February 2026 Meeting – Municipal Military and Veterans Affairs Commission

Speak of the devil. Hey, how you doing? That was the previous meeting. Thank you. I probably met you today.

He's always been working hard on this stuff. And in business together. So we're out sitting, and then I, uh, I'm over— now I'm over at the Fort Bridge sometimes, which is our satellite office, right? Yeah, first floor. And everything's in a partial shut down.

It's always— I don't know if they had a vote this morning or anything. So we're still connected. Interesting. I saw the message Okay, yeah, I saw the notification from the Jaber PA address. Yeah, I know what I have and I've used them all, but I was doing— completing the shift last summer.

I retired from the government. Really good. So I'll give the audience a chance now to like the first 3 Privacy time for 3 years, 2 before you— and then like it expired. Looks like everybody else. One year, and I shipped.

I did last the 12th month, shipped it, uh, because I wasn't ready to put it into my house down in Washington State.

Oh, see you back. Well, usually he'll— if he's going to— if he's out of town and can't make it, he usually sends me an email.

Hey, Laura, that's what you had in the Nice folder for these here. Do you have—. You have a—. I can see. What is that?

Fancy folder.

William, how you doing? Great, great.

So did you pass the, uh, assembly? I don't know, not yet. Oh, okay. They're, they're, uh, doing— I'm Craig. They're doing the, uh, one that have more, uh, open seats, try to both fill.

I don't know why it makes any difference. They should come all in and say, hey, it's a I am anyway. Thank you.

All right, well, let's go ahead and start Pledge of Allegiance. Yes, I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Good morning, folks. It is. Yes, it is.

Al Milpaw here. Kamal absent. Olivia absent. Robert Speer present. Uh, Jason He's, he's ghosting.

Bye. But we do have a quorum, that's the main thing. All right, Post 29. And that— I went blank on your name just now. It is Jason Porter.

Oh yeah, Porter is it. Yes. Yeah, I'm glad to have you here All right, everybody get a chance to read the meeting minutes from the last meeting online? Does anybody have any changes or complaints or anything Anybody have a problem or anything changes the agenda? Have a couple item.

Uh, the girls college under guest public, that was on that one. They're not being provided a certificate this month. Okay, not a problem. Then add, uh, in there, uh, Focus 29 We'll add them on the minutes. Yeah, again, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, on this meeting, this meeting's minutes, we'll add them in there. And that—. You have anything else? All right, um, so let's go on, uh Okay, uh, having no other changes or anything, um, not hear anything, they pass— the agenda passes by unanimous consent with the change of making sure that post-9/11 is added in there.

All right, uh, are there other copies of the agenda? Yes, there should be some over there. Yes. Are they different from the one that I got? Cuz I looked at it, it's the same.

There, there it is. Need one, one more fan. Do you need more? Yes. Okay, you got minutes?

I do. Yeah, thank you.

Jeff, would you get them in for the agenda? The agenda. Everything's good. Yeah, they got this because they got the minutes in the email. They're part of the email for the minutes.

All right, 11th Air Force Memorial grant request. We're going to talk about grant requests. Hello, Miss Olivia. Good morning. Good morning.

Morning. So sorry, my coffee pot broke Friday. This is the first cup of coffee I've had all weekend. Oh my goodness, I know, TMI. And you're in a halfway good mood, I'm surprised.

That is correct.

All right, so the grant request, uh, you guys had some discussion you guys want to have on the—. Uh, wanted us to confirm how much we needed in grant money. Correct, Laura, on that? You wanted to figure out exactly how much we need? Yes, I need all the details for the grant application that you are requesting.

So that would be dollar amount. Yeah, well, that's all in the template I gave you before. It doesn't change. Right, but it does— I don't have the support for the grant that you're requesting. But you mean specifically how much we need from the grant?

The grant application requires a specific dollar amount that you're requesting.

So that's, that's where, uh, where not really understanding how much we need because we got already some grant, $4,200. But who's going to be the, uh, in charge of the, uh, after it gets all completed? That depends on who the ownership of it that how much money remaining for continuing maintenance. Uh, you follow me? Generally speaking though, wouldn't we give each of the grantors a complete package as though there was no one else giving money?

Because you don't know how much they're going to have. Here's the reference when they asked how much regarding receiving grant money. But I still think, I think we should ask total. $28,000 Is what the, uh, is what our initial request said. I think we should still ask for that because it's going to— we're going to need continued—.

No doubt, no doubt, that's right—. Down the road. And so no matter how much we get— okay, but the ownership is— the problem comes in is the ownership of the stewardship after everything gets completed, because if the city maintains it, then I don't, I don't know if any more grant money will be needed or any funds will be needed because that'll be under their They're being weird. What are they asking for? They're just asking for an itemized thing of what you want, period, today.

For the grant application. That is correct. For the dollar amount you're asking. Uh-huh. So give it to them.

The total is going to be whatever we get, it will be less than. Yeah, so if they want— if the total amount is $28,000, no matter where it's coming from, give her $28,000. Tell her what you want it for and move on, because she's going to ask for that. If they get it, that's great. If they don't, they'll ask for more information.

