Anchorage Assembly: Neighborhood Nerd Nite: The Future is on Tap

Several of our folks that are just started the paramedic program here in August, we have 6 that are in the paramedic program as well as teaching our own in-house advanced EMT course. So we are continually training our folks to the highest level they can in the state of Alaska to provide continuous advanced life support service for our folks in Chugiak. Chugiak is a pretty big area. It's 50 square miles. It goes from the North Eagle River exit all the way to the Knik River Bridge and over to the ocean to the top of the Chugiak Chugiak Mountains.

14,000 Residents call Chugiak home and about 60,000 folks drive the Glenn Highway corridor every day going back and forth to work. We provide fire and EMS protection for Chugiak out of 5 stations. One of them is over by the Fred Meyer just up the old Glenn. The main station where the members have sleeping quarters and living quarters is the fire station across from the bus barn in the old glen. Another station is by the North Peters Creek exit off Settlers.

There's a station at the Birchwood Airport and the one off of the Birchwood Loop off of Inlet Vista. So from those 5 stations, we provide fire and EMS service for the Chugach area.

We do a little bit of everything— fire suppression, emergency medical services, fire prevention, public education, and wildfire. We don't think about that so much in Chugiak, but our crews deploy every year in support of firefighting operations throughout the state. This year we went to Tok along with the strike force with the Anchorage Fire Department and Girdwood. The year before that we were in Healy. The year before that we were in the Kenai Peninsula.

So we are helping our neighbors to the north and south with our folks.

So the question is, where do we get our money? With an all-volunteer department, we are funded through the real estate personal property taxes. In the Chugiak Fire Service area, the mill rate is 1%. As well as we're funded through Anchorage Areawide EMS at all 3 departments, Girdwood and Anchorage and Chugiak get a portion of that pie. And our nonprofit company funds and donations goes to our department to help run it.

The problem is there isn't enough of that funding, and here's why.

Our department has about— collects about $1.7 million in revenue after the city takes their cut for intergovernmental charges from dispatch to apparatus maintenance to to data systems, it leaves us a significantly less amount of money to run our department. The problem is these days is that pretty red fire truck you see rolling down the road now costs $1.2 to $1.5 million. So if you take that price of a fire truck and you— we only collect around $1 million or so, there isn't enough money to go around to buy a new fire truck and put gas in the fire truck. If anybody drives a diesel truck, you can feel my pain with how much diesel is right now. With all our fire trucks having diesel, it creates a problem for us.

So our proposal here is that we need to raise the mill rate in the Chugiak Fire Service Area to buy fire trucks, to put fuel in the trucks, all those things. So an example here, if you had $250,000 $250,000 worth of assessed property. Now I realize you can't buy a home in Chugiak for $250,000, but imagine with me.

If we went to 1.5, that would— your annual property tax for the Chugiak Fire Service area would be $375. That's still a pretty good deal compared to our brothers in the Anchorage Fire Department area that you're paying 2.27 there.

We've been around since 2000. We haven't raised the mill rate since 2005. So it's been a long, long time that we've asked the community to chip in a little more money to help us run calls and provide service. The demand's still there. It's jumped 27%.

If the word Powder Reserve is new to you, you should look that up. That's a lot of houses coming to the Chugiak area. We're going to need more help, more people, more fire trucks, more stations to help cover that.

The National Fire Protection Association says you really shouldn't be driving around fire trucks that are older than 15 years old. These are some of our trucks that are much older than 15 years old. And if I wanted to buy each one of those trucks at $1.2 to $1.5 million, you can see very quickly I don't have enough money to do that.

We, we, uh, The goal here isn't to expand our services per se. The goal is just keep what we have, right? We're a volunteer department, so we're not paying salaries for those folks. Our goal here is just to continue to provide services at the level that it is now. We've got a long-standing history of strict financial stewardship.

We've never wasted money. We never bonded. We haven't asked for money before, so it's— I think it's time. So by leveraging all these services with the city, with maintenance and IT and stuff, we're able to do it a little cheaper than if we had to do all that ourselves.

So in conclusion, it's that our goal is not to expand our services, just to keep what we got. To continue to provide service into the future. And we are hoping that the people who live in the Chugach Fire Service area in the spring will support our initiative to bring more money in the door so we can keep putting gas in trucks. Thank you. Thank you, Chief Dalton.

So we're going to take a 10-minute Intermission here. We'll come back, but grab another pint. There's pizza at the food truck outside, and everyone get to know your neighbors. Thank you.

How's everybody doing?

Alright!

Well, it's an honor to be here at Centennial Hall. Working for K2. I want to give a really, uh, great thanks to our star producer Grace Elliott over there by the door putting the show together, and the whole staff of K2— Jamie Waste, Jeff Brown, Carol, Katie Hiltz. And can I hear it one time for Fort James playing the bass.

And how about for Alan Wicks on the drums?

And Mr. Steve Nelson on the keys playing for you.

My name is Justin Smith, and we got Doc Washington in the house all the way here from Phoenix to sing for you. Hey, stick around folks, cuz we're playing all night.

Thank you. So this next presentation is going to be about the invisible systems of Eagle River, what really brings your pint to life. So if you grabbed a drink I think it's a hands-on presentation, and so Karen's gonna come up and present. Thank you.

