Kodiak Borough: Assembly Work Session of July 9, 2026

All right. Well, I will call the Cody Columboro Assembly Work Session to order. It is Thursday, July 9th. We are going to open up with citizen comments. We have one opportunity at today's work session for citizens to come to the podium or call in.

For those who wish to call in, the local number is 907-486-3231. Toll-free number is 1-855-492-9202. Please turn off your radio or any listening device to prevent feedback. For those in the room who wish to speak under Citizens' Comments, please come to the podium and sign in. Turn on the microphone, make sure the green light is on before speaking, and speak directly into the mic.

State your name for the record and address all remarks to the Assembly as a body and not to any member thereof.

Hello. Take it away. Good evening, members of the Assembly. My name is Noam Pector and I am with the Kodiak Soil and Water Conservation District. I spoke with you all before about the importance of our work, but I want to thank you guys for your past support.

And I will let you know that we are here in case you have any questions about our application or activities at large. Thank you, guys. All right. Thank you.

Any calls?

Good evening, my name is Carly McChesney. I'm here tonight in support of this grant, the Kodiak Island Borough, the grant report on the Hope Community Resources for this group. There was an excellent article in today's Kodiak Daily Mirror by a mother who had a learning disabled daughter. And I worked at Hope Community Resources and I loved my job and still visit with some of the clients. They kind of live on a shoestring, so everything means so much to them.

A dollar DVD, a purse from the thrift store, just tea at the coffee shop. They sit there and just have a cup of tea. So what's been happening with Medicaid cuts, it's affecting these people drastically. So I really support what we do for them. Thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

¡Hey there! I am Susan Smith and I represent Brother Francis Homeless Shelter. I came to thank you for all the time that you put into our community, all the hard work that you do to do. Um, of course, it's nonprofit season, and that is never an easy task. The borough's generous funds play a pivotal role not only in our mission but in the mission of many Kodiak nonprofits.

Brother Franz's mission is to serve Kodiak's homeless and low-income community, and with your help, we make a significant impact in the lives of those in need. Last year, we provided over 4,000 bed nights of shelter, over 15,000 nutritious meals, and recorded 194 unduplicated evening clients receiving shelter services. Our evening food service is up 8% over last year, which reflects an increased financial strain on low-income residents. Clients don't have to stay the night in order to eat, and some folks are having difficulty affording essentials and must come to us for food. Your funds help us cover operating expenses, enable us to keep the facility open, provide necessities, warmth, safety, and food to those who need it most, 365 days of the year.

What else do you— what else do we do? With your grant funds, we are able to leverage additional grant funds that positively affect Kodiak's community. We distribute over 15,000 pounds of fish and pantry items out of our community food bank. Our homeless prevention program assisted 108 households to date this year. We help families that in need stay housed and prevent them from becoming homeless.

We keep family homelessness at bay in our community. We continue to search and find affordable housing for our clients, although it continues to be extremely difficult. We offer multiple NA and AA meetings at our facility each day. We partner with other organizations to help our clients find successful paths forward. We provided Kodiak Reentry with some educational materials for their SMART Recovery classes.

Um, we significantly reduced the amount of emergency calls to emergency services, police department, and the hospital. We sincerely thank the borough for their unwavering support. We deeply appreciate your understanding of the essential nature of our services to the community, and we recognize that our work would not be possible without your generous financial assistance. Thank you. Thank you.

Any calls? Anyone else?

Okay. We will move on into Manager's comments. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, Assemblymembers. Received notice today that KCHC is not interested in pursuing the Signal Hill mental health buildings any longer.

And so that is off the table for them now. I sent a letter of support for the Alaska Municipal League's application to the Rural Community's Opioid Response Program. Uh, it's a planning grant. They needed a letter before the assembly could meet, so I sent it earlier this week. I worked with Island Trails Network to work on a hold harmless agreement, um, that allows them to continue to make trail improvements on borough land.

That's something that they've been doing all over the place, and this just kind of gives them the permission to do so. Mayor Griffin and I met with the Board of Education chair and superintendent earlier this week. We're planning on continuing, uh, this level of meeting at least quarterly. And also, I did not put this in here because I remembered it later, but Northstar Gym has been added back to the usable facilities list, and that's being taken care of by, um, the school district. So when you go on the facilities list of places to hold your event, it is now on there, um, and we have worked out the keys, um, our insurance is there, so Northstar is back in play.

Nonprofit funding schedule. Tonight is our first work session. We will have a follow-up work session on July 30th. In Community Development, there was a work session that was held on Wednesday, July 8th. The Commission reviewed the first chapter of the Comprehensive Plan, which is the introduction chapter, and will continue to review it at their August 12th work session.

Their packet review consisted of reviewing 4 subdivision requests for Cliff Point, a rezone case that is associated with those subdivisions and a conditional use permit for a detached accessory dwelling unit. In finance, for 2025 foreclosures, staff submitted the documents to the attorney that will be filed with the courts. What sign the judgment will put a lien on real properties until delinquent taxes are paid. Since additional interest and fees continue to accrue, please call the finance department at 486-9324 for payoff amounts. Our 2026 tax statements were mailed to property owners on June 30th.

Staff is continuing to work with Tyler Finance team to complete remaining outstanding items with our new software implementation project. We have issues with delinquent notices and data exports, but there is progress being made. Citizens and residents can access our property information link on the borough website and get information to print property tax statements, make payments, and view history and general property information. In assessing, you'll see that the assessing folks are out inside of the city of Kodiak this summer for senior citizen and disabled veterans. We have 38 applicants that are senior citizens that do not— did not file for PFD and one disabled veteran that did not apply for a PFD.

And then we have 23 seniors and 2 disabled veterans that are undetermined in the PFD system. ¡Hola! So if you remember a couple of weeks ago in the manager's report, we told you a very big number. There were like 156 people, uh, that, uh, were not going to get their exemptions. So when the tax statements went out, they did not have an exemption.

A lot of those folks have come in. Some of them have contacted their state-level legislators, which have then contacted us. So we're explaining that situation. There are no tax payments due until August 15th. If you were paying half of your tax payment Um, we're hoping to get a lot of these resolved before any tax payments are due.

