Anchorage's revised Chugach access board plan would seat two road board veterans

A rewritten ordinance from Assembly Chair Anna Brawley and Vice Chair Daniel Volland, on the Anchorage Assembly's agenda for Tuesday, Oct. 20, would create a seven-member board to advise on Chugach State Park access projects. Two seats would be reserved for people with road board experience in neighborhoods bordering the park.

The mayor would appoint the members and the Assembly would confirm them. The board could review projects and make recommendations, but it would have no land use authority.

Voters approved the Chugach State Park Access Service Area, or CASA, on April 4, 2023, with 59.68% support. Its projects must be near the park and used for access, but its taxing boundaries cover the entire Anchorage Bowl and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson. It has no board of its own; municipal departments provide its services directly, according to the ordinance.

Under the substitute ordinance, one seat requires expertise in trail and recreation amenity design and another in project management, transportation or civil engineering. Four go to community members who have recreated in the park over the past five years and know multiple access points firsthand. The park superintendent serves ex officio.

Two of the community seats go to residents of the Anchorage Roads and Drainage Service Area. The July 7 version let the other two go to anyone living in a limited or rural road service area inside CASA. The new version limits them to people who serve now, or served within the last 10 years, on the board of supervisors of a road service area bordering the park.

The change followed requests from neighborhood groups. The Basher Community Council voted 23-0 on Sept. 10 to oppose the original ordinance unless changed; its resolution sought a seat for someone with road board experience in an area with park access points. Nancy Pease, speaking for the Rabbit Creek Community Council on Aug. 4, said the council supported a board but wanted a majority of members with firsthand knowledge of park access issues.

The board would review CASA's capital improvement program and budget each year, including maintenance needs, hold public hearings before sending recommendations and file an annual report.

The city would consult road service area boards before listing a project, before construction and during upkeep, and give them an official estimate of lifetime maintenance costs. CASA money could not replace funding other service areas provide for existing service levels. A September work session left the question of who pays for upkeep unresolved.

The CASA capital improvement plan is scheduled for adoption with the 2027 budget on Nov. 17, according to the work session presentation.