The Chilkoot Indian Association says it is offering — not asking — to take on ownership of a borough-owned childcare facility.
It’s a distinction that follows pushback on a community childcare working group’s proposal that the local tribal government run the building that currently houses the Haines Senior Center and Chilkat Valley Preschool.
At Tuesday’s borough meeting, tribal administrator Harriet Brouillette said she had been discussing a partnership with the borough on childcare for years with Tom Morphet, whose term as borough mayor ended this week.
“What I told Mr. Morphet was that the Chilkoot Indian Association is more than happy to work with the borough, but we’re not going to beg,” she said.
If the borough doesn’t want to partner, for instance by transferring ownership of the Chilkat Valley Preschool, Brouillette said, the tribe will continue with its own plans.
“We’ll be doing it with the borough or we’ll be doing it on our own, but either way we’ll be doing it and we will be serving everyone in the community who wants to use our facility.”
Childcare has been a much-debated topic over the past year — part of larger conversations about aging demographics and support for young families in the valley.
Many have said local childcare services are too limited, too expensive or both.
All the while, availability has continued to drop, with the Chilkat Valley Preschool abruptly closing at the end of August after it announced it could not fund its program, in part due to low enrollment.
A range of experts and childcare providers in town have held that costs of licensing and staff are higher than what families can fund with tuition. Many have called for subsidies to close that gap — following models already in place in nearby communities like Juneau.
But even after months of discussion on the topic, the assembly hasn’t put forward any durable plan to fund providers beyond a small one-time food subsidy it gave out last year.
Meanwhile, the Chilkoot Indian Association says its plan for subsidized childcare is already in place.
The tribal government appears to have more fiscal flexibility to fund childcare with its $20 million operating budget, roughly half of the borough’s annual spending.
Through grant funding and a partnership with the Central Council of the Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, a regional tribal government, the tribe is midway through a rebuild of the distinctive “yellow building” on Main Street, or Chʼáakʼ, which will house a new childcare facility. Once it’s running, the tribe says it will use federal funds to keep tuition lower than the cost of providing the service, though it hasn’t yet said by how much. Brouillette has emphasized that the childcare facility will be available to both tribal citizens and non-tribal community members.
That would be in addition to potentially taking on responsibility for the Chilkat Valley Preschool building from borough taxpayers.
Since the tribe’s proposal — or offer — to take over the building, other stakeholders have put forward competing proposals.
The Chilkat Valley Preschool, after shutting down its licensed program this fall, is currently running more limited programming, keeping the space open to parents and children but without “traditional staffing,” board member Jessie Wuesthoff told the assembly this month. The preschool also plans to run a summer program next year.
Along with other board members, Wuesthoff has advocated that the assembly maintain ownership of the building, writing in a letter to the assembly that “maintaining CVP’s lease preserves an established, inclusive community resource that is already meeting local needs, rather than risking the loss of that resource during a transition to a different entity.”
At the same time, the senior center housed in the same building, operated by Catholic Community Services, has also put forward a plan to run the whole building. Under that plan, the Chilkat Valley Preschool space would be converted to serve seniors instead of young children, including through use as an internet cafe and recreation area.
Brouillette said Tuesday the tribe already provides funding to Catholic Community Services’ regional operations, and would be willing to direct that funding instead solely to the Haines Senior Center.
Assembly member Mark Smith said Tuesday that he had questioned why the tribe would want to take on a “taxpayer-owned facility,” but said he understood Brouillette’s answer to be that the tribe “didn’t have to.”
Smith, the only assembly member who asked any questions of Brouillette, also asked her if “it is part of your organization’s strategic goals to assume ownership of Tlingit Park and all the buildings there, including the Senior Center.”
Brouillette said “getting land back” was part of the tribal government’s strategic plan, but not any particular parcel, Tlingit Park or otherwise.
She did, however, emphasize the importance of the Tlingit Park parcel, citing a Native burial ground in the park where remains had been disturbed in recent years.