Um, so the assessing staff checks with the PFD twice a day, so as soon as the PFD clears people, we will know. And so I know that that's been a cause of frustration, especially for folks who always get an exemption. The PFD is how the borough actually checks residency, and so if you didn't file for a PFD you forgot, we have a way to overcome that too. There's a form you can fill out. But if you have filed for a PFD, we usually wait for the answer to come back from the PFD to verify your residence.

For exemptions, no changes. We have those 3 that have timely filed their exemption applications. We haven't heard anything back from the Superior Court or the Supreme— Alaska Supreme Court about our cases that we are waiting Uh, we did get an email from Scott Brent Erickson last week saying that every Friday he logs into the system hoping, um, that something will be heard. We're 19 months out from the day that they heard that, and so this is way longer than a normal Supreme Court case takes, but still nothing yet. Uh, Tyler conversion assessing staff went live with our residential and multi-use properties on the 23rd, and the next anticipated milestone to a go-live date is July 31st for commercial properties.

Um, not everything has been smooth sailing with Tyler, and if the assessor reads my report, she'll see that I took some of that language out. It is not always smooth, but we are moving forward. In IT, IT is working on replacing the satellite internet system out at the landfill. When we had an energy glitch out there, it fried the Starlink, and so we are getting that replaced. We are also reviewing our phone systems to remove legacy information, and they are continuing work on the public-facing laser, laser fish forms with the clerks.

The Koniak cybersecurity infrastructure project is ongoing. They have a targeted date of the 20th for the cutover from the legacy to the new Fortinet firewalls. GIS is working on maps for community development. They are being placed in the comprehensive plan, as well as meeting with Tyler to get data from their systems imported to our public-facing GIS maps, which that means when you go into our map viewer and you click on your property, you'll be able to see all of the new tax information in there. Engineering facilities, the seawater pump extensions are complete for 3 and 4.

IPA is going to be coming back to install the other pumps in the coming weeks. Um, we're really excited to realign the building's automation system to the original design intent, so those things are a lot more self-sufficient. And after we've We made it through our first very low tides. Uh, we were able to not be there at 2 o'clock in the morning to watch the system, so that was a relief for staff. Our solid waste RFP is posted on the website and will close on August 4th.

We're awaiting the proposal, uh, to come in. Uh, before that date, there was only one contractor at the mandatory pre-bid meeting, so we know who that proposal will be coming from. Nothing has changed with the fuel spill assistance. But we are, um, continuing to uncover the land farm out at the landfill if the weather is good, which we've had a few good days. Otherwise, that's since under plastic.

On the nice days, we can take the plastic off and let the sun hit it directly. The other interesting thing at the landfill is that on Tuesday, we got a phone call and an email from the EPA. They're coming for a very unscheduled visit on Tuesday next week to review our surface water, out of the landfill. So that's going to be educational for all. The Port Lions School painting project has already started.

The contractor is out there and has started priming, uh, areas that they have prepped. Uh, we will be seeing, um, work around the underground storage tank removal over at the annex building. We don't have a schedule for that yet. The Mill Bay Beach stairs, if you drive by there, they are something. They're, they're amazing.

Um, they are open for public use. I think we're gonna go do a staff picture on them since it has gotten so much publicity. Um, actually, Haley sent me a gorgeous picture of them today and I forgot to put it in, but I'll get that next week. Uh, the leachate treatment plant citric acid dosing skid row placement, uh, it was delayed, but staff's working with the vendor on updated delivery date. And we're working on our office roof warranty.

We met with a contractor, um, we changed the scope a little bit and work's going to begin on that soon. Uh, we're working on the environmental services contract and the contractor roster that's listed there. That's our change to using a preferred vendor system so that when it's time to get work done, we don't have to wait for the vendor that we have a contract with to make time for us. We can contact anyone who's been pre-approved on that list. Upcoming meetings, we have the Health Facilities Advisory Board meeting on August 4th.

Our new environmental specialist, his name is Zach, starts work next week, the day before the EPA inspection. So welcome aboard, Zach. And that's all I have for the report tonight, and I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. All right. Thank you, Amy.

Any questions for the Manager tonight?

Okay. I will just add to the upcoming meetings, we have a Bureau Lands Committee meeting on Monday— or the 20th. Okay. Never mind. That's coming up.

That's good, I got an extra week.

Fantastic. Um, all right, seeing no comments or questions, let's move on to our first agenda item, reviewing nonprofit applications and requests and initial proposals of funding. Um, Manager Williams, would you like to start us off? Absolutely. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

So in your packet tonight, you have 3 different sets of information. The first set are the applications that came in for our college and libraries. You have a second set with an Excel spreadsheet summary there for health and social services. For those listening, we have $85,000 for that line item with $277,000-plus in requests. This third section that we have is for education, culture, and recreation.

We also have $85,000 scheduled for that line item. Budgeted, and we have just over $122,000 for that. Assemblymember Roberts identified that there was a grant report missing in the packet for Hope Community Resources. They did send one, it just got overlooked in the packet. So in front of you, you will see a copy of that.

That will be put in the packet when we see this again on the 30th, but for tonight, that's there in case you need to reference it for some reason. Um, and just, I wanted to go over a couple of numbers. I already mentioned we have $170,000 budgeted between the two line items, plus $100,000 budgeted for college and libraries, uh, which puts us at $270,000. But we have, uh, $68,169 in the opioid fund balance. There are four applications that are going just for that money.

And then we also, um, last year utilized our Fisheries Economic Development— last year we specifically used it for the Kodiak Seafood Marine and Science Center application. And I wanted to make one note on the application from fiscal year '26. They didn't use all of their money, and so they are going to be returning $4,882.43, which will go back to that Fisheries Development Fund because that's where it came from. So really, that fund will have more money than I just said, but as of right now, until that money comes back and is put in there, there's $68,000 in there. And then we'll let Mr. Smiley explain his two versions of what he has done.

