young person now, because I could pick the job. It wasn’t that way when I was younger. But these days, it’s really a hard job market. I would say probably the interim hire is okay because you need to keep that functionality working. For example, right now we don’t have a planner. And I talked to Alekka [Fullerton] about that. I said, ‘What is the role of the planner with regard to the planning commission?’ Really that role is similar to what the clerk does for the assembly, and the assembly really can’t work without a clerk. So the planning commission is working at a loss right now without a planner. So even if we had a temporary person in there, it would help.
Dawson: The borough should absolutely wait for applicants that have the skills, knowledge and capabilities required of the position. This has come up in discussions around the borough manager replacement. We decided to go with an interim manager because we realized that it’s going to take a while to find a number of candidates, or it could take a while to find a number of candidates that are qualified for that level of position. I think we should approach any of our department lead positions that way – and maybe others in the borough – kind of depending on what the job is, but definitely in those leadership positions, making sure that we’re doing our due diligence to find the people. Hiring is one of the biggest responsibilities of any body of management and the borough assembly manages the manager, who manages everyone else. So that position, and how that position trickles down into hiring those other positions is super important.
Schnabel: The latter, even though I did not always behave that way.
Smith: We would benefit both short and long term by completing an appropriate hiring process to ensure the best qualified applicants are recruited and retained. This will be challenging given our reputation for high turnover in upper management positions (manager, clerk, two police chiefs, public works and planning directors—all in the last 2 years). To better understand this, a comprehensive assessment of the organizational culture must be accomplished.
Stickler: The fiscally responsible thing to do, as tough as it is, is to wait for the right person because the amount of money you spend in the hiring process, in getting somebody moved here, getting them trained up – and not just trained in their job responsibilities, but trained in how Haines works. If we could, if we would have taken more time, we could – indulge me a little bit – I mean, Haines is beautiful place to live. It’s a beautiful place. It’s a beautiful community. It’s a diversified community, but that diversification is our strength. That is our strength, and so as hard as it is, we have got to hire the just-right person for that just-right job, and I believe that just-right person is out there. So what does that mean we do in the meantime? Well, it’s going to be all-hands-on-deck. We’re all going to have to work more, display more grace toward one another, and recruit in a fashion that draws qualified candidates and increases the interest for the positions here in Haines. Recruitment and retention in this community – whether it’s at the school or in working for the borough – is very challenging, because we just do not have the economic base to make it an attractive recruitment in terms of your salary package.
Zimmerly: I think there is a reasonable window of time to allow job applicants to submit their applications, but also the necessary fact that the tasks at hand need to be completed by competent and qualified individuals. I think it would be irresponsible for the borough to hastily fill a position with unqualified individuals. However under extraneous circumstances, I could see that hiring a slightly under-qualified individual who had the propensity and willingness to learn might be appropriate.
Katherine Lee asked: How important is it to keep young families in Haines? The cost of living is so high, how do you feel you can help support them? They shouldn’t feel the need to fight for the support of local government.
Clement: This question gets to the heart of why I am running for a seat on the assembly. I will promote full-time, year-round jobs that pay well so that families can afford to live in this high-priced town. I am open to residents’ ideas, and if an idea has a good track record in similar communities, I will support these. I do not pretend to have the answer to this; Southeast Conference has many ideas which are being “test driven” in other Southeast communities. This is very worthy of further investigation and planning.
Dawson: It’s super important to provide the baseline services to all of our residents, working families, elders and everyone in between who wants to stay here. But, again, there are many things out of the borough’s control. Where I do feel like the borough can assist people is in trying to understand, maybe not directly fund, but try to understand the basic needs that people have so they can be here. So for me, that looks like housing, right? People need a place to live. They need a habitat, childcare services – again whether or not the borough can actually support those is another question. But how can we create an environment where childcare services can thrive? Supporting our schools, K-12, because that’s another age at which people may choose to stay or not stay in a community based on what’s available for education, for sports and extracurriculars, college prep, all of those things. And then transportation needs, right? If the ferry – and again, a lot of this is out of our hands – but to what extent can we engage in the dialogues happening to support those services at the state level? Thinking about what those basic services are and how we can make sure they’re available to people, and that the outlook is good, because if people keep hearing ‘Oh, the ferries may or may not run next year, and they’re thinking about moving to town, then they might not choose to live here, because half the year it’s really hard to get out by anything other than ferry if we have a long stretch of inclement weather. So, I think it’s definitely important to try to create an environment where people can come here, raise families here, and grow old here.
