Kodiak Borough: Assembly Regular Meeting of July 16, 2026 Part 2

All right. I will reconvene the regular meeting at 8:11 PM. And I will declare nominations open for the Code of Conduct Assembly appointment. Mr. Whiteside. I would like to nominate Mr. Mark Anthony Viscoccio, Mr. Alexander Sweeney, Mr. Caleb Callahan, and Mr. Shawn Brekke.

Okay. All candidates have been nominated, so we will proceed to balloting. I believe the Clerk has already— delivered distributed ballot slips for you. So, you write down the name and the clerk will come by and pick up your vote and then we will tally the votes.

And while that is going on for the public, a majority vote of the Assembly shall be required for an election, not a majority vote of those here today, but— but for the entire 7-seat assembly. And if there is no majority cast for any candidate, the candidates with the fewest ballots will be dropped from the list of the candidates until there are 2 remaining, and balloting will continue until 1 candidate is elected. And in the case of an ultimate tie, that won't happen. So we don't have to worry about me voting.

Mr. Mayor and members of the assembly, um, I have Mr. Viscacho getting 3 votes, Mr. Brekke 1 vote, and Mr. Sweeney 1 vote. I think we're gonna need to re-vote, um, and we'll just drop the zero vote from the list, and then we'll have Mr. Vizcacho, Burke, and Mr. Sweeney on the list for people to vote. Okay, okay, so take another round of voting.

For Mr. Mayor, members of the assembly, for the second round of voting, we do have a result, and they are as follows: Mr. Vizcocho, 4 votes, and then Mr. Brekke, 1 vote. So we have a majority vote for Mr. Vizcocho. Right, um, congratulations to Mr. Vizcocho. For the other applicants, again, thank you so much for, for coming in. And, um, yes, there will be plenty of open seats on the assembly, and I think if I can speak on behalf of the group up here on the dais, we would really like to encourage every single one of you to run for one of these open seats this fall.

So with that, our last item is to administer the oath of office to the newly appointed assembly member. And so Borough Clerk Nova Javier will administer the oath of office to Mr. Vizcocho. Mr. Vizcocho, I would like to invite you I would like you to come up, please.

Okay, please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, state your name, I, Barbara Antonette Escorcho, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will support and defend, that I will support and defend, the Constitution of the United States of America, The Constitution of the United States of America. The Constitution of the State of Alaska. The Constitution of the State of Alaska. And the ordinances of the Kodiak Island Borough.

And the ordinances of the Kodiak Island Borough. I will honestly, faithfully. Honestly and faithfully. And impartially. And impartially.

Discharge my duties. Discharge my duties. As a member. As a member. Of the Kodiak Island Borough Assembly.

—Of the Kodiak Island Borough Assembly to the best of my ability. Congratulations.

Nova, when does Mr. Vizcocho's term actually begin? I would say after this meeting.

Okay. And then I will be in contact so that we can have an orientation. Thank you. Congratulations again.

Thank you. All right. That brings us to our second and final opportunity for citizens' comments. For those who wish to call in, the local number is 907-486-3231, toll-free 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. And please state your name for the record, address all remarks to the assembly as a body and not to any member thereof.

Good evening, my name is Carly. Just wanted to say that we have some pretty amazing candidates, and I hope to see them, some of them sitting up there. And, um, I just learned that this gentleman actually worked for Bill Wilakowski in Juneau, and he's one of my favorite. I have a bigger poster on my kitchen wall, but I also have a giant poster of the borough assembly meetings on the other kitchen wall. So this is pretty exciting.

Just, um, thank you, and I hope you all come back. Thank you. Thank you, Carleen. Anyone else? Any calls?

All right, then we'll move into Assemblymember comments. Mr. Gardner.

Thanks so much, all four of you, for putting your names in the hat. It's a scary and a little bit humbling thing to do. For those of you that weren't nominated, everybody up here would like to beg you to please put your name in the hat again. It was really hard to choose, um, harder than it may have seemed from that side of the table. And, um, congratulations to Mr. Viscoccio.

I appreciate everything you do for the community, and I'm deeply looking forward to see how much the other 3 of you can do for the community come this October. So thanks so much for coming out. Thank you, staff. Thanks, everybody else. Mr.

Smiley, um, thanks to all 4 of you for showing up and trying out for this. I agree you should sign up for the open seats in October. And thank you very much, Mr. Whiteside. Thank you, Maggie. Thanks to all four of you.

You're all outstanding candidates, and I truly mean that. And we had a lot of great things to say about each one of you. You all bring great ideas, great strengths to the assembly. There's going to be several seats open here in just a few months. Please don't let this deter you from continuing to want to sit up here on the assembly.

I think every one of you would be fantastic up here. So please don't let it sway you from the election in October. Just let this kind of fuel your next step on how you are going to pursue the election. But thank you for the time spent in coming and speaking with us. You all did a great job.

Ms. Roberts. Thank you. Mr. Whiteside said it well. Thank you to all the applicants that came, put your application in and came to speak tonight.

It takes a lot of guts to sit there. I know the feeling. And please put your name on