Before we do that, I just want to make my nonprofit conflict of interest statement speech that I have. There are several nonprofit organizations who have applied for grants here that I am a part of. Probably the first, the big one, is Kodiak College. I'm a professor of English at Kodiak College. The grant is for student, uh, student support, um, and I am, uh, my salary is not affected by that in any way.

It's determined by the state legislature and union negotiations and by UA in Fairbanks. The second one is KMXT where I do some management work for them, and then Kodiak Arts Council. Every summer I do a summer theater camp for kids, and I'm actually in the middle of doing that right now, for which I get a small stipend.

I volunteer and I'm involved with Special Olympics, but not in a financial way, but just for transparency. And we just submitted our first dog photo to the Pet Idol that's sponsored by the Humane Society. I don't know if that, you know, means anything. But so I will be, if there are any specific Conversations about Arts Council, KMXT, and Kodiak College, I will not be— I will just not participate in those and won't ask follow-up questions and will defer to the DPO for those. And obviously we are not voting tonight, so I don't need to recuse myself from voting or anything.

But I will defer to Beau first. Does that sound okay? All right. All right. Start us off, Mr. Smiley.

This is the 8th time that I have dealt with this. A mess. It is incredibly complicated, as you can tell. I think a couple of principles to state are, first off, there's not intellectual capacity on this board to understand all of the grants for each of the members of the board. I understand a couple of them, but not all of them by any means.

And in the past, we have nickled and dimed people And sometimes it seems it's due to personal bias, and I don't think that's fair. Um, so one of the remedies for that is to have two levels of funding. In the past, we have used $25,000 for the health and safety ones, and for the educational ones, $5,000. That's not supported by the amount of money we have. And it's tough to find more money.

So I have— I still think the idea of having two— my watch is telling me to shut up.

I think it's important to have two categories of funding. I think if we divide them in that way, it's fine. I think it's crazy to try to nickel and dime things on each of the— on each of the applications because we just don't know enough. One other thing that I've done with these two sheets is for applicants that are new to our system and are asking for the big amount of money, we don't have a history of how you deal with finances. So I think the temperate thing to do is to limit them to the lower amount of money.

For the first time, see how they do things. After they have established a presence in doing this, then that's fine, we can go to the bigger amounts of money. If we limit the amount of money on one of these sheets, the big guys get $15,000 and the small guys get $3,500, that adds up to $181,000, which is $11,000 $100,000 more than we have, but $11,000 should be close to doable. The other one is more advanced than the two amounts are, $20,000 and $4,000. That adds up to $224,000, which is $54,000 more than we've budgeted.

So that's going to take more work. You can look at these I've got them all listed out according to the order that they were presented in the thing on the web. So, other than that, I think the things that we need to make sure about— I'm iffy in terms of some things on the grants. I haven't dealt with it in any way on these two— is personnel. I'm not sure that— Our job is to fund people's personnel.

I think projects are fine, but personnel is a little different. And I really like to see clear budgets. When you just have global kind of, we are going to spend it this way, that just doesn't sway me very much. At any rate, that is my two cents worth. Thank you, Mr. Smiley.

And also keep in mind we have a whole other work session too. Scheduled that we can, if we don't feel like diving into the proposal here, we got time to think about it and get more into it. But we certainly can if you want to now. But I know there are several of you in here who are new to the process and maybe just have more questions than solutions. So we will just kind of keep it open.

Mr. Woods. Just in the interest of declaring potential conflicts, I do serve as a board member for Teen Court. I will not be participating in discussion relating to that. I think that's fine. There's no financial interest.

There's none, but just like you, you set the standard. I figured I might as well follow it. Thank you, Mr. Gardner.

This is hard. Um, there's a lot of requests. It's a lot of money. Uh, at the end of the day, my realm of thinking is to stick very close to what we budgeted for. And, um, I just want to thank Mr. Smiley for the amount of work that went into this.

I was struggling to wrap my head around what to do, and, um, it's an uncomfortable situation. And, uh, I am leaning towards option A that Mr. Smiley had that puts us just $11,000 over budget.— that feels like a surmountable hurdle. And it's doing our best to be fair to everyone as much as possible without breaking the bank. But yeah, I just really appreciate the work you put in here. That's my two cents.

Anyone else? Mr. Whiteside. Thank you. I agree. Thank you, Dr. Smiley, for putting this together.

Looking at that Option A with an $11,000 $1,000 overage if we went that route. Question through the mayor for Madam Manager is there's 3 museums on the list that would total $9,000— $10,500, which would almost bridge that gap if we were to leverage tourism development funds for those 3. That could get us pretty darn close. Yes, you are correct. I also— Mr. Smiley has Rule Cap as being new.

Rule Cap has 2 applications in. One is for a housing initiative. That one is new. The other one is for Head Start. That one is not new.

Just to clarify those. You are going to see them twice, but they have been grant recipients before, and also Kodiak Reentry was new last year, but not this year. Last year, and their grant fund report is in there. They're just back in the opioid funds portion. And they have two in there as well, one for use of opioid funds and one in the regular nonprofit funding.

So just wanted to let you know that those two— and they spent like $19,800 of their $20,000, and that grant report is in there. But yes, I think that would be a good look at the use of those tourism funds and clearly supports tourism and that is what the fund is for. So that would be a great use. Sorry, we were so close on bridging that 11 and then I ruined it by the other statement. But yes, I think that would be a great start.

Anything else, Mr. Whiteside? Okay. We will go Mr. Ames and then Mr. Woods.

Many of these nonprofits like Teen Court, Special Olympics, they don't generate any money from what they do. I have a problem with KCHC. Yes, they are a nonprofit, but they are a business as a medical service, and they charge.

If you got insurance, they charge a lot, and if you make good money and you don't, they charge a lot. I have a real problem with even giving them anything.

I like what they, you know, they're needed in town, but I really don't see them as a pure nonprofit.

The others we can talk about, but I think eliminating that would be a start for filling in gaps. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Woods. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, did you have a follow-up to Mr. Ames?

