The borough assembly Tuesday unanimously confirmed the Haines Borough Planning Commission’s recommendation to rezone all heavy-industrial land at Jones Point to industrial-light commercial. The next step to rezone the land is for the borough to draft an ordinance, which would then be considered by the assembly in two public hearings before passage.

The planning commission voted unanimously in June to recommend rezoning the land to light industrial. The commission’s recommendation followed its rejection of the Takshanuk Watershed Council and Professional Property Management’s December application to rezone 61 acres of land in the area to rural mixed use. The commission settled on light industrial as a compromise to allow the community recreation, research and conservation uses proposed by PPM and TWC as well as any future industrial use.

The assembly also confirmed the commission’s rejection of TWC and PPM’s application for mixed use.

Some of the land up for rezoning includes a contaminated site at Jones Point owned by the watershed council. The council is in the final stages of soil remediation, director Meredith Pochardt told the assembly. The council took over ownership and remediation of the land in 2015. She said the council has created a plan for remediation which includes applying to a brownfields funding grant from the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation.

The council purchased the land from the Native village corporation of Klukwan, which had moved contaminated soil to the site from a former oil products storage tank farm.

Assembly member Brenda Josephson said she voted in favor of the recommendation for light industrial because she believes in supporting the planning commission. However, she raised several concerns about the site, including the watershed council’s reliance on state grant funding for soil remediation and the planning commission’s hesitations about rezoning the site.

Assembly member Tom Morphet said heavy-industrial zoning does not allow allow for the proposed mixed use and recreation development. “We handcuffed ourselves into bad code and I’m going to vote for this because it’s our only way out.” Light-industrial zoning does allow for such land uses.

Assembly member Heather Lende said the rezone was a creative decision and a good compromise, and that the ongoing cleanup issues were not in the assembly’s jurisdiction. “It’s not the assembly’s jurisdiction to look over that. It’s a zoning issue and it’s one we should support.”