Woo-hoo!

All right. Welcome everybody again to Nerd Night. It's been fun so far. So far, so I've got exactly 7 minutes to convince you that your Friday night beer at happy hour is actually a high-stakes, subarctic maritime conspiracy involving cargo ships, brewers, and two words: baby goats.

Okay, maybe not the conspiracy theory part, but it just sounded really cool. So my name is Karen, and I'm just a naturally curious person about how things get from point A to point B. I'm a little bit of a supply chain geek. So, you know, big thing to be a geek about, but you could say. And when you hear the term supply chain, you probably think of pallets and forklifts and trucks. My brain sees a web, a network, you could say.

So I'm about to show you how a supply chain is an invisible system built by human relationships and trust.

And of course, since we're at Odd Man Rush, what better thing to talk about than beer, am I right? So let's take a look at what many of you are holding right now, a pint of Odd Man Rush's Enforcer IPA. It looks simple, it's cold, it's hops-forward, it's delicious. But looking at a pint of beer and without reflecting on what it took to get it here is like looking at a light switch without thinking about the power grid behind it. That single glass is the final output of a massive, fragile, multi-state, sub-Arctic logistics coordination effort.

And look, we're just talking about the Enforcer IPA. Don't get me started on OMR's Mile High Hefeweizen because I can go down a rabbit hole on German wheat logistics and we would be in this corporate hostile training moment here. But moving on. So the Enforcer IPA, it's a 10-barrel batch of Enforcer the guys here have to assemble over 700 pounds of grain, or even for a double patch, up to 1,500 pounds, along with 4 varieties of hops: Columbus, Simcoe, Cascade, and Amarillo. Now, the only ingredient in your beer here today is water from Eagle River.

Everything else, absolutely every other ingredient, had to either fly over or cross an ocean to get here to make this brewery magic happen.

Sorry, my fingers are not working. Okay, this really is not working well. There we go. Alright, so Alaska doesn't grow commercial brewery barley or commercial hops in bulk, so Odd Man Rush works through distributors and suppliers that aggregate grain and specialty hops from across the country in the lower 48. From warehouses in Washington, these pallets get loaded onto a barge or a container ship in the Puget Sound.

They ride the ocean for days through the Gulf of Alaska weather, hit the docks at the Port of Alaska, get cleared, and then trucked up the Glenn Highway to Eagle River. Now, if you run a brewery in Seattle or even in Oregon and your grain is late, you know, it's a phone call and the next day or the day after that. You can just get mad at Amazon Prime maybe of why your delivery wasn't here. But up here in Alaska, 2-week minimum. And that's if the weather cooperates.

Don't get me started on that. All right. So your grain is literally riding a floating metal football field across the glass of the Gulf of Alaska while a captain named Bjorn questions every life choice that got them there to the front of that bridge. So it's not just inventory management, it's really hypervigilant operational forecasting. The cans, the can labels, the malt, the findings, every physical component required somebody weeks ago to anticipate tonight's thirst.

All right. So the touchpoint web. Here is where my brain really starts to light up. I want you to think about before the beer ever touched the tap handle, think about how many people had to do their jobs right just so the chain didn't break. A farmer in the Midwest monitoring the weather forecast and crops to determine the precise day to harvest.

A cycle counter in an Auburn warehouse verifying inventory counts. A crane operator stacking containers at the docks. Our barge captain Bjorn navigating a storm while having an existential crisis. Maybe a longshoreman at the Alaska port unloading cargo into Anchorage. And then finally the delivery driver backing up to the roll-up door out back.

And then finally, finally the ingredients are here. That reach Odd Man Rush. Where this isn't a massive corporate department, the three founders, Brian, Reed, and Ross, do the brewing, the prowl out wrestling, the recipe scaling, the marketing, the cleaning, the maintenance, and they actually even do the keg deliveries to the local taps themselves. So a supply chain isn't steel containers and trucks, it's a relay race of trust between dozens of working hands, and now I promised you all baby goats at the beginning of this column. By golly, let's— let me tell you how we could get this into this story.

So what happens after the beer is brewed? Now most people assume the supply chain stops when the pint is poured, but every batch leaves right about 700 pounds of heavy, wet, steaming spent grain. Now if we toss that into a dumpster and then it makes its way to our local landfill, fill. No, Kelly, no! And then Kelly has to deal with the off-gassing of the methane at the dump.

But in a small town, you don't have to call waste management. You lean into your human network.

Enter the tiny homestead right up the road in Shugiak. So instead of hauling spent grain off to the dump in Eagle River, Farmer Tony pulls up, loads it while it's still warm, and takes it home. Now, the tiny homestead— the grain directly powers a herd of 30 to 40 Nigerian Dwarf and Mini Alpine goats. The brewery just cuts disposal costs to zero, the goats get nutrient-dense feed, and the community gets raw milk and cheese across herd share stretching from Chugiak down to East Anchorage. So that's what a closed-loop system looks like on the ground.

No waste, mutual benefit. And we're gonna take it a step farther. So has anybody gone to the Alaska State Fair this year? Raise a hand. All right, I think it's sacrilegious if you don't and live in the area, like if you don't go to the fair.