Sorry, I just was going to say Casey, she also has an opioid ask in for a larger amount, so it might be more appropriate to fund them through there if you don't want to do this one. And then also, we'll talk about it when we get to contracts and packet review, but a large part of what we pay for animal control actually goes to the Humane Society, like to the tune of like almost $75,000. And so if we're looking for low-hanging fruit, giving them another 4 might be, you know, $79,000 instead of $75,000. That might be an easy one to take off the list as well. I do love them, and I feel bad saying that because my dogs are from there.

However, sorry, Miss Jean, that one, though, I know I'm going to hear about that one. But I think that that's an easy one because we do make a significant contribution to the Humane Society through our contract with the city. Thank you for that. Mr. Woods, not having a full understanding of what our restrictions are for our tourism development stuff. Um, seems like Island Trails is a pretty easy fit for that as well.

I mean, they do a tremendous amount of work for— that all goes to promoting tourism here with the different trail maps and such, through primarily through, um, Discover Kodiak Acknowledged. However, that is a resource used by many visitors to Kodiak. So I mean, that— correct me if I'm wrong, but that kind of seems like low-hanging fruit for a source of funding for that.

Anyone else? Other questions? Mr. Gardner. To that effect, as Mr. Woods said, can we not do the same thing for the fair and rodeo? It feels like that can go from tourism.

And then I am curious. I didn't read every single one of the 198 pages of this. Does anybody know exactly what Kodiak Racing is? Is that Kodiak Island Racing Association at the fairgrounds? Yes.

Okay.

Mr. Weisheit. Thank you. I agree with Mr. Woods. Discover Kodiak was here promoting Island Trails Network directly, so I agree with with categorizing that as— or shifting that over into the tourism-related category. Similar to the comment about KCHC, I'm curious about CANA.

I did read their request for the WIC program. It seems like a great program, but I feel that a lot of these nonprofits we are looking at have very limited resources, and similar to KCHC, probably even more so, CANA has a lot of resources available, so I'm not sure if someone has more knowledge about that, how, how our funding is critical to that program and why Canna can't fund that themselves. I'm just— I support the program. I'm just unsure if our contribution is more appropriate than Canna funding it. Yeah, there's a— Manager Williams, did you have—.

Thank you. So, uh, Canna is our local sponsor of the Women, Infants, and Children in the Infant Learning Program, they're not the funding source. And because it was going to get dropped if no one picked it up, Canna picked it up. And so they are not the funders. Those are state programs that they're just administering.

And so it's a great question that comes up every year because people are like, Canna, Canna, why can't Canna do that? Well, it's not, it's not actually a Canna responsibility. And so they're asking for help and making sure that that program continues. Yeah, okay, thank you. Mr. Gardner?

Uh, Madam Manager pretty much took the words out of my mouth, and I know a lot of people that, uh, rely heavily on that program. So, um, yeah, like she said, they're just sponsors. Ms. Roberts? I had a follow-up question for that. Um, in their application, it does break it out by ILP and WIC.

Do those go hand in hand together? Because ILP is over $17,000 of it and WIC is only $5,000 of it?

I don't know how to answer that for sure. I do— I can tell you that when my daughter was little, we were involved in the ILP, but there's no way we would have qualified for WIC, right? And so Infant Learning Program identifies children early on with special needs that might need, you know, eyesight or hearing assistance, where WIC is financially based. So I don't think that they go hand Mr. Ames.

I am correct, if I understand that program, that like you said, Canada is administrating it, but it's a state one and it is open to anybody. It's not Native, correct, or anything like that. It's just the program they run. Yeah, yeah, you are correct, Mr. Ames. It's Those programs are available to anyone in the community.

Anything else? Ms. Roberts. You know, we are looking at some of these big ones that, you know, they asked for $25,000 and we are proposing giving them $3,500. Is there any communication that we should be having with that applicant if $3,500 would even make their project viable? Like if they are interested in $3,500 since that is such a big difference in funding, like are they going to be able to do anything with $3,500 versus $25,000?

That is a concern of mine with some of these gaps that we are proposing. Just a thought.

No, I think that is a valid question. In the grant world that I live in, you ask for your amount and it is either thumbs up, thumbs down. There is really no negotiation on that. That's one thing the Assembly does is adjust, and the City Council too.

Are you asking staff to follow up and contact them? And I don't know if that's what you want to do. Okay. Oh, I don't— I'm not volunteering myself for that. I'm just recalling some of the projects that I saw.

You know, it could be a whole waiting room and it's broken down to chairs, flooring, paint, and so the $3,500 could just cover one part of that, but would that mean that they don't do the whole project just because we are not giving them the full funding? And so is it worth giving them the $3,500? I don't know. It would be great if representatives from the grant applications could come in and answer some of those questions. Okay.

All right. I think— I think that if you are interested, I think it's okay to reach out and ask. I think those are valid questions, personally. And if we're not sure, it's okay to award it, and then if they can't use it, you know, they give it back, you know, for— or they just don't take it at all. Yeah, that is true.

Yeah. Yeah. So, so one thing that I'm hearing is, are you— are we asking staff or the manager to kind of look at the Tourism Development Fund to see what available money is in there after the Discover Kodiak contract? And, and that'll help us in the next conversation, I think. What might also help is after our conversation today, maybe the next time, if it seems like there's a little bit of interest and consensus around Mr. Smiley's Option A here, would it be helpful to have another column that identifies, you know, the funding source, right?

This is going to come from, from GF, this is going to come from tourism, opioid, fishery development fund, and then help us balance out that way. Does that make sense? Yes, Amy. Mr. Smiley, would you send me a copy of your letter A so that I can adapt it? You mean electronically?

Yes, electronically. I saw Mr. Armstrong. Oh, so we are confused. Thank you. No, I would appreciate it electronically, please.

Okay. Thank you. So we'll add— we'll leave the same order so that it matches your packet. And then we'll also add in the college and libraries so you see that. And then the Fisheries Economic Development Fund so you can see what's in there.

And then the— we'll add the opioid on there as well so you can see because there are some with dual entries. Right. Right? Okay. Yeah.

Okay. Mr. Gardner. For college and libraries, I would propose that, uh, while we're trying to stay in budget here— seems to be the theme of the night, which is awesome— um, to lessen the UAF Seafood and Marine Science Center by the amount that they did not use this year, and then subtract that amount, which will be $24,000 and change, from the $100,000 on the college, keeping that within its $100,000 total. Can I make a comment? For sure, yeah.

