Haines Borough voters decide five tax and planning measures with no fiscal note

Haines Borough voters will decide Tuesday, Oct. 6, whether to repeal the seasonal sales tax, tax resource exports, add a new alcohol tax, shrink a senior tax break and stop electing the planning commission.

Initiative 3 would replace the 7% summer and 4.5% winter rates with the old year-round rate of 5.5% in the townsite, starting Jan. 1, 2027, and end the winter grocery exemption at SNAP-authorized stores. It would revisit a 2025 vote in which residents narrowly approved the seasonal structure, 573-518. Unnamed petitioners say the seasonal tax raises costs "during the months when many Haines residents recreate, construct, build, and develop projects."

Mayor Tom Morphet urged a no vote, writing that residents who find the summer rate too high can "do your shopping in winter!"

The Assembly's severance tax would tax timber at $5 per thousand board feet and sand, gravel or rock at 15 cents a ton when intended for export or use outside the borough, and would tax mining in the borough at 4.5% of gross production value, for the permanent fund. Other measures include a 2% alcohol sales tax for the general fund, a cut to the senior property tax exemption cap from $300,000 to $200,000, and a return to a mayor-appointed planning commission, reversing a 2023 charter change. Six candidates are running for four elected seats on the same ballot.

The borough has not posted estimates of what the five measures would raise or cost. The record contains no statements from seniors, retailers, resource exporters or named initiative sponsors.

Early voting runs weekdays through Oct. 5.