So give her that level. I understand that. Uh, did we do that? Did you get— did they get $28,000? Uh, hold on, hold on.

No, the reason it was brought here is because today is because both Laurel and, uh, Al wanted to bring it to the table for the commission to make that decision. So what we're going to do is if we decide that, we're going to have a vote, and that's going to do it. And then, then we will give Laurel, what the commission has said that we're going to ask for. And you know, the point is, uh, it's the, the grant has different types of grants, and this is a Type 1 grant. And if I remember right, we can request up to— is it $35,000?

Do you remember, Laurel, the total, the highest that we can request? I don't. I think it's $35,000. I think so too. So my question would be, do you want to request $35,000 from them and hope for $28,000?

And, well, hope for whatever they want to give, you know. Even though we have $28,000 right now in our initial template, you know, for the request form. But we're, like I said, we're probably still going to need money down the road. For continuous maintenance of it. So should we ask for the, uh, max under, under the step 1 for the harassment?

Yes, that's my question. I would, I would, well, I would follow that. Yes, because for the max and—. Is there anything in the grant paperwork that's, uh, you're gonna start asking for a breakdown of what the money is going to be? Because if they're going to want to break down, we have to justify $35,000.

And, uh, and we're, we're not because we're just trying to get finished getting it fixed up and, and repaired. And if that's— if we get quotes and everything for $28,000, then we need— maybe we need to stick with that. And that's kind of where I was coming from. We should just—. We already have that as a I think Earl, the airport manager, he's the one that provided that initially, if I remember right.

Right. Uh, and so I was kind of thinking, you know, we shouldn't ask for the MAC because it's going to be hard justifying it since we already have an estimate as $28,000. It's going to be hard to justify demanding more than $28,000 since we already have— What do you think, Dave, concerning the They know that we're going to have to maintain it and we're going to have to ask for help to maintain it. The difference between 28 and 35 would not— yes, but we're not going to— what's your feelings? Your pushback?

Here's my feelings. Okay. And I've been saying this since last summer. We have done our part in the commission.

As far as what we were asked for, we were asked for to find out what was going on. We found out what we did. We dug in and got all the information, and I have no problems with filling out the things and trying to get the grants and get that going and keep going because that puts a pot of money— because the biggest problem the municipality has right now is this is a monument that's come in and they haven't budgeted for fixing it up, right? They don't have a budget for right now. If we can help get a budget to get it fixed up and then get it taken care of that way, which takes it so, uh, Earl is not having to pull out of his budget to do it, and Parks and Rec, and I have to pull out of their budget to do it.

Then we give them a start, we give them funds, yeah, to where it can get fixed, and all they have to do is work out for their budget for next year is work out adding this monument and park little area to the rest of their stuff. Earl has already said he's going to keep maintaining and doing what he's doing because his guys are already doing all the stuff around it. Um, Parks and Rec already does some stuff around it because they have the playground, some other things there. So it's easy for both of them to incorporate it, but it's not easy for either one to fix it. Um, so that's why I don't have a problem with going for the grants to try to get that $28,000 and have that there for the thing.

But I still— my final thing is that everything after that falls on the municipality to, as a whole, to decide who's going to own it, who's going to maintain it, who's going to do what parts. Excellent. Okay, so the key here is we're done. Rathmuses, they want part of their paperwork is, have you received any of the grant money yet? Yes, we have.

We have to— of course. So that would reduce the $28,000, take the $4,400—. Not necessarily, not necessarily, but I would tell them, I would ask for the $28,000, tell them that we've already received this amount, and let them decide. Let them do the math of, okay, we'll only give them this part, or we'll give them what they're asking for, or something, you know. So I'll make a motion that we ask for $28,000, let them know that we already had the $4,400, and we change, uh and they can make the decision.

So that's, that's the motion. Um, and you haven't considered inflation, which— since you bid. Yeah, so that's why I said you need to kind of let the Rasmussen know all the factors in that. We got to be—. Yeah, I have a second.

I'll second. I know you will, Eleanor. Go ahead. I have the grant program guidelines, um, for the Rasmussen Foundation grants that are available. Um, a couple pages long, but just going through it, um, it— my recommendation would be for the board to read through these guidelines and then to determine if any of these actually apply to the Air Force Memorial.

And I can print it out, um, and give it to you all today. But, like, for example, the Tier 1 grant, that is, like, they give examples of Tier 1 grants: kitchen upgrades and appliances at a senior center, a ramp to improve access for everybody at a library, technology upgrades for youth in a rural vocational program, construction of a new playground. Community support grants include construction of senior housing, upgrades to rural youth recreation, pilot expansion of behavioral health clinic, and then legacy grants is the other one, construction of a new child care facility, support of a small business development program, construction of a new hub for businesses and community connections, creation of a quota bank to promote rural and indigenous access to fisheries. So that would be my recommendation because what, what I don't want to happen is we apply for a grant that is not applicable to the mission that that we are trying to receive monies for. Appreciate that.