Part of the reason that they didn't spend all of the money is they didn't have all of the number of students that they were teaching. There are a whole bunch of courses that they give, so the reason they're giving money back is they didn't have full enrollment in some of them. In previous years they have, next year they probably will. So yeah, and that's how we use that the fishery development. Mr. Weisheit.

Yeah, just to follow up on that and then that funding is coming from or directly from that Fisheries Economic Development Fund which is in comparison has a fairly healthy balance that can accommodate that. Did you want to follow up, Mr. Gardner? I was just going to say to follow up Mr. Smiley then. If we wanted to give the Science Center their full ask there, then to lessen the college by that full ask. But again, if that money is coming from one of our different funds and not from our overall expenditure, then that makes me lean the other direction, possibly.

Mr. Woods. Correct me if I'm wrong there too, but I think you're in that regard maybe robbing Peter to pay Paul a little bit. The Fishery Center is administered through UAF. Our local college here is administered through UAA. They're different entities, completely different.

Well, I mean, yes, they're under the UA umbrella. However, they are very separate, distinguished, like distinct areas.

Mr. Garner? Yeah, sure. I'm just saying, let's stay in budget for that, that fund. We've budgeted for $100,000, so That's just where my mind is at.

Anything else? All right, Amy, do you have enough to get us ready for the next one? Yes. Okay.

Oh, I do have a question. We did have— we do have a paper copy of The Hope community, maybe you already explained this, was this not included in the electronic or was this part submitted late? No, that part was submitted on time. They did everything right. Don't hold it against them.

It is just not in your packet. And we have— so when you get your packet for the 30th, it's already been updated and it's in there. But there's nothing— like, we found it this afternoon, so there was no updating your packet for tonight, but it's there. All right. Thank you.

Okay. Up next is to discuss code change to reduce allowable assembly absences. And this one is Mr. Whitesides.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So this was— we discussed this quite a while back. Let's see, in January. So dusting this off now that we are through getting towards the back end of our budget cycle. So I proposed this when I first joined the assembly.

I, I didn't know how many meetings we could actually miss, and we can miss up to 50% of regular meetings, and that doesn't even include special meetings, work sessions. And I thought that was an unreasonable amount of absences. I view running for this body to serve our community as a commitment, understanding that this isn't our most, if not all of ours, you know, we all have jobs or other obligations during the day, but reducing that by half to miss one quarter of the total meetings, I think, is very reasonable, especially given we've recently expanded the opportunity for remote participation. So if someone's traveling for work and they're at their hotel that has Wi-Fi, they can jump in on a meeting at the end of the day from their hotel, or if they're If someone has a mild illness, you know, you got a cold or a cough and you want to participate, you still can remotely through that. But to me, missing half of the meetings, you are just not committing to do the job.

You can step out in January and miss the entire budget cycle, for example, and jump in in the summer. Or if folks want to just enjoy summer and not participate in any meetings, you are just going to miss huge gaps of time. 25%, And that accounts for folks, you know, people want to travel, go on vacation. That's a natural thing, and I think it's very reasonable and would be accommodated through this ordinance or adjusting the code. The exception would be through excused absences for illnesses, which are laid out— let me find our lines here.

So electronic participation is noted in lines 27 through 29, uh, excusals on line 37 through 46. So if there's a medical, medical reason, that's routed through the clerk for illness or injury for an assembly member or a member of their family, bereavement leave if there's a death in family, and then borough business. If you're out at, you know, AML or any other associated borough-related meetings out of town and you can't join remotely in the evenings, those are the allowable excused absences we have in this draft ordinance following procedure that you route it through the clerk. And then just, you know, it's up to our individual integrity No one is going to investigate that. You know, we are not going to look into providing proof of that.

But anyhow, blabbering a bit at this point, but I think this is an appropriate thing to do for folks. If you are going to run for this assembly to represent our community, it is a time commitment. And so that is where I landed.

So, Mr. Whiteside, it looks like that there are— correct me if I am wrong or you see it differently— there are kind of— just to kind of guide our discussion, there are 3 things here. One is the, the reasons, the allowable excused reasons. Number two is the, um, the process of, um, qualifying for an excused absence. And then the third thing is the, uh, revising the allowable number of absences from 50% to 25%. Correct.

And then that third part, um, to include work sessions and special meetings. Right.

So just to help streamline the discussion, is it okay if we look at the first kind of section first, the reasons, medical bereavement and borough business? Any—. Sure, yeah. So this came up when we— when I first initiated discussion on this back in January, folks brought up some great points, you know, about medical, and there's some, you know, it's a nuanced, I guess, reason for being absent. So that's why we modified the language a little bit to, you know, allow all medical absences for immediate— for not only assembly member but their immediate family as well.

So if you have sick kids, sick family members that you need to care for, so that's where we landed on that. On that one. But, um, okay, so let's talk about those first. Uh, Mr. Garner and then Mr. Woods. Full support across the board.

Don't take the job if you can't commit. Mr. Woods. I'm going to go completely opposite of Jeremiah, which I find I do more than I ever would have believed. Um, a couple big reasons. One, we have approximately 619 folks in the borough that live in the Village, uh, showing up for all of them with their relatively restricted means by which we can participate electronically, essentially makes those— it functionally impossible for those people to participate in this body.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but we're only allowed something like 5 or 6 particip— we can only participate electronically a fixed number of times within the year. Unless we're going to drastically expand that electronic participation permission, this is not going to get my support. I completely understand the importance of staying forward to your commitment, but I also have the concern of it's not being abused currently. We don't seem to have issues with that at present, so it seems like it's something that's not broke that we're fixing. Um, for those reasons, I will not be supporting this.

Mr. Gardner? I think it's not being abused currently because we are kind of at a special time with a good assembly, and I'm pretty certain it's been used in the past, but I would be in favor of expanding electronic participation, you know. But I just see no reason why you shouldn't have to be at the meeting.