But anyways, the State Fair, the system keeps going. If any of you were at the Alaska State Fair in Palmer, you might have seen a booth called Goats and Giggles. Sound familiar? It's a petting booth that's run by the family behind the tiny homestead, and you or your kids might have patted a little tiny goat on the head. So connect the dots with me quickly.

The baby goat that you pet in Palmer was powered by some of the spent grain from the beer brewed right here behind this wall. So when you buy a pint of Enforcer IPA, your purchase supports an Eagle River brewery, which supports maritime freight workers, which supports hop growers in Washington and the Midwest, which creates spent grain that feeds the Nigerian dwarf goats in Chugiak, which brings joy to thousands of families at the state fair. And if you can tell me another business model where your Friday night happy hour directly subsidizes baby goat giggles and goat yoga at Bear Paw, I don't know what else to tell you.

So, the next time you step up to the bar, grab a can from the cooler, or take a sip of beer, take a second to look past the foam. Remember the maritime barges battling those 30-foot swells in the Gulf of Alaska. Remember the longshoremen on the anchorage docks in 20-below winds. Remember the 3 guys shoveling hundreds of pounds of steaming wet grain by hand and the homestead goats eating breakfast tomorrow morning. But this isn't just true for beer.

It's the coffee you grabbed at your favorite coffee hut this morning. The gear at the volunteer fire department down the street, the textbooks in our schools, the groceries on our shelves, and the supplies for the small businesses lining the Glen. None of this happens by accident in a subarctic town at the end of a maritime highway. It happens because people communicate, people solve bottlenecks, and show up for each other every single day. The systems that keep Eagle River running are invisible, but they're entirely human.

And then once you learn to see him, you really can't unsee him. So if everybody can raise a glass of whatever you have, I just want to say to the brewers of Odd Man Rush, our community, and the baby freaking goats, cheers! Thanks everybody.

Thank you, Karen. So our next presentation is going to be Melissa. Who is going to talk about "From Avocado Bathtubs to $500,000 Homes: What's Next for Eagle River?" Thank you.

Okay, I'm going to need to hold all things, so— okay, all right, how do I go?

That's me, I'm a real estate nerd.

I was peer pressured to be here by Kristen. Thank you. I do believe who you surround you with is very important. I'm Melissa Flint. I'm a realtor with Century 21 here in Eagle River and a proud member and board member of SERWEB.

And I'm really nervous. So, all right, so Real estate. Nobody talks about it, right? Nobody. All right.

So am I going the wrong way? I am. Okay. All right. So notes, you cannot go away.

Okay. So tonight we're really looking at what's next for Eagle River, the future of Eagle River. But before we can do that, we need to look back, see where we're at today. And what is possible for the future and what is important about that. So— and I'm going the wrong way again.

Okay. So show of hands, would you keep it? Raise your hand for yes. It does come with a matching sink.

ChatGPT actually made the tub smaller, which made me sad. And no matter what, prompt I gave it, it would not keep it the same size. But literally the tub matched the sink. I was like, am I in the sink? Am I in the tub?

You can't tell. All right, so, uh, some, some, uh, trends should probably be left in the past, but I did actually really like this. The wallpaper was kind of fabulous with it.

All right, so, um, the Alaska MLS This data is pulled from there. The furthest back that we could go was 1994. I felt like the very best, uh, uh, stat to look at would be median home prices because there's always going to be some that are a little lower or some that's like some just kind of out of whack one. But if you go by median, we get a really good picture. And I would have loved to go back to like 1980, so we could look at some of those trends.

But so, um, we're gonna look at some of the fun trends that we saw during these times. We're also going to talk about the prices. So 1994, did anybody buy a house in 1994 here? Nice work, good job. You have an equity position right now, I would say.

All right, so $143,000 $250,000. I mean, this, it just keeps going up and up. In 2020, we, we just had like an anomaly of things happen, but even with 2020, you can see that it's still like, it felt so big, but it's just this, yeah. So 3.5 times higher, 256%. Now you can look at stats and people will say, oh, you can make the stats say or do whatever you want it to.

These are pulled just from the Alaska MLS, and I wanted to add— okay, so this, this is the big one.

All right, all right, sorry about that. Um, it didn't happen in a straight line, it kind of all happened in this almost perfectly linear movement. So when we look to the future, we're going to pay attention to that as well. Okay, so, ah, all right. So who likes— so you have a 256% increase on your home.

Congratulations. All right. So in the '90s, Honey Oak, Brass, hunter green wallpaper. We were very committed to wallpaper, and there are a lot of homes that still have it. If you have it, I apologize, but it is not highly desirable in this market.

All right, so in the 2000s, $172,000, Tuscan vibes, travertine floors. Cherry cabinets. Every show on HGTV was travertine floors. Every show. All right, and you know, we still have this look.

It's not bad. The 2010s— gray everything, clean lines, open spaces, jetted tubs. Also, I hate to tell you, jetted tubs are kind of out. They kind of gross people out. But if you have a jetted tub and you love it, there's no judgment.