Brouillette used her closing comments at the borough meeting to make a broader point:
“We’re not trying to pull a sneaky thing or anything like that,” she told the assembly. “We’re just trying to help. That’s all we’re trying to do.”
Meanwhile, Morphet used his final comment on the last day of his mayorship to speak to the issue. Much of his three minutes of public comment were spent listing off the names and comments of respondents to his “40 and under survey” of young residents conducted last year — comments that cited affordable childcare as a top need of the younger demographic.
“We are so lucky to have another government in this valley that is offering to help us with a very pressing issue and expensive need,” Morphet said.
The assembly has not taken any action yet on future ownership of the Chilkat Valley Preschool building and has referred the topic to its Government Affairs and Services Committee.
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- Discussed with T+H possible partnership to help fund new preschool facility
- Drawn up building plans, have been edited to comply with regulations for childcare facility
- Employing summer lynch, working on rules and regulations
10/28
- HB: I realize there’s some pushback regarding the CIA taking the building that houses the senior lunch and the CVP. For the last 5 years the CIA has been working on a plan to develop and build a preschool and childcare facility. I realize that childcare is something that’s needed, desperately needed in our community. 5 babies in our office right now in need of childcare.
- Have been speaking with former mayor morphet over past few years about perhaps a collaboration. what i told mr morphet was CIA more than happy to work with the borough but we’re not going to beg. we have money, we have a facility, we can do this, but we can also do it for the community. know there’s a little bit of fear we’re going to exclude people from our facility and that’s absolutely not true.
- met today with representative from T+H who confirmed our plan to use combination of funds tribe eligible for from fed and state gov.
- There are people who say we are grant dependent. some of our programs are, not all of them are. we have come long way in last decade. when i took on this position we were 2.5 million dollars in the hole. today our op budget for 2026 was 20 million dollars. we can do this, obviously. and we’re offering to help.
- we can do it. we’re doing it for ourselves, our facility will be open to the public.
- we’ll be doing it with the borough or we’ll be doing it on our own. but either way we’ll be doing it and we will be serving everyone in the community who wants to use our facility.
- Smith:
- big question why would you want to take over taxpayer owned facility. you kind of answered it: we dont have to.
- HB: million dollar start grant from HUD. “the yellow building” or Ch’aak.
- T+H helping fund it, hiring architect, providing all the chairs desks computers, they’re filling space with equipment. they’re doing that through funding they recieved from fed gov. something CIA also qualifies for “when the time comes we will also be able to collect that money
- funding we collect for our tribal citizens will help lower the cost for any non tribal member that wants to participate in our program. we figured in order to run our program it would probably cost us about 2700 per child per month. but we have ways to leverage funding we’re getting from fed to cover some of that expense. anybody who participates won’t have to pay full 2700.
- Smith: is it part of your orgs strategic goals to assume ownership of tlingit park and all the buildings there including senior center
- HB: it’s not part of our strategic plan, no. getting land back is part of our strategic plan. we don’t have specific parcels named. but I can tell you how important that piece of property is, there are obviously native people who are buried there and over the years the wooden markers have deteriorated and are no longer visible. even in last couple of years as work has been done in that area remains have been disturbed.
- I have a number of skulls in my office waiting to be put back to rest. so yes that piece of property is important to us. We do also provide funding to haines senior lunch program. funding goes directly to southeast senior services catholic community services, so if the need comes we are more than happy to pull that money out of southeast senior services and use it locally. right now it’s divided amongst communities in SE alaska. all we do is collect money and we send it to them.
- Smith: thought catholic community services was assisting with senior center.
- HB: we receive section 106 funding that goes from our bank account directly thru to CCS.
- we’re not trying to pull a sneaky thing or anything like that. we’re just trying to help. that’s all we’re trying to do.
- Morphet: we are so lucky to have another government in this valley that is offering to help us with a very pressing issue and expensive need. there have been questions raised about if childcare is actually needed in this town. addressed in 40 and under survey.
- lists off names and names of under 40 parents and couples, using good amount of his 3 minutes reading down that list of names and comments.
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