Mr. Whiteside. Yeah, thanks for that, Mr. Woods. This is something that I have brought up in the past as well for folks in the Villages if they wanted to run for assembly. I support full remote participation. I do remember the Mr.

Clerk mentioning there are some limitations to that as far as remote participation and being in person for certain items. I don't recall what was brought up, but I do know—. Executive sessions. Yeah, right, executive session. That was certainly one of them.

Um, but I agree, uh, with Mr. Woods, and I would support something like that, but acknowledging that there are limitations, that we couldn't just go full remote for people that are in the villages or even remote communities like Chinniack and Sacchac.

Mr. Ames.

Forgive me if I haven't read this clearly enough, but are we separating work sessions so you're basically— 25% means you can miss 6 regular meetings if it were just regular meetings. So are we separating You can miss 6 regular meetings, you will miss 6 work sessions, or—. Yeah, go ahead, Mr. Weisack. I think the goal is a cumulative total of total meetings, not, not of each category of meeting or type of meeting. Mr. Woods, theoretically, because this definition also includes special meetings, doesn't that percentage number potentially change just based on scheduling?

If we have— call another special meeting or we remove one from the calendar, wouldn't that potentially impact somebody who is already very close to that 25%, whether or not that keeps them in compliance or automatically vacates a seat? And that being the case, I can see how that could be abused by a less scrupulous— a less scrupulous— a less— what am I looking for? Unscrupulous. Thank you. A more unscrupulous individual.

I just want to just have a point of clarification before I think Mr. Ames had his hand raised. I don't think the term abuse is really even true or relevant to this. I don't understand how you can— anyone could have abused the policy. It's more like maybe somebody has been pushing missing a third to 40% and getting close to 50%. As far as I know, there's only been— we have Mr. Arndt here, he might know— one person removed or close to being removed for attendance in the past few decades, you know.

So I don't think it's anything having to do with abusing a policy, but just taking a look at it differently. Mr. Ames.

Again, just clarification thing. When a special meeting is on the same night as a work session, does that count as two hits or—. Okay.

Mr. Weitzig. Yeah, I agree. Another way to look at this, and I think maybe a nod to the Mayor's comment, was this also frontloads the commitment. To anyone who's running with the expectation that they are going to show up to these meetings and contribute, have a meaningful contribution throughout the year. And knowing that going into putting your name on the ballot that you can miss 25% of meetings or, well, if I can miss up to 50, then I might be able to pull this off and run for the assembly.

So there's— that's another way of looking at it as well. You are front-loading that expectation that someone is going to meaningfully contribute throughout that year.

Ms. Roberts.

In general, I support this. I did have a couple of notes for it. Medical illness or injury, does that include or could that include family leave, like if a spouse has a baby or something, is that going to be excused?

And then the other thing I had for it, I know at one point we did have a report put on our desk when we got here of how many absences we had had so far in the year. I think, you know, if it's getting narrowed down to 25%, it'd be nice to have a pretty more frequent update of how many you've missed. I think we all track it pretty closely ourselves, but just to have an awareness of how many we've missed would be Good. Um, yeah, Mr. Whiteside, about Ms. Roberts' question. Yeah, for, you know, for medical, there's, there's probably dozens of reasons that we could categorize as a medical absence.

I'm not too hung up on diving very deep into that. I think anything that would require medical care that would prevent you from being at a meeting or with for you or your immediate family, I think qualifies, just keeping it that broad. Yeah. Then I would suggest someone to amend maybe line 42, because we don't want to consider pregnancy as an illness or injury. It seems like a pretty contained set right there, but maybe just a little bit of wordsmithing to get what you're trying to get at, Mr. Whiteside.

Yeah, perhaps even medical, just getting rid of illness injury or any medical need that would prevent you from participating in a meeting. You know, we can go that route. So maybe, Mr. Mayor, if you could maybe lend your wordsmithing abilities to that line, that would be appreciated.

And that is why it is important we have diverse representation. On the Borough Assembly, just saying. Mr. Woods.

More to reiterate a point. I would feel a lot more comfortable supporting this because I do believe it is absolutely made with the— made in good faith with the right intentions to try and clarify things. And I think it is a good look. But while we are taking one bite of the apple, it would make a lot of sense to me to expand that electronic participation thing. If we are going to expand sections of various sections of code, it would make me a lot happier to do that and would most likely get my support.

All right. Let's take a look at the process part, lines 47 through 56. Any questions or discussion there?

Okay. And then any other final comments on lines 101 to 102?

Okay. I'm hearing none. It just sounds like the one change will just kind of look at line 42 and make that a little more inclusive. All right.

Okay. Oh, yeah. Mr.— oh, yes. Thank you. Yes, Lena.

Mr. Mayor, just to speak to Assemblymember Roberts' comment about the printout, we do quarterly printouts for the attendance. However, you know, we can adjust that as necessary depending on what happens with this, um, this ordinance. If you, you know, we could do monthly or whatever the case. So, but right now we've been printing them quarterly.

Uh, Mr. Raines, basically I agree with this I really don't like the idea of a special meeting comes up quickly.

I'm on vacation out of the country for 3 weeks, a special meeting comes up and I get docked twice. I don't think that's appropriate if it came up after I gave notice and left town that I get hit twice. That's just my opinion. Mr. Weisheit. Commissioner Burchett.

Thank you. To Mr. Wood's comments again, I do support revisiting code for remote participation. I would— but I would understand that that would have to come through a separate ordinance to modify that language in code. I would certainly support that and co-sponsor that if that is something anyone wanted to spearhead. Or I could do it myself, but I do think it's a great idea.

But I think we would have to keep that separate from this one. It would be difficult to lump them together because it's just different code.

Anyone else? Okay. Well, that takes care of our work session agenda. Let's take about a 3-minute break before we move into packet review. And so we'll be back in 3 minutes.

Anybody want random celebratory cake? For no specific reason? Thursday cake. Thursday cake. Do we have another cake?

Do we ever not have a cake?

Thursday cake. Thursday cake. Do it. I enjoyed that one.

Should it rain so we always have to eat? Yeah. Okay. Lunch. I'm not eating.