It's just not as desirable as it used to be. All right, the 2020s, $442,000. Okay, so I actually bought a house in Eagle River in 2020. That's when I moved here, and the house that I bought was about $370,000. Today it's worth at least $450,000.

So we're just— we're comfort and connection, warmer. In 2020, can we all agree that our homes became the most important asset that we had? Like, you wanted spaces that you could come together, you wanted spaces where you could separate. So that is what came from 2020. And so when you look at our property descriptions today, almost all of them them like space to come together, space to be apart, you know, all the things.

So today, uh, and this is from last month, um, they will vary a bit here and there. Um, like this next month it might actually go down a little bit because we had this little 7% increase or interest rate that happened in the past week. So $510,000 year to date. We have a lot of the same warm woods, functional spaces, outdoor living. You know, it's all about bringing the outdoors in, in Alaska, and all of those things.

But so, $510,000, isn't that crazy? Congratulations back there, person at Botten. All right, so, so one of the questions that I got when we did our our, um, we did our, uh, rehearsal. Yes, she can read my mind. Was so like, how does Eagle River compare to Matsu or Anchorage?

And Eagle River, it used to be the more affordable place to live. It used to be cheaper to live here. But last year, 2025 to this year, year over year, you can see that I mean, all of them saw great increases. I don't know if your, your investments increased at that percentage, but our homes have just been insane and we don't see any reason why this would change moving forward. So we are officially more expensive than Anchorage.

Okay, so last year, if you bought a house, $560,000. This year, $629,000.

All right, so does that scare you or excite you?

I see both sides.

All right, so what happens next? I don't have a crystal ball. I feel like I tell my clients all the time, I don't know, I don't have a crystal ball, but this is the This is what I've seen when I'm in the market with buyers and sellers. If we look at Fannie Mae and we just do these very like, I mean, just like 1%, 3%, 5%, the percentages that we saw were quite a bit bigger. This is on a national level.

Alaska is not normal. It's never been normal. And that's why we love it, right? So at But even this very smallest 1% increase, you can see that living in Eagle River is a great investment, right?

So, but what actually makes a place more valuable? We talk about interest rates. I talked about interest rates a lot today. It was really nerdy and kind of fun and exciting and scary. I'd love to talk about interest rates with any of you.

Not a lender. Supply, jobs, population, new construction. One thing I'd love to put up here is infrastructure. How do we maintain this without becoming undesirable? All right.

And the most important The most important thing to me about Eagle River is, besides all of these things, because they're gonna choose to live somewhere, is desirability. We have beautiful surroundings. I mean, the mountains are in our literal backyard. The river, the nature center. I'm excited to go on that field trip to the landfill.

I can't wait. Both me and my friend said we're going. Our schools are amazing, our sports are amazing, outdoor living, a welcoming community, it all adds up, and I think that's why we have become more expensive than other places to live. And this is why. We shop local, on Man Rush, we have traditions like the Bear Paw Festival and our holiday tree lighting, we have community community events.

We just had Trick-or-Treat in the Heat. We have two communities that do that here. My community is Eagle Ridge, and we did 600 wristbands, and Eagle Point did 600 as well. So that's 1,200 kids. That's $15 a bracelet, and it all goes for childhood cancer and helping families dealing with that.

We have the Nature Center and the Eagle River I mean, it's just who wouldn't want to live here, right? And then we have Nerd Night. We are so excited to have Nerd Night here and we want it back again, just FYI. Right? Yeah.

So the future value of Eagle River isn't just something that happens to us. We help create it. We show up. I think we have 81 people here or something like that. It's insane.

All right, support local. We have this many people here. We want to support our local businesses. The supply chains are not invisible to us anymore. We volunteer.

We give our time and make a difference. I love volunteering with Eagle River Women in Business. It's one of my favorite things to do. Know your neighbors. Trick-or-treat in the heat gets every single one of my neighbors out and about, and it's so fun seeing everybody all dressed up.

And then taking pride in your place. For me, I work with people that own property or want to own property, but it's also with people that rent here, that work here, that drive through here. Like, it's a pride of being here.

And that's it.

Thank you. When I first saw on the presentation the avocado tub, I didn't know if it was the color or the shape, and then looking at that photo, it was kind of both.

So our last nerd here, we've got Luke, and he is going to talk about the update for the Eagle River Chugiak Comprehensive Plan.

All right, there we go.

All right, I am Luke Bertram. I am a senior planner with the MOA Planning Department Long Range Division, and I am excited to announce that coming up soon we will be beginning the Chugiak/Eagle River Comprehensive plan update.

So a comprehensive plan, just to catch everyone up to speed, reflects community vision and goals in order to create a roadmap for really everything in the community. So there's zoning and land use, like this map here from the 2006 update plan that kind of maps out what we want to see in the future in Eagle River of like Say this pale yellow here, residential, less than 1 to 1 dwelling per acre, things like that. And if you're interested in more on what we have, we also have a copy of the book back there you can flip through. We also touch on economic development, parks, you know, with our municipal parks, but also say connections to Chugach State Park, street and utility infrastructure, public facilities, especially when we look at like, uh, say our Chugiak Volunteer Fire Department, emergency services, schools, and really everything.