And I had talked to the, uh, the representative because they, they do think you give— they do give government type grant, and our world would fall in the Zach's Round Group. So then I passed on the word, brush it off, you know. And just to clarify my role with the grant applications, the only thing I do is submit the grant application. So all of the legwork comes from the board and commissions for any of the grant applications that I submit. Um, and then I can provide a recommendation if there are questions for something that I'm familiar with, but the legwork is on the board to complete.

For those grants. But I'm going to go ahead and print this out right now, and I will hand it out to you all just for your awareness. I'll hold off on the motion, then maybe we can pass this on later on during, during our meeting here. Make decision later on. You're kind of looking for it, but we're only voting on the dollar amount anyways.

Well, so she can— but she need to is so she can process the application. So do we want—. Can we do that offline? The application? Yeah, we can take the motion and hold the motion till later in the meeting.

Yeah, just don't let me forget to come back to it. Thank you, B. Yeah, I'm all—. Anyway, hello and how are you? Hello, I'm all—. Hello and how are you?

Good to see you. It's good to be here. Hi, sorry I'm late. No problem. All right, so now we're going to go on to the Canadian flag.

Um, for the people that might have missed it, uh, I believe he said that somebody, uh, approached her about we should have a Canadian flag up there. Well, we've got a Canadian unit out there. That's right, at El Menor. We do. This memorial has nothing to do with the current people, with the people that are on today.

This is for— this is to commemorate the original 11th Air Force that built a shack on the backside of Merrill Field and put the very first— and started the very first Air Force presence in the state of Alaska. And I can't— I can't remember looking back if there was any Canadians that were brought over too for the first part of the unit. I don't know. Uh, my main thing that I, that I have to say about this, and then I'm going to go, is that that is past us, that's beyond our scope. Okay.

Okay, that is, that's, that is petitioning Parks and Rec and, okay, whoever's going to be controlling it down the road. No worries. And putting together, just like they have to put together Uh, when, when we got the petition sent over to us for them adding a name on the wall, okay, the Jack Henry, right? It is our— one of our things is we sit back and we go out and look at all the evidence they have, maybe do a little research ourselves, and then say letter to Parks and Rec, yes, we have looked at this and we found that this person does qualify to be on the wall, and we give them a letter, and that whole packet goes to Parks and Rec, and they have to still go through and vote, yes, we're going to put them on the wall or not. This is something that's— that is theirs.

When we pass this package on to the new recipient, can we tag that with a line that says there were Canadians, would you like to commemorate them with a flag, and leave it at that? The people that want to do it, they need to put a packet together of why they think there should be a flag on the memorial. You know, the memorial. Oh, yeah. They put that packet together and they submit it.

They submit it to the municipality. Got it. Okay. Thank you. And also, you know, we're talking about Native, Alaskan, female, male, everybody, you know, different units.

It isn't, you know, it's Canadians plus many more. So how many Black Americans are represented, you know? So now really, yeah, that's why, you know, I think the way we have to go now is— That's because you're a white boy. That's all that is. That's because you're a white boy.

You don't care if anybody else is represented. That pisses me off. Oh, can we go back to, uh, the, the grant? Jeff, Jeff, what's the status? Uh, you have any status on, on our request?

So the Alaska Veterans Advisory Council will be meeting next week. Um, so your grant will go before them. Um, so kind of status quo for now, but yeah, I knew they were going to be meeting sometime in the new year and They finally decided their meeting was next week. So, great. I will tell them.

The meeting's open to the public. You guys can come. It's an all-day. Yeah. Bob's been there before.

So, it is, it's open to the public. Should be a notice that it's allowed. We have Birdie and Forrest are in town. Surprisingly, yeah. And then all 3 of us are gone by the end of the month.

So, yeah. But no, we were— yeah, everybody's going to be there. So, um, it'll be the third— yeah, it'll be in our office building. So 4600 DeBar Road. Um, we'll have it in one of the conference rooms on the first floor.

Most of the advisory councils either from the Anchorage area, uh, we got a lot of Fairbanks folks, so they'll be flying in, most of them. Um, and it starts— I want to say the meeting starts at 9. What day is it? What's today again? The 13th.

February 13th. Should be at 0900. I think it starts at 0900. And I can send out, yeah, it's next Friday.

Once I get a firm time, usually they start around 9:00, they go till about 3:00 or 4:00. So yeah, I'll send that out to you guys. So if anybody wants to come, you guys can come.

Yes, they, they, the things they vote on are though, you know, they vote on any grant applications that they receive. They vote on who to be the next Veteran Advocate for the Year for the governor, which is an annual award that's given out on Veterans Day. And then they talk about just other veteran issues around the state and stuff like that. You hang that up, you'll take care of that. Okay, you don't want to go?

I mean, couple of hours. Are you gonna, are you gonna go there, Olivia? I'll take a couple of hours and go. Yeah, I'll find out when the— what their agenda is. I live down the street.

What about Robert? You want to go? Sure. The other Robert too? It's all Robert.