Schnabel: That’s a good question. I am very interested in the changing demographic in this community and I would like to pay more attention to what we can do to ensure that we have a balanced and healthy community. In other words, not simply a community of retirees which we’re sort of moving towards that definition. It is very important to me [to keep young families in Haines]. And I should say this, young professional families is one thing I’d also like to stay. I would like to have young people come into the community that are dependent on the community to function. We have institutions right now that can’t function because we don’t have good people. Our schools are hiring from different nations. We don’t have a labor force. We don’t have a flexible, viable labor force. So if that dovetails with the question of young families, I’m very interested in what young families bring to the community, what they need in the community, and to know how we can keep them here.
Smith: It is vitally important to attract and keep young families in Haines. The best way to support their ability to live in Haines is by creating a stable regulatory environment for the business community. Encouraging stability in the business sector will foster entrepreneurship and create opportunities for gainful employment, thereby enabling residents to sustain themselves with living wages. We must also promote fiscal responsibility and policies that do not have unintended consequences, which could lead to increasing the cost of housing and other living expenses in Haines Borough.
Stickler: This is not part of my platform, but I’m willing to have the conversation. There has been an idea floated in this community for a number of years of, how do we increase our tax revenues but spread it out more now that we have our visitor industry coming back? I’m not talking about a head tax or a bed tax or anything like that, but what if we had like a two-cent fuel tax? Not heating fuel, gas and diesel. Then we could benefit from these big rigs, from our independent travelers coming through, the cruise ships coming through. We could benefit from that and I’m willing to have that conversation if that income that’s garnered is earmarked for roads. So that would alleviate some of the pressure in the general budget for road maintenance, and then what does that look like for the cost of living in our town.
Is that something that could be addressed? There was talk in the past about building another sales tax structure. I think we should keep it as simple and straightforward as we can. But, is there a way to create tax breaks for local residents year round? Especially in the winter, I mean, heating fuel is high, cost of living is high, unemployment is almost 15% in the winter. It’s hard.
Zimmerly: It seems very important to keep young families in Haines. The cost of living is high but encouraging community projects and a thriving local economy might make that more manageable. Ensuring that the school has funding and adequate programming to encourage environmental and engineering education might keep younger folks invested in staying in the Chilkat Valley long term.
David Thomas asked: What is your view of the assembly’s responsibility to follow the comprehensive plan 2035 report findings released this past June informing decisions made by the assembly.
Clement: I wanted to be a part of the planning commission two years ago because I saw that a new 10-year plan was coming up, and I wanted to ensure that it was a fair representation of the desires of Haines residents. While on the commission from October of 2022 through October of 2023, I paid particular attention to this effort because it is the single chance to formally document these needs as Haines residents describe them. Now that the project is complete, we need to follow through by hiring a borough planner and task that person with creating a plan to implement these ideas. With good leadership, mentoring and training, this could define short-term and long-term objectives. I strongly believe that the assembly should follow the comprehensive plan.
Dawson: Plans are helpful guides in understanding how to prioritize new and existing projects, in particular with evaluating the annual CIP list and CAPSIS requests that go to the state legislature.
Schnabel: The comprehensive plan is a guide. It is an assembly member’s responsibility to know the content, to appreciate how the content was developed, and to default to its recommendations when faced with issues addressed.
Smith: The comp plan, formulated with public input, is guidance. As guidance, it should always be considered when making decisions. The comp plan is not a requirement but represents an important component of any decisions made by the assembly.
Stickler: The Haines Borough Comprehensive Plan 2035 is extremely useful in advising public policy makers. It contains relevant data concerning the current state of our borough and projecting future trends if the status quo is maintained. It is not a collection of directives, but offers suggestions on areas of concern while allowing space to develop concrete plans.