So the comprehensive plan gives residents a voice to map out that future. So if you want to just close your eyes for a second and imagine you're transported to the year 2050, Think about how you want your community to look, your area, whether you're in Chugach, Eagle River. Think about what you want to see.

Give these guys a couple more seconds to think about that.

So this plan really— you can open your eyes— this plan really gives us the roadmap to get there. So it takes this vision, but also we need to put the steps together on how to do that. Um, also, just for a bit more clarity, um, the plan is conceptual, but it is legally binding. So while it does set— say, um, if someone wants to zone a property, they refer to this plan. But if a public facility of some sort is planned in the document, when we adopt it, it's not going to set funding immediately.

So there are still steps that come after this plan is adopted. It does not change zoning immediately. So once it's adopted, your property zoning does not change right then and there. And yeah, it doesn't count as an approval for kind of proposed projects. So if there's a proposed development, hypothetically This doesn't automatically approve that.

So our most recent version that we're still working with is from 2006, which a lot has changed since 2006. For one, we predicted at the time that we would have about 50,000 people here by 2025, which was not the case. We're closer to about 300,000. $36,000 To $40,000 right now. Um, but from this plan, we were able to get some great stuff for Eagle River and Chugiak out of it.

Um, so beforehand, all of the zoning in Chugiak and Eagle River followed the exact same requirements as in the Anchorage Bowl. Um, the community at the time said, we want our own zoning, we want to dictate how we do our land use, and that That plan there gave us the background, gave us the leverage really to make that happen so that Eagle River and Chugiak residents have a lot more autonomy than before on how their community looks.

I have a QR code here if anyone wants to take a look at the 2006 plan on their phones, but again, I have a copy back there. This can just give you a bit of an idea of what we're looking at, what the plan might look like, but we're hoping a lot more modern than that one.

Let's see.

All right.

So, from that, we start this big planning process. So, It is a coordination not just with the planning department, but we will be working with a consulting team. We are still working through budgets, so we haven't quite started the plan yet, but we are getting very, very close and should hopefully have that contract ready to go to the assembly in hopes that they will approve.

But from there, we'll start putting together some of the background, some of the framework. And get to our first survey and workshop where we're really planning on asking, what do you value? What do you want to see in the future? And really, what matters to you? So also like, what do you love in Eagle River and what do you want to still see there?

And maybe also if you have any grievances, anything that you want changed, what changes do you want to see?

So that also goes into our second survey and workshop. These workshops will be really just— we'll be presenting some information and also really hearing back from you. Because again, this is Eagle River's plan. This is Chugiak's plan. This is not the department's plan.

We do the paperwork and the documents. But you design the plan.

And from there, we'll work on scenarios, bring it back to you of putting together really this consolidated future, something that we can make happen, something that we can have the strategies to implement so that what you envisioned as Eagle River in 2050 can maybe become a reality. So from there, we'll put together a review draft and again, another review so that everyone in this room, everyone in the community can take a look and put their thoughts. Let us know what you think before we bring it to C-RAB. I believe we do have a C-RAB member here. Thank you.

And Planning and Zoning Commission before finally going to the Assembly for approval.

So really, we want to hear from you right now. We're still very early on. But I have my contact information here, and I really just want to know, how do you think we can be best in touch with the community? What ideas do you have that we can come to Eagle River and reach as many people as possible? You know, we really want your creativity to come up with the best plan that we can.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, so all the nerds, if you could come back up, we're gonna do the Q&A portion now. And so if you've got those cards with questions, raise them up. Claire will come around and grab them.

Huh?

Yeah, I want to do one of these chairs.

People in the front.

Hey everyone! Whoa, hello! While the nerves are getting organized— well done everyone! My name is Julie Jessen. I am the president of the Eagle River Valley Community Council.

And just a quick question before we get into the Q&A. How many people know which council area they live in?

How many of you are active in those community councils?

I just want to give a shout out because there was a wonderful presentation about peer pressure, and I am here to peer pressure you. The community councils are a great opportunity to get involved and get informed about what's going on in your community, things like the comprehensive Plan, and you help shape the conversation being part of your community council. If you don't know what community council area you live in, I encourage you to go to communitycouncils.org and you can look that up and get involved. Councils typically meet one week— weeknight a month, uh, usually off in the summer, but it's a really great place to learn things. Like, we had Waste to Energy come to our council meeting.

We're going to have comp Plan come to our meeting. We're going to have opportunities for businesses and the local library and Parks and Rec and everybody talk about what's going on and to get engaged in your community. A lot of times our assembly members, Donald, others, Jared, they look to our— they attend our community councils to hear what's of importance to us. If you don't show up, they don't know. So here's my plug, communitycouncils.org.

Please do get involved with your community councils. Don't just have the 10 of us that show up every week or every month dictate what's recommended moving forward. So thanks all.

Thank you so much. And Julie is selling herself short. They usually have one of the more attended community councils. It's way more than 10.

All right, thanks so much, Donald, for emceeing tonight. I'm Claire Ross, I work for the assembly, and I'm going to ask our nerds some questions. Our first question is for Chief Dalton: Why have medical calls increased so much when others are relatively stable? Well, I can't speak to the medical calls for your private health insurance, but I can tell you Miss— Municipality of Anchorage, if you call an ambulance, you're going to be billed $950 plus $12 a loaded mile. So break that down to how much an ambulance costs.

