Kenai proposes dropping park designation from Ahlstrom Park to free land for housing

Kenai's Parks & Recreation Commission will decide Nov. 5 whether to recommend removing the public purpose designation from Carl F. Ahlstrom Park, a 2.32-acre city parcel between Iliamna Road and Spur Drive. The designation reserves the land for parks and recreation. Removing it would let the city dispose of the land, which a draft ordinance says could help reconfigure surrounding lots for housing.

The city took the parcel through tax and special assessment foreclosure. A 2004 ordinance kept it for parks and recreation, but the city's 2022 Land Management Plan later recommended disposing of it. Planning Director Kevin Buettner wrote in an Oct. 26 memo, sent through Parks and Recreation Director Tyler Best, that those two designations conflict, because city code sets out how city land is leased or sold.

The memo says the city's first Parks and Recreation Master Plan, adopted in June, did not recommend a park in that area. The parcel is zoned Suburban Residential. Buettner wrote that removing the designation could help the city reconfigure and subdivide the existing Ahlstrom subdivision lots into a more marketable layout, encouraging residential development and expanding opportunities for future housing.

The administration points to another city parcel, between the Mommsens and Kenai Meadows subdivisions along the Redoubt Avenue corridor, as a potential park site instead. Buettner's presentation says that land was first meant for a community well, but the area is now served by water and sewer mains, and a park there would be more central to nearby homes. The 2022 plan says a 1991 ordinance set that parcel aside for a future park but that it was no longer needed for one, and recommended disposing of part of it.

The request follows a July proposal to strip public purpose status from six other city parcels, which City Council enacted in August. At that time, City Manager Terry Eubank said of those parcels, "we just completed the city's Parks and Rec master plan, and it did not denote those parcels as needed for a public park."

The same night, the commission will consider recommending an update to the Land Management Plan. Buettner's memo says land sales and new borough data had made the 2022 version inaccurate; the update counts 376 city-owned parcels.

The commission's vote on Ahlstrom Park is a recommendation only. The ordinance is scheduled to be introduced at City Council on Nov. 4, and the Planning & Zoning Commission holds its own hearing Nov. 17. The council is scheduled to vote Nov. 18. If enacted, the ordinance would take effect Dec. 17.

Residents may comment at the parks commission meeting, which starts at 6 pm Nov. 5 at Kenai City Hall. Remote participation is available by Zoom.