Yeah, anybody should go. Oh my God, you know how big— how small that little building is? Can I do it by Zoom, by the way?

We have before. Um, it just depends on— the one conference room has the ability to, the other conference room, which I think is the one we're going to get stuck in, doesn't. Yeah. And, um, while we're back on the grants, let's go ahead. Uh, what's this?

We got the sheet back. The motion was to— we're going to ask for a grant because the grant would be— we'd ask for $28,000. Um, let's go ahead and vote on that because if we decide that not do the grant with them, then it doesn't matter. But that way, once we read this and if it's a fit, then we've already got it decided what we're going to ask for. Okay.

So we have a motion and we have a second. All in favor of asking for $28,000 in the grant, raise your hand. Anybody against? Okay, it passes. Because I just briefly— what we have to really look into it and see if, uh, if are they— are submitting the paperwork is if it's going to work something that they the boards.

But we'll see, we'll look it through. And now, if it's just submitting the paperwork and it only takes like a few minutes to put it together, the worst they can say is no. But, uh, did you get— did you get a ball? No, I didn't look up. Mo, what did you vote?

I voted yes. Okay, thank you. Against? No. Yes.

Yes. Oh, okay, I'm sorry. No, no, he said yes. So I thought I gave a thumbs up. I gave a thumbs up.

Sorry. Well, there you go.

All right, unfinished old business. Meeting videos being posted. That is the Now working on getting solved. They're up there. We're recording now, and Laurel has the ability to get on the site and put it up there.

So this is good. Yeah, Laura, I think you emailed. When I looked online, the word recording is in the title, you know, the name of us and date. And by having that recording in there, it can't see the date of the meeting. And, uh, but every other commission meeting, they don't have the word recording in there, but you can read actually the date.

So if you can maybe work it out to have that taken out of there. Okay, I can do that for—. Otherwise, this way we can see all the dates, you know, about the meeting. Pick the one you want. Okay, so you want date first and then commission?

Just take the word recording. Okay, it's got, you know, the, uh, our meeting, and then it says the date is recording. That's taken out. Everything's fine, and it'll match all the rest of the commissions too.

Anything else on the video recordings? All right, commissioners renewal application and new commissioners application. All right, uh, I guess they didn't pull your name up or bring you up. Laura was explaining, and I'll let her explain it again. So the update I have is that you are likely to be confirmed at one of the March assembly meetings.

What they are doing right now is pushing through the confirmations for boards and commissions that currently do not have a quorum. So because they are doing that, it is moved, and MBAC has a quorum, it's moved you to the back of the line a little bit for the confirmations. But I don't have to do anything? You do not have to do anything. Oh, okay.

And the meeting, when I— when it comes, am I going to be notified to be there, or? I will ask Marie and confirm with her because she handles all of that and see if— I don't believe you need to attend, but Don't take my word for it. I will, um, confirm with her and then let you know. Okay. I know, Cal, when I went, it was a block and they just said these numbers through these numbers.

Yes, they're all affirmed. Yeah. And that's, and that's what I've seen before too. That's why I was surprised. But, oh, they have to do these first, these first.

I said, just in the last, in the past they've done them as a block. So why don't they? I don't know, especially unless there's controversial things, and that would takes more time. Okay, I don't expect you to come and say thank you, thank you, thank you. And also, Sarah, because I remember that in October, 3 members—.

When do we need to submit? Uh, or do we? Anytime, right? You just have to— what Marie put last time, all you have to do is at least Send them an email saying, I want to remain on the commission. You can send it to me.

Okay. And then I'll get it to where it needs to go. Oh, what about the ones that already submitted paperwork? The, the 3 that were from last year, they are updated. They're good.

I went through and looked, and all 3 of you are, uh, up until the 28th. And that— so now it's just the— yeah, you know, it's just the ones that, that, uh, come up due at the end of October 2026. Those ones are the ones that need to submit their email or whatever. You have, you know, 6, 7 months, but we start reminding people now, then by the time we get there, we won't be sitting there doing it, uh, waiting for afterwards. Okay, thank you.

Yeah, I got the list right here. Amal was 26, Dave is 27, Olivia 26. I think it's— I think you were on 26. 28. Oh, you were the part of the three?

Yeah, we basically have Amal, Olivia, and myself. Yeah, okay, right. And then, uh, so we just need to each of us send a note to Laurel and just say yes, we want to continue. We haven't been on yet, not that long, right? All right, all right.

Certificates of recognition for the Merrill Field manager and That's the thing I got to change. And, uh, post-20— American Legion post-29.

Is Earl online? I can't tell. No, he's not. Did them all? He's only one more.

Yeah. Well, we last month we tried to present it, but we had a technical difficulty, so I'll read it, uh, and then after the meeting I'll take it over to Earl. Want me to read it again, Phil? Certificate of Appreciation, Merrill Field Manager and Staff, in recognition of your outstanding support of the municipality of the Municipal Military Veterans Affairs Commission's support and that of your staff on Veterans Day for the 11th Air Force American Homefront Liberation Memorial, significantly contributed to the success of the ceremony. Thank you for your dedication and honorable service.