Anybody have an idea how much a new ambulance costs to buy one fully equipped?

Yeah, well, I wish there's one. Yeah, they're, they're right at $700,000 completely equipped with everything you need on it. So if you take that, and if you're— if you use the services of the Anchorage Fire Department, then that—. This—. The salaries and benefits for those folks also come out of that bill.

So it's, uh, it's probably not a lot, uh, or enough money to, to provide those essential services based on what the bargain price we're getting for EMS. Frankly, there's a lot of private ambulance services around the country that are charging a lot more than what we're being charged in the city. Probably not— did not answer your question, but that's the best I got. How, uh, why have medical calls increased? Is that what—.

Why are they— why are they increasing? Yeah, or why have the number of them increased? The calls or the cost? The call— the number of calls. It went from like 800 to 1,000.

Got it. Why, why are the number of calls The short answer is, is that our healthcare system sucks.

We just— I mean, it just, I mean, it just, just does. There isn't enough primary care. There isn't enough folks that's able to get that care. So a lot of, a lot of those people unfortunately rely on emergency medical services, take them to the ER for their primary care. So we just, we just don't have enough of it.

So that, that falls back to the fire department to provide those essential services and get those folks to the care that otherwise in other places they would get that primary care in their community. Instead, they're using the ambulance in the emergency department. Perfect, thank you. For everyone in the audience, you should have note cards, and then I ran out of note cards, but I found Post-it notes. So write your questions and you can run them up to to me and I'll ask them.

This next question I think is for Mark. When is the half marathon going to open for next year?

Hey, yeah, that's a great question.

So we're kind of on a shifting scale. Our goal is to kind of line up with the Odd Man Rush Eagle River beer release that they do as a fundraiser for the Nature Center. Which happens closer to like mid-September timeframe. So stand by. I would say I don't have that answer for you yet, but I will get it to you soon.

Follow our Facebook page. That's all I got.

I can't tell if this is someone's notes They're all questions? Okay.

Okay. Oh, Mark, you got the mic, so I'll ask you this one. You only need so many bananas— 50 bananas for 3 aid stations. What is the oddest and best way to use excess bananas?

Great question. So we had a lot of banana bread made afterwards. We had banana muffins made, we had banana smoothies made. I have not had banana beer made, but I would love to pair up with Odd Man and see if we can make all that and come up with some, some banana beer afterwards. Who knows?

All right, Melissa, I'm not sure if you know the answer to this one, but someone was wondering what $19.94 would be in 2026. If $143,000 was the median house in 1994, how does that change with like inflation?

So, hmm, that's a very good question. I think that I would need to do a little bit more research on that because inflation is a little more complex. And so when we look at these things, so people would say, oh, well, my interest rate was 14%, you know, so 7% really isn't that big of a deal. But when you look at they were paying that on a $100,000 home as compared to a $500,000 home, it does make a huge difference. I am not nerdy enough to answer that question.

That's probably my best answer. Wait, hold on. Inflation calculator? You are my nerd.

Whoa, you, you are my new best friend, which I do go to the muni and all the time for code violations and all that good stuff. But okay, $144,000 in 1994 is worth $325,000 $325,500 today, a little less than that, $325,486.64. So almost impossible to buy a single-family home for $325,000 right now. Yeah, even with inflation, the prices have gone up. And then like you said, they might have paid a lot more interest or less interest depending on when they bought.

True story. All right.

Double inflation.

You guys are so good. There's some nerd talk over here with inflation.

Okay, this one goes to Kelly. Is the plan for the MOA to own the waste-to-energy plant, or are you working with MEA, Matanuska Electric Association, for shared ownership? Good question, thank you very much. The answer is the owner of the facility would be the municipality, Solid Waste Services, and we are in the process of closing out requests for proposals for a construction manager at risk. It sounds like the start of a really good joke.

There once was this guy who was a construction manager at risk who had to had to sit down at the table with an operator manager at risk who had to also sit down with the designer, and they all had to come together to build a fantastic facility. And that's what we're working on. And since I have the mic, remember I talked to you guys about the awesome professionals at the landfill and how awesome I think they are? They're all standing right back there. Thank you, guys.

Thanks for coming out. Okay, let's see. I'm gonna keep it down there for Kelly. Many things aren't supposed to be thrown away, like batteries. What is the toxic air impact with burning things like that?

Such a good question. We're actually— if you follow the AnchorageWasteToEnergy.org there's going to be a deep dive into air quality pollution control systems, and we are going to get into the science and the molecular structure of air particles and how we are going to manage them at the, at the new waste-to-energy facility. It's very exciting, and I hope you guys all come out for it.

All right, Luke, since you have the mic, I'm not sure if you know the answer to this, but maybe you can say through the plan how it might happen. How do we get the old movie theater site redeveloped?

Anyone else can jump in if you can phone a friend for Luke. So there's a couple different ways. Either if— I don't think it's a brownfield site, so I think it would be a demolition, or there's nothing there. No, yeah, there's nothing there.

If someone were to purchase the site with the intent of developing it, I don't have the zoning information on hand of what they would be able to do with the site immediately.