Zimmerly: I am not yet super familiar with the comprehensive plan, but I imagine that like most long-term plans it can be a framework to guide how certain decisions get made. I think we will have to approach any plans or decisions with nuance and compassion under shifting circumstances and emergent community agendas.
David Thomas asked: What is the criteria, in your opinion, for a decision to be brought to a public vote?
Clement: Special elections cost over $10,000. That’s money coming straight from Haines taxpayers, so I have a high bar when it comes to promoting a special election. We have annual elections, and with planning, we should be able to add topics to the general election. I would caution to ask voters only those topics that the Haines Borough can truly affect, and avoid questions that have a broader scope than the Haines charter and code.
Dawson: I believe we should require bonding on large, physical infrastructure projects – perhaps anything over $5M in estimated costs. This would require a vote of the people. I believe that to have a successful vote, we would also want to ensure that the public is well informed about what they will be voting on.
Schnabel: A measure of an issue’s complexity…when the solution to an issue would carry the borough into an unknown or an obviously different direction than the current path, it is probably a good idea to bring the issue to a public vote.
Smith: I’m comfortable with current codified criteria in borough code/charter for issues requiring a public vote.
Stickler: If a proposition or petition acquires the necessary signatures and is certified by the borough clerk 42-75 days before an election, it will be placed on the ballot. This is the best avenue for bringing items to a public vote, because it originates with community members. The assembly can bring items to a public vote if the decision impacts the community on a wide-scale basis and if its authority is not already addressed in the borough charter and in borough code.
Zimmerly: Large infrastructure expenditures that will inevitably [burden] taxpayers should be decided by the taxpayers. Likewise, uses of public lands that will impact the people using those spaces should also be brought to a vote when the individuals benefiting from the use of said lands are a smaller party than those that may potentially benefit, such as forest resources or impacts to fisheries and waterways.
Eric Holle asked: Given the history of mine failures in Yukon and elsewhere in recent years, both economic and environmental, how should the borough evaluate the long-term costs and benefits of large-scale extractive industries to our local community and environment?
Clement: The borough should work closely with State of Alaska agencies (Department of Natural Resources and Department of Environmental Conservation, and others) to anticipate the possible effect of mining, as other Alaskan communities have done over the years. Following state law, these agencies are charged with oversight and monitoring of mining activities. At this time, there will be five more years (after 16 years) of exploration at the Palmer Prospect. Presently, there are many possible outcomes – from an operating mine to no mine at all. The Haines Borough should have a plan in place to address all possible outcomes of the exploration. All Haines residents should pay attention to this exploration and consider the positive and negative impact on the infrastructure maintained by the borough.
Dawson: We should consider what, if any, influence the borough has over these issues, make sure the borough can benefit while not assuming long term costs, and try not to allow these issues to drive every single decision making process we do together as a borough.
Schnabel: I would like to see us continue rigorous debate about what is most important to us. I believe that the purpose of industry is to manufacture a product that people need in a way that does no harm. There will always be impacts. I do not support “large scale” anything, nor do I champion industry for the sake of jobs.
Smith: These mine failures are unfortunate and disturbing. The current exploration in the Chilkat Valley is managed at the state and federal levels. Although this is a deeply controversial issue/topic, the Haines Borough Assembly and borough have no legal authority or oversight of this project.
Stickler: The borough assembly has little authority in approving or disapproving “large-scale extractive industries” because they will mostly operate on state and federal lands. As such, they are required to follow governmental requirements and guidelines. Borough zoning regulates business on borough land.
Zimmerly: I think we need to be extremely austere in allowing mining projects to go forward in this valley. We live in a wildly active geological area that is prone to incredible seasonal variability, which makes any kind of mitigation planning almost impossible and extremely risky. Mining – and other extractive industries – are not inherently destructive or polluting processes, but under the wrong conditions they are both. We need to be aware of the long-term consequences we may be facing as a community, and also be held responsible as potentially destructive forces in a richly biodiverse and pristine wilderness