Awarded second day of February 26th. Signed Dave, the chair, and Dan Fran, the mayor.

Yay!

Yay! Okay, Jason, let's make it nice. Certificate of Appreciation American Legion Post 49. Recognition of your outstanding support of the Municipal Military and Veterans Affairs Commission. Your generous donation of clay and financial support for the Beva Air Force American Home from Siberia Memorial has made a significant and meaningful contribution to the success of this important Thank you for your dedication and honorable service.

On the second day of February 26th, signed Mayor David and Mayor Dan. Take the picture with the flags and put him in front of the flags. Yeah, put him— he looks like—. Oh, that's lovely. Yeah, beautiful.

We can send that to you, Jason.

You still going? No, we have Ellen over here. Hey, hey, Ellen. He'll send it, he'll send it to all of us. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. I think your other friend had his picture last month. If you could send— yeah, if you send me, I appreciate it, and we'll get it on the shared drive.

Yeah, any pictures, send to Dave so he can put on the shared drive. Dave needs more work to do.

All right, that final nomination and elections.

All right.

Do we have— does anybody have— let me recap. Be the smart thing. All right. So last month we had nominations, first nominations.

Al nominated me for Chairman again.

Al nominated himself for Vice Chairman. Robert Eo was nominated for Secretary. Okay, are there any other nominations today for any of the positions? Any nominations for— any other nominations for Chairman?

All right, hell no. Having, having none, and I guess I have to do it again. I do have a question though. I saw that there was only just chair, co-chair, and secretary. Are there any—.

Do we have any other positions within the—. Um, we— I'm gonna—. I am gonna mention that, but yeah, we don't. We, we could— there's like one or two more that we probably could. Yeah, and I am going to talk about that.

Okay. Right there. Do we have any other nominations for vice chairman?

I would nominate my little self. I want to know what you do. Okay. Yeah. Okay.

She would be my vice vice. Remember we talked about that when I first met you? No, no, no, no vice vice. What do they call that? The vizier, the person that you come and ask questions to.

That's you. Me? Yeah, that's right. That's right. I ain't stupid.

So we have Al and we have Olivia. Do we have any others?

All right. So now we get to vote.

Is Al still on? Or Amal still on?

Yeah, I'm still here. All right, so we have, uh, 2 people for vice chair. We have Al and we have Olivia. Um, let's, uh, we're going to order people that were nominated. What they were—.

Yeah. No. Okay. I guess it could be. What would be the protocol for that?

Let's make them remove themselves. That'll work. Well, they could vote. They could vote. But then it doesn't matter.

I'll be using ballots. I'm a baby, so I'm just trying to, you know, see how—. Yes. So do your thing and I'll support you no matter what.

We don't have ballots. Oh, paper. And we could, we could do it that way. It makes everybody feel more comfortable.

You should see the community council. We get like sometimes 30, 40 kids raise their hand and vote whoever you want to. Yeah, it doesn't matter. I mean [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] While we're waiting for those to come back, we'll go down to Secretary. Do we have any other nominations for Secretary?

Oh, no. Do you have any nominations for Secretary, Kamal? You don't want to do it? No. Good.

All right. Not hearing any other nominations, Robert is our Secretary of the NHEA. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] We didn't get data. Oh, that's right, we didn't. Hello there.

There is a— there's not a need to have it right now, but we might want to look into— we could have a, uh, treasurer. Okay. As we get the grants, then that, that would be the person that would be directly coordinating with the mayor's office for the financial stuff, like the check that we've already gotten and any grants that we get, working with them, money going in, and also working with the budget office and that for once, if anything's going on that has to be taken care of, of coordinating with the mayor's office of, you know, this is being done, this has got to be paid. And that kind of piece. And that, so there, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have that position, and that way it's a dedicated Loridon position of who's going to be the person coordinate the financial pieces.

And they would also take on, like, when we're doing something like Memorial Day, which is going to be coming up here in a second, we put in the pieces, but then there is the time where Renekton is sending us an email. Yep. Hey, uh, we haven't got paid for the Renektons yet, and I gotta forward that to Laurel, and then Laurel's got to take the thing. That would be something else that the treasurer would be involved in. Do we want to call the treasurer though?

Because, uh, treasurer Normally they keep a, you know, ledger of all the money they receive. Would a different name, like maybe, uh, activity director like that, be more appropriate? I don't know. That's not something we normally—. I don't know if you need a formal—.

I don't know that you can vote because you haven't been confirmed yet. Yeah, I'm not— that's— you hear all the But this would put it up under all the different pieces under one thing, or they're specifically in that one piece. I'm gonna call him to get his vote. Um, Laurel, question, uh, is it appropriate for us to have a treasurer part, uh, like take care of all any If there's any money, money aspect, you know, I, I don't know. I would say it's up to the board's discretion on whether or not you want to try.