It's something that we would love to hear from the community on what you want to see with the site when you engage with us during the comprehensive plan process. I think he means show him the money and then it'll happen. Perfect. Whoever wrote that question, hold on to it for when the comp plan update happens and you can make that one of the topics.

Okay, let's go to Clifton, does your public education include skill building on lifts at home without EMS? Ask that question again. Does your public education include skill building on the lifts at home without EMS?

Yeah, you're talking about lift 15 patients, is that what you're asking? Yeah. And the question is? Do you teach people in their homes if maybe their family member or someone is high risk? Oh, oh, oh, I see, I see, I see.

I'm tracking. So I think what you're asking me, if we go to these lift assist frequently, are we educating the family members on correct lifting techniques? Is that the gist of it? The short answer is we don't have a formal education program, I would say, to do that. That's a really good idea because we run a lot of lift assists.

But we certainly, when we're there, we're demonstrating the correct lifting techniques, some of the specialized equipment we have to use. But I would not per se say we have a specific training program. But it's a really good idea, though. Thanks for the suggestion. OK, Chris.

Kristen, as a new— we have a person who is a new and upcoming small business owner in the house. What advice would you give them for the positive peer pressure? Find your community fast, meaning find the people in our community that are already doing what you're doing. Don't see people that are already in your same line of business as somebody that you need to compete with. See them as somebody that you want to get to know and figure out what they did right and what they did wrong.

I think the biggest thing that can help a small business owner coming into a new business is learning from the mistakes of others. And then I would also just encourage you to get involved in the different ways our community can support you. Chugiak/Eagle River Women in Business is a great example, just a group where we support each other, we lift each other up, we educate each other, and finding that niche group that can really just make you a better person and business owner in general. But yeah, find your circle. All right, next up, Karen.

In preparing your presentation, do you specialize in breweries, or did you have to like—. So like, how did you do your research to put that together? Well, I guess to start, a little bit about me. I've worked in supply chain logistics for 20 years. I started out in food manufacturing for a frozen baked goods manufacturer out of the Northeast, and I currently am a senior risk manager for Amazon's transportation risk and compliance team.

I've also worked in multiple different modes of delivery with Amazon, so I know a lot about it. And I was actually going to do the talk about a cup of coffee, but then I was just like, oh, you know, we're at Odd Man Rush, they're housing us, let's talk about beer. And took the time to meet with Brian here. He gave me a lot of great information and then a lot of like, you know, rabbit hole deep dive on the internet, which is like my favorite hyperfixation to do. And then linking up with Tony at the State Fair, actually ran into him and just said, hey, it was kind of an idea of when Brian was just like, I'm like, oh yeah, you know, he goes, yeah, and then we were talking about what do you do with all the waste?

And he goes, oh, there's people come and ask for some hops to put in their garden and And there's all this great guy named Tony up in Shugiac. So it was kind of cool to build the community connections off of it. Awesome. Woo-hoo! Yay!

Okay, Melissa. If I am fixing to sell my house, what are the most important rooms or areas to upgrade that will catch the eye of today's buyer? That is an awesome question, and it's loaded.

I honestly think I would tweak that just a little bit, and knowing that today's buyer is paying a premium, at least in their opinion for sure, at 7%, that they're not going to have the ability money to do some of these repairs that are needed or upgrade their floors or do the paint. They might be able to do paint, but a lot of our buyers are kind of pushing what their comfort level is. So we might— they, they might have affordability at $400,000 and they're not finding what they like at that price point. And then we're like slowly trying to ink them up to where they will feel a little bit more comfortable spending more. But when they get to that house, like, let's say they're pushing at $450,000 and they have repairs to do and a roof to replace and carpet to do, and it's not clean.

And it's, you know, it's all these things. It's not that the kitchen's not updated. It's not that it's the color of the house. It's what they're gonna have to do to move into that house and what their next big expense is gonna be. So when we talk to sellers, we talk to them about if they were a buyer buying this house, what would their concerns be, and are we gonna price it for condition or are we going to make those repairs?

Okay, our next Next question is for Assemblymember Handlin.

What could be a new way to fund trail maintenance and trailside facilities look like, aka more Nordic grooming, warming huts, chalets? So sorry, what's that again? How are you going to find the money to add more Nordic trails, chalets, and other park features? Have Eagle River Parks and Recreation. We've got our own service area for that, and so we, we do have a funding source set up for that.

So I would defer to Jeff on that unless he's the one who wrote this question and put a heart on it to try to put some pressure on me here. But yeah, I mean, huh, if someone—. They're welcome. I could go on for more than 7 minutes, but if someone—. We have our next speaker.

—Wants to follow up, just contact us at our office and I'll— I actually— you mentioned the service area. We— not a lot of people know that Parks and Recreation— more people maybe know with Roads. Our model for delivery of services is the service area model, and it really gives us a lot of power and a lot of local input on how things are done, and it really much The short of it is my budget is different than the Anchorage Parks and Rec budget, and it really allows us to meet the community's needs in a pretty impactful way. But if the person who asked the question finds me, he knows me, and—. Yeah, that's good, and that's another reminder for community councils.

