A Hillside road area may spend far more than planned after erosion damage

A small Hillside neighborhood that taxes itself to maintain its own roads may have to spend far more than it budgeted this year, after heavy ice buildup and spring runoff caused what the city calls significant erosion. The SRW Homeowner's Limited Road Service Area is asking the Anchorage Assembly to roughly quadruple what it can spend on repairs — raising the ceiling on its road-maintenance contract from about $21,000 a year to nearly $99,000.

The extra money would pay Snowline Alaska for as-needed repair work under an existing contract; the city attributes the damage to "an unanticipated level of ice accumulation and spring runoff." A separate request would draw another $15,000 from the service area's savings toward this year's maintenance.

This isn't the first time the strain has come up. On the Hillside, small neighborhoods tax themselves to keep up their own roads, and advocates — including the Anchorage Park Foundation — argue those small tax bases can't absorb the heavy wear that park traffic brings. Alaska News has covered similar requests from other Hillside road areas this summer, including one for Rabbit Creek View and Heights.