It is, it is one of the things, it is one of the positions that you can have in there, yeah, for the, for the commission. Yeah, Amal, can you hear me?

I can. Um, may I get your phone number so I can call you and get your vote? Sure, 907-250-5523. And then just make sure you're on mute, and I'm going to step out of the room and call you. Yeah.

Are you here to collect your check? Yes. How are you doing? Good, good. Oh, good morning, my brother.

Yep. Thank you.

Olivia is still writing her— Ella's still writing her stuff.

This fancy—. When they elected me, there was nobody to run against. Yeah, right. Want me to be involved with the tally?

No, should be okay. Thank you though, sir.

No, I can't vote.

We didn't have any meeting prior meeting before he came in today. Yeah, maybe they just got done quick. I should have stopped him altogether. I know it's hard to believe, bro, right? Government.

All right, thank you, Miss Diana. All right, so for votes, we have a total of 5 votes for Al and 2 for Olivia. All right, that means we got to tolerate Al as the Oh my God. Well, didn't you know that the vice chair is supposed to be the Memorial Day chairman? You are now.

I got to remember that one. Dave got so much information in that head of his that I don't know what— How big is that head? That's right, for heaven's sake. I said I go sit at Ambette's too and we sit and talk. Oh, okay.

Memorial Day. Oh, first of all, welcome to the, the one new, uh, officer. Oh yeah, the returning officers, the permanent secretary, right? Yeah, not kidding. All right, you start screwing up, so we'll be on the court for you next year.

All right, new business, new business. Um, I just, I added Memorial Day on there because it's time for us to start doing stuff with that. And so, uh, need a volunteer for a committee lead, and some people like to be— a couple people like to be on that committee. You going to be on that one too? I've got two under my belt, so I kind of know what's going on.

Okay. All right.

Who else would like to be on that committee? I'll be working with that committee directly because I need to start showing everybody how we put the packet together. And it's pretty easy because it's all there. But it might change a little bit this year. Anybody else want to be on?

Oh, I'm not a member.

Because you're gonna be. We all work together pretty good.

Okay, but we'll leave a spot for you. Do one more.

Okay, Olivia, I think I did it last year with you. Yeah, well, everybody's gonna be working out. This is just the people that are going to be to go into the meeting, getting together, and, uh, getting— when we're not here, getting together and passing information on. You had a lot of good ideas last year, and that I want to incorporate those. Okay.

And that is, so everybody doesn't remember because it's been a while, I'll mail it back. You know, Olivia was sitting back and she was saying, you know, that we should split things up, like one person in charge of parking, one person's in charge of this part, and that way everybody's got their piece of it. Uh, the only, the only problem that we got to be careful with that is, and this is where the, the main people that are on the committee has to do with coordinating this in between these meetings, is you can't just have a big get-together where everybody talks about their part of it. Okay? So you can't sit back and say, we get done here, and, uh, next week you want to stop and have coffee and have everybody stop in so you can discuss your different pieces.

As we get, we get in trouble. That's what we used to do. We used to go for breakfast. Oh, yeah. Sit down.

And now we found out that we can't do that. We can't have more than 3 people get together without it being public. So you guys are never there. You guys can sit back and say, okay, after we designate, okay, Bob is in charge of making sure the parking and signs for VIPs and a little can be held up. You know, you guys can sit back and talk to how things are going with that.

You know, Ellen, who's done the last couple years, will probably maintain getting a hold of the youth court. Okay, boom, and talking about that kind of stuff. And that— but you can't talk to everybody at one time. You can only talk to like one of them at a time. Yes, or two of them.

But I can publicly notice a committee meeting should you want to get together. Exactly. And talk about it. And it's not hard. I was actually going to show you all.

I publicly noticed this meeting, and it's on the meeting calendar, and I'm going to go ahead and publicly notice the rest of the meetings for 2026 because I'm able to do that. So if you do want to call a special committee meeting, you're allowed to. I just have to publicly notice it. 24 Hours before the meeting takes place. Okay.

Can I say that procedurally, I think it would be— you're absolutely right, but we need a mindset, and the mindset is every so often we don't need a big meeting, we just need a sprint. So it's like the stuff that you have, bring it so we all know where you are, and that, that is an email of where are you, am I, you know, and just answer the question. That's a sprint. And then the meeting that we actually have with us together offsite is an actual Scrum. So that's where everybody brings their whole piece once, wherever we decide to have that, maybe here at the meeting here would be a good time for the Scrum itself.

But essentially it's really just a little sprints here and there, and that's something we can do offline and still stay coordinated. Good. Yep. And if I'm correct, that could be email. If we communicate, we have to— can't do that either without notification.

Not, not business. Not business, right? Yeah, business. Like, we can— you and me doing a thing, we can put out information for like meetings or something like that, or request, and we can include everybody in that, but we can't discuss any business. I can't send out anything on an email to everybody.

That and said about business. I remember the way it was explained to me. Um, and I only have one thing that I do want to sit down and talk with you about, um, and that is in the past the, the packet for requesting the park strip has been put out by somebody in the commission. It's not that—. It's—.

I won't say it's not that hard to do because now we have all the forms that we just change the dates and the year. We make sure that everything is changed. We change any contact numbers that need to be changed, and we do enforce. When I started doing it under the previous mayor, um, and because they were involved, I started changing everything to the municipal, the mayor's office address, and I've been changing everything to where points of contact include the mayor's office because it's the municipality's ceremony, and it should be. Before we were doing that, it was like private ceremony.

Ran by the Military and Veterans Affairs Commission in the name of the municipality. Now we changed that, we made it— it's the municipality, it's theirs. And so it's getting better and we're putting it in. We still get the things from the, uh, you know, we get the bill from the Police Department for the overtime. I give it to you guys.

In the past, I sent it in an email to whoever is in your position, and it goes to get— gets done. Same thing with the RenEkan. It gets sent up, you know, the, the invoice when we first request them gets sent up to you guys. And then when I get the notice that they haven't got paid yet, I send it to you guys that they get paid. And if we want to keep doing the way, it's fine.

But we'll just look at the packet and see if, uh, if there's a way to maybe streamline it by having the mayor's office being a little more involved in it. Okay, I can—. Because if we can streamline it, that's always better, right? Always better. Again, now that new division we're talking about, the treasurer, would that fall under the treasurer, you know, this we're talking about?

Just with the, uh, anything that comes back. So, like, we would submit the paperwork if, like, we do now, and that person would be involved in getting a copy of it and knowing that these things here were done because the mayor's office has got to pay for the safety people before we put the packet in. There's a request that we have to send off to the, the safety people, and that comes back with it. This plan is approved, and that goes with the packet because it's got to be approved before they'll ever— before they'll even pass all the sections out. And then later on, they're gonna— they either at that time or a little bit later, they send off an invoice saying, okay, you owe us this much for going over your plan and approving it.

They're also the ones that bring out the barriers and the cones and everything else. And then block off the street, 10th Avenue. And we— so that would come, that would go to the treasurer, who would, uh, send it, or I would, or whoever is doing the packet would send a copy to the treasurer and to Laurel so that it could go to the, the people, the finance, or the bunch of people who would get it paid. And, but then The treasurer would be the one to keep following up with that. Did that get paid?

Same thing with the, uh, same thing with the porta-potties. They would have a copy of that so they could follow up and keep checking on it. And it could, it could, the porta-potties could go to that treasurer person altogether because that's a separate request and that's something that that person could take care of and requesting them and then passing the invoice on to the mayor's office. Because the whole thing is we should relieve you as much responsibility as— because you're the chair, you have a bunch of stuff to do. You showing someone how to do this package?

Yeah, you need to be involved because you need to know what's going on with the overall picture of it. Yeah, right, but not in the weeds. Yeah.

All right, plus for you coming back from Byers Lake Yeah, I know you're busy day, busy weekend. By the way, what, what day will, uh, 25th, 25th, 25th of May. Yes, 25th of May.

Okay, excuse me. All right, does anybody have any other questions or anything on Memorial Day or have anything else new that they And so what's the, the triple group then will create a checklist of things that we need to be aware of, and now we can start thinking about it. I know Al, I remember Al getting out all the information to all the houses in that area. Yeah, and yeah, because the, as we get closer, there's, you know, we get chairs usually donated from the Downtown Partnership All the chairs that we put out there, they come from the Downtown Partnership. The, uh, we, we get the letters for the community around the Park Strip.

We get— that's right, because you weren't here last year for this. So yeah, we write up a letter, we give it to you guys, you get printed off, and we take— and those letters get put in the mailboxes of all the houses along the Park Strip and 11th. Okay, because that's where the motorcycle stage on 11th Avenue and I, and, uh, we'll— we do have to throw the, uh, the little handbills, the brochures that are, uh, there. We do a— we do a flyer and a brochure for the day. For the flyer is so we can— everybody takes a digital copy and starts sending it out, and we get some hard copies that can be posted on the board.

Places all over town. You need assistance with creating flyers? What's that? Do you need assistance creating the flyers for that? We've got them.

Okay. If we— but that's one thing we'll go through is say maybe we want to change it up a little bit, and if we want to change it up a little bit, then the committee will work on that. Or if you've got someone that can help them, maybe they'll work with you guys on that. So I believe I can request that our reprographics create and print those off, but I will confirm that. I mean, they're the ones that created the certificates.

I know that we've gotten— we've got them printed over the last few years through you guys. Okay. We submitted and did them up in like Uh, it was— they're either PDFs or they were done up as a, uh, uh, what's— it was the other P with Office, not PowerPoint. Yeah, probably could do it either. Yeah, yeah, but it wasn't through— it was, it was, uh, Publisher.

It could be through Publisher. Yeah, but we, uh, we've done that in the past. And like I said, we— before we were doing it all ourselves, and it was nice that we started working more with the mayor's office and through them, which was nice. But we've got those, uh, and of course there's going to be the going through. And, uh, we have letters that we put together that send out.