One of the things that I really like is that in South Fork, that's kind of how I got involved. I was able to get right on the road board and really have a beneficial impact on it. That's one of the things that is so cool for our community, because if you have an issue with a road and you live in Anchorage, you have to go through planning, like there's so many extra steps, and you can literally go and talk to one of your neighbors and have them make an impact, or you can volunteer and you can be that neighbor.

Thanks, Member Hanlon. All right, we have 2 minutes left and a couple questions. I'm gonna try to combine a couple, but some of the youth Youth in the room are wondering how you can improve youth facilities and activities, including YMCA for the kids of Eagle River, and how will the comprehensive plan consider quality of life for high school students, think recreation and access to activities. So Luke or anyone on this panel, do you have ideas for how Eagle River can plan for the future for youth?

Start off. Yeah, so, I mean, we, again, we were reaching out to everyone and that does include youth. We want to hear from youth. We are hoping to get to some of the schools in Eagle River to directly reach out to kids on what they want to see in the Eagle River of their future.

Could you read the first part of the question again? They're wanting to know how to improve, for instance, the YMCA for the kids of Eagle River, or create more recreation access to activities. So I think that's a question any of you could answer. With the YMCA, since it is a nonprofit, again, we would also reaching out to them, and we would love to get them involved. Yeah.

I can add on to that too. I think, again, let's look back at peer pressure. So if you're a kid and you wanna do something, rather than sitting around and waiting until somebody older than you or brings that to our town, do it yourself. Grab your friends and start a group. You would be surprised how quickly a really fun group will grow in a small community like this.

One thing I love about Eagle River is when we find something fun, we just take it and run with it. So it doesn't matter, you don't have to wait until you're a grown-up or until that group exists, just find your friends and people will come, especially if you talk about it and if you have a really good time doing it. And get your parents to, you know, ask their friends or make a group online for you that they can kind of sponsor you for, and you'll find your people out there. Okay, and there's a very cool teacher in this room right now who just retired who came and asked me about cleaning up trails and recycling. So if anybody wants to talk trash later and you're in high school or even older, let's go talk and let's make this happen out here.

Okay, we have one last question and I'm gonna do a speed round for all of you. So this one is for Kelly. Will the cost of not building a new landfill be included in the cost-benefit analysis? Of the waste-to-energy project? Very good question, and yes, it is going to be part of it.

There are communities in the city— or in the state right now that have to ship their trash down to Seattle, Tacoma area, in the southeast region. And so that's extremely expensive, and the price of trash there obviously has gone really high. And so yes, avoided cost is definitely part of the equation. Thanks. Okay.

So that wraps up the questions. I have one last speed round. What is your favorite place in Chugiak/Eagle River?

Go for it. Yeah, I'll start. I love the Eagle River Nature Center. All right, pass it on down. Yeah, let's cheer for that.

Woo! Well, I have two. Beach Lake is It's one of my favorites, especially with the new trails that go there. It's absolutely gorgeous and the view of the Bear Mountain and those lakes. And then in our backyard is Occluden Lake.

It's probably my church.

Well, I'm actually a recent transplant to Eagle River, so I'm still learning all the cool fun places here, but I do love the Nature Center as well. But I love the coffee hut scene here. I've been tasting my way through it, and I gotta say, so far, Coho's my top tier right now. It's the number one spot. I will take any recommendations to knock it out of number one.

Come see me after. Kind of on the same boat. I just love our local to Eagle River businesses. Being in Women in Business, seeing them pop up and succeed is so heartwarming. So I really love all of the places, the restaurants, the shops that are ours and that we really feel that ownership over and that pride.

And so all of our local businesses that are standalone Eagle River Chugiak businesses. I'm tired of following Kristen.

No, yeah, she said it best. There's a billion places, but Trailhead, definitely Symphony in Eagle Lakes. I I really love my neighborhood. We just did trick-or-treat in the heat, and seeing everybody come out and deck— just all dressed up and being out in their cul-de-sacs and fi— you know, like the little campfires and stuff like that was just really, really fun. Perfect.

Oh, okay, besides the landfill. Love you guys. Uh, I— we spend a lot of time— actually, my family spends a lot of time out at Birchwood Shooting Park. And I also like taking my dogs out the Starnor Bridge Trail and just walking out there along the coastal area there. And then of course Thunderbird Falls and Barbara Falls are a great stop too.

So all those places. And Christmas time, Merry Merchant Munch, great time to see your friends and neighbors. So, uh, love the community. Thanks. Awesome.

That really covers most of the region. So I'm gonna hand it back to Member Hannalan for final comments, but let's give a round of applause for our nerds.

Thanks everyone for coming out. I think this really, I mean, exemplifies, I mean, why we all love living here in Eagle River and Chugiak. And so have this be the kind of catalyst thing. Stay involved. We've got a lot of events and stuff.

I mean, summer unfortunately is winding down, but we've got community councils that are just ramping up. And so really good to see everyone, and thanks everyone. Thanks to the staff for putting this on. Let's give a round of applause for that, for Odd Man Rush for hosting us, and let's give one final round of applause for our 7 nerds over here.

Thank you, everyone.

We wanted to get a picture of them too. That's you.