Animal shelter, about $75,000. Yeah, that's numbers per year. Yeah, it's split with the city. So we usually approve 2 years at a time.

I'm in the final stages of Task 1, I don't know if you know what that feels like. I'm wrapping up my paper, my technology report. It's going to be—. I'm going to be putting it for review on public review on the 18th, next Wednesday. I'm excited.

Finish line is close. The what? The finish line is close. Yeah, it's going to be nice.

Chris, how many pages is Chapter 1 of your comprehensive plan? With maps is 132, I think. Or just the introduction?

Yeah. Oh, okay. I feel like I've only kind of scratched the surface, and I went from 70 pages in the original document to 140.

5 Pages. Each cluster didn't even have like 10 pages each. Yeah, they were pretty small. I can remember, we were able to like actually dig into it.

We miss you up there in the office next door. It's really dark now, so that's okay.

That's right. Okay. Let's come back to the Work Session agenda. We are moving into packet review for the regular meeting next week. So up first, we will have a public hearing next week on Ordinance No.

FY 2027-03, rezoning a portion of Uzinqui Trac-C Block 1, remainder of USS 4871 from R-1 Single-Family District to PL Public Use. PL District, and that zoning will correspond to a lot created by preliminary subdivision S-26-016. Manager Williams. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The Native Village of Ozinki submitted a rezoning application to rezone the subject property from R-1 District to the PL District to permit the existing building on the property to be used for government offices and as the community tsunami shelter.

The existing property was once a part of the Ozinki Airport, which is no longer in operation. Our 2008 comprehensive plans Future Use Land Map designated this property as industrial. However, that designation is no longer valid since the subject property is no longer in operation as an airport. The proposed PL District supports the use of a portion of the property for government uses such as government offices and a tsunami shelter. Our Community Development Director Chris French is here tonight if you have any specific questions.

All right, thank you. Any, uh, questions or discussion about the item?

Mr. Ames. I will just hand out the comment I have handed out before, and I wish organizations would make sure they have the proper zoning before they put buildings up. I will support this, but putting buildings up before you have the proper zoning is not appropriate in my opinion.

Thank you. Anyone else?

Mr. Gardner. I just think that, uh, maybe we could let people like Mr. French know if we are going to have questions so he doesn't have to sit here all night and wait for us to not have any questions on a very simple subject.

Thank you, Mr. Gardner. Anyone else?

Okay. And now we're going to move into, uh, contracts. Uh, the first contract, uh, contract number FY2027-01, animal control contract between Kodiak Island Borough and the City of Kodiak for July 1st, 2026 to June 30th, 2028 for the amount of $156,903 for year 1 and $160,826 for year 2. Manager Williams. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Recognizing the need for control of animals outside of the the city for the purpose of protecting public health and safety. I am authorized to partner with the city of Kodiak to provide animal control services under our code subsection in Title 604.200. I've included that code in the other information part for you in case you're curious. The contract amount is split equally between the city of Kodiak's agreement with the Humane Society and the salary costs for animal control services. So as I mentioned during nonprofit funding, the city of Kodiak does provide animal control services both inside and outside.

And then a portion of that money that we give also goes to fund the Humane Society each year.

Thank you. All right. Any discussion from the assembly? Mr. Ames, do we have an idea of how much goes to the animal control officer part and how much goes to the shelter?

Yes, of our portion, about $75,000 goes to the shelter and the rest goes to the animal control services. And when I asked— when I got this from the city, I did ask for their budget report, and there's no identifiable line item in there that you're going to get to that number. Um, the money that goes to the Humane Society is Under professional services, it's 430.110. This year, that number is higher. It's $194,000 because included in that is improvements to the shelter itself that they've already agreed to do.

So not all of that money is just a donation to the Humane Society. They have that wrapped up in professional services because that's how they will track the money that goes to the contractor that performs those repairs.

So there's, um, but you'll see in that line item, um, for contracted services, it's, it's similar to that amount. This year it'll be $150,000 that goes to the actual Humane Society, so $75,000 of that will be ours.

All right, Mr. Woods. Yeah, just kind of some clarification there, um, as far as probably I'm imagining why it's hard to see a budget line item the city. They used to have a position that was strictly animal control there, uh, that has since been morphed into tasking for most of the community service officers. Um, so I suspect that's why it's kind of hard to parse out. Um, it's not like the service isn't being done, it's just more a matter of job titles have changed and tasking has changed.

And the employee that was in that animal control services position had been with the city for a long time, and so their salary was higher, and we're paying a little less now for the salary portion because the employees aren't on that high of a pay scale.

Anyone else? All right, thank you. Moving on, um, next contract, um, contract number FY2027-08, approval of facility surface maintenance repairs and snow removal services with MK Enterprises LLC. I see that that's just a placeholder. Uh, the reason there's no information on that one, Mr. Mayor, is because we had a protest on the contract, and so we delayed it to this cycle.

Uh, we responded— I responded as the procurement officer to the formal bid protest this morning. Alignment with staff recommendation and our legal team's recommendation, we have canceled that procurement. So that contract will not go through as it was put out in the universe on this first round. As we learned from contracts in the past, when we cancel procurement and we still need those services done and we need to resolicit for those services, we're required to change that contract significantly. Uh, this round we're going to utilize, um, one of the other things that we're doing.

So we're going to change this contract to be snow removal only. That makes it all non-prevailing wages instead of mixing a contract that has prevailing and non-prevailing wages, which makes sense and our legal team was fond of. And then we are switching, as I mentioned earlier, we're doing that preferred vendor contract. So when we put a list out for services, um, for brush clearing or pothole maintenance or curb repair, or I think in the past we've used it for grading out at the landfill, we'll have a list of contractors that are available to perform those services, and we still try to use the cheapest first, but we have a list of things. That part of this contract was so minuscule when it came time to look at the base bid and what the majority of the work was going to be, and then looking at all of the equipment that you would need for all of those other little things that may or may not happen, it became very confusing and got very convoluted.

And so separating those out will make this contract a lot more clear. And I think we fell victim to that old— that this is the way we've always done it thing. Like, we bid this because this is the way it's always been bid. And so our ENF director and our legal team, I think, very wisely came up with a recommendation to split those out so we're not always doing it. That same way.