We have letters that for, uh, the two senators and the representative, and then we have one that we put together for the state legislators. It's a It's not by name, it's— that's just one that goes out to the, the all the state legislators. Now the 4, the 4 by name is for the governor, the House, the representative, and the 2 senators. And then we have a— we have a blanket one that we send out for the military leaders that we usually pass off to Kyle, and then she sits back and she distributes to all the senior officers We have to decide, we have to go through and decide people that we'd like to have as a speaker or a keynote speaker. And then we have to send out requests through Kyle for them if they're available.

And we can't wait too late because their calendar fills up fast. So that, we have a couple things like that that we have to go through and In the past, the email to the state legislature, uh, hadn't gone down to our representative in Anchorage. So I called each of our representatives in the legislature, Alaska, personally, and some of them weren't even aware of it. So I'll take care of that. And should we, as we get ideas, send you an email Hey, this is maybe something we should consider.

So you can kind of start compiling a listing, you know, and then we have your meetings and you can say, well, yeah, this is taken care of, or it's a good idea, not a good idea. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, no, that's good. Yeah, that's this idea of the sprint. We'll have to keep you posted as we sprint so you'll know where we are.

You give us the thing and then you'll know exactly which ones are taken care of.

All right. And one of the big things we need to start working on early this year is, uh, trying to actually get live music, which that's going to be hard again. Yeah, there's, there's one that I contacted. It's always because they're on break, you know, and obviously the holiday, and they're going some place. Memorial Day weekend, we need to talk to some people It's—.

Everybody's breaking up. Everybody's done for the year and they're doing the stuff, and it's a hard time, and I understand that. That's what's nice about having the Army band. Yeah, well, we had the Army band. Yeah, no, it was great.

As soon as they left, it was like, you know, why didn't they— because they don't like us. I mean, we're so far away from anybody else. They still come away from home, etc. 4-Star level. Gotcha.

So nobody got 3.5 stars. All right, upcoming events. Uh, we got the 4 chaplains of the U.S. Army Transport Orchestra, right? And that's tomorrow at 2 PM down at the Alaska Veterans Museum. Okay.

Um, so we will start—. We, we have actually 5 chaplains. I've got 4 for each of the individuals who died and then I have an overall chaplain to read the whole story. Okay. So, uh, I will not be able to be there.

I am—. Yeah, so you gotta go to work. I'm balls deep in something, but we're moving. It's a mess. But that's set up for tomorrow.

If you're available, please come on down, check it out. Museum's there right at the mushing district right now where the arch is. Of beautiful. As I said, we'll be doing it in the foyer if you've been there before, so, uh, it'll— we'll see how it all goes. It's our first foray into this, this one.

So, uh, and then I get on tomorrow night, fly to Florida for a wedding.

It might be warmer here than there. No, they're going to have 70s. Okay, parts of Florida got snow. That's right. Where, where are you going?

Tampa lately. Tampa. Okay, Tampa was 29 degrees yesterday. Thank you, but not when I get there. Oh, okay.

What is it? Okay, all right, get the— yeah, the 2026 Military Appreciation Bowl-a-thon The fundraiser is this Saturday on February 7th, and that's from 3 to 6 at Polar Bowl. Oh, at Jay Bear. Okay. The Polar Bowl, that's on Jay Bear.

Jay Bear.

I've got the annual salute to the military that is coming up on the 14th. That's, uh, it's not this Saturday. Saturday. Saturday.

Yes, it is. It is on Valentine's Day and they're still, they're still doing it that day because it's always on the second. Second Saturday. I know, but that's, that's what the, uh, that's ASYMCA. Yeah, that's the Armed Services YMCA.

That's where they recognize people for their service and it really has a formal event too. Yeah, they have, uh, it's a, it's a nice ceremony. Um, they, they just got to the point that they're charging so much for the tables that most people can't even go anymore. And that is just— I remember when it used to be like $1,000, $2,000, $5,000. Now they're $5,000, $10,000, and like $15,000 or $20,000.

It's like, um, I have my retirement party there. Yeah, it was good. Anybody else have any other events?

All right, the, uh, good. Every— got anything for the good of the commission? Nothing. We good? Are we all straight on the grant then, Laura?

Forward it. Do you still want me to submit the application? That what we need? Well, we're going to read that thing, then we'll We'll email back. It's going to be— I'll email to you.

Okay, okay. Well then, yeah, we're on the committee. Yeah, you get— if you guys are good with it, then yeah, go ahead. I'm good with it. Okay, you give it down.

Yeah.

Long way away. Yeah, hopefully we get the thing done by fall. Yeah, right. Next meeting, 2 March. Everybody, any major problems with 2 March?

I won't, I won't be here. I'll be out of state. I'll be down to DC. But I'm sorry, be here. All right, you can join the team too.

Verdy's dragging me down there and he's— yeah, I'm doing the NASDA stuff and He's got all sorts of plans for me. Oh yeah. All right, I'll entertain a motion. I so move to close. Do we have a second?

Second. All right, all in favor? Aye. Those opposed?

All right.