This just is going to simplify it a lot. So we will resolicit a new contract for just snow removal, and then anything else that we need for maintenance, we will be doing completely separately outside of this contract. Yeah. Yeah. We talked and it makes sense to me.

Any discussion from the Assembly?

Okay. All right. And the third contract, contract number FY2027-11, provision of destination marketing and tourism development services with Korea County Convention and Visitors Bureau, doing business as Discover Kodiak, in the amount of $75,000. Uh, Madam Manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

This is our annual contract with the Kodiak Island Convention and Visitors Bureau. They do business as Discover Kodiak to provide Kodiak Island as a tourist destination to promote local businesses in support of tourism activities. You'll see our standard contract has been the same contract for the last few years, uh, for the amount of $75,000 in your packet. And I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have about that. Any questions?

Mr. Gardner. I directly benefit from Discover Kodiak. I feel like I may have a financial conflict of interest here, but I do think they're awesome. But I think I would recuse myself from a vote on this.

We'll talk. Uh, Mr. Woods. And I kind of think we all benefit from Discover Kodiak, and that's kind of the point of having them. Um, not to diminish what you're saying at all, actually, it's a, it's a big integrity thing. I just think it's, um, whenever we deal with something like this, it is kind of interesting how we do all directly and indirectly benefit from services like this.

It's, uh, it's kind of a cool deal what they do. Thank you. Yeah, like when we, when we lower the mill rate, we all benefit from, you know, a lower mill rate. But, you know, so we all have a financial stake in that. But yeah, I see what you're saying, Mr. Woods.

Uh, Mr. Garner, just having a tourism business, they send me a lot of business, and I'm just saying I have a financial benefit from those guys. That's a little more direct than you guys. I wouldn't like the optics if I were in the community, that's all.

Anyone else?

Okay, moving on. We have one ordinance for introduction next week. This is Ordinance Number FY 2027-05, Levying an Area-Wide Marijuana Excise Tax, Establishing the Community Well-Being Fund, and Providing for Voter Approval of the Tax. And I'll toss it over to Ms. Roberts. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

We've had a couple of updates since last week. This was sent over to the legal team. We just got an email tonight with those comments, also had feedback from Finance Director, and so can't really speak in detail of those because I haven't really had the chance to read through them yet. There was an initial recommendation from the attorney to amend the current ordinance and not send this to ballot, and I just don't think that was my intent or the assembly's intent. And so I think we want to move forward with putting it to the ballot, and we've scrapped the idea of amending at all.

And so that was the guidance that we gave her when reviewing the ordinance language, was to please view it as putting it on the ballot. So I'll support moving this to ordinance— or this ordinance, uh, to public hearing.

Any other discussion? Mr. Gardiner? I don't like it, but I'll support it going to public hearing.

Anyone else? Mr. Smiley? I like it and I'll support it.

Mr. Woods? Two parts. One, I, I do like it. I do think it's a necessary step to diversifying income stream coming into the borough. Second bit, really not impressed with how a pretty straightforward question was asked of our attorney, and we came back with a really not even close to what we asked for answer.

That was not impressive in any way.

Anyone else?

Okay. All right. Whoops. I switched tabs. There we go.

And then, as a reminder, we will be having a special work session at 6 PM next week to interview candidates. And so we have on our agenda for next week under other items some business items in case we— y'all decide to make a decision that night. So the appointment and the administration of oath of office are down there. Any questions about the process?

Okay. Oh yeah, Mr. Gardner. How—. I can't remember off the top of my head, how long is the period for them to apply? Does it run right up to the day before?

Yeah, Lena. So the deadline is July 11th, so Saturday. Thank you.

Okay, that takes us back to, um, the work session agenda and to Clerk's comments.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the assembly. I did just do a brief Clerk's report for you in Nova's absence. The only couple highlights I have is we did receive our election envelopes that we had ordered We ordered new inner and outer envelopes. You probably won't understand what that means, but that's what we call them. When we finally received them, they were lost for a little bit, but we found them and they are here.

And then we did receive 2 additional applications for the assembly vacant seat this afternoon, and those have been emailed to you. We have had a few other people pick up applications, but they have until Saturday. As long as their applications are notarized, then they can email them to the clerk's office tomorrow. If they do need a notary, they can come in, bring their application, and we can notarize it in the clerk's office. And I'm happy to answer any questions you might have about my report.

Any questions for the clerks?

Okay, seeing none, we'll Move into Assemblymember comments. We will start down there at the end with Mr. Woods.

No comment.

Ms. Roberts. No comment. Mr. Weisheit. Nothing to add. Thank you.

Mr. Ames.

I would like to say I appreciate Scott's time bringing him to the Commission. Budget sheets and options. Other than that, we are done. Mr. Smiley. I am getting worried about our attorney and how tight are we tied into them.

What was— how was it, a 3-year contract? Is there any way out of it?

I am so sorry, this is not a Q&A for the manager. This is your time, Mr. Smiley. I think we should look into getting out of that contract, I guess. Secondly, I want to thank people for their input on nonprofit stuff. It is a burden, I understand.

My goal is to help simplify it, and I hope I have done that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Gardner. I also want to thank Mr. Smiley for the obvious amount of time that went into the work that he did and tell the public that I wish we could give everybody all of the money. There's only a set amount of money, and no matter how much people ask, it doesn't change how much is in the bank account.

But it's sad to not give you everything you want. Um, that's all I have to say. Thank you. And, uh, Mayor's comments tonight, not much. Um, I'll just bring up Lands Committee meeting on the 20th.

We're looking at parcel and things. And so I want to thank the Community Development Department for that. And I also want to say that I think this work session went really, really well today because we have, you know, Assemblymembers who worked hard at the homework, you know, taking the time to work on ordinance language or, you know, nonprofit ideas. And so I think when we, when we do that outside homework, it really pays off during during meeting time. And so I really appreciate you all for the hard work you have been putting into that and the patience with me and the staff and the lawyer, you know, in trying to get some of these things together.

So I really appreciate you guys. And with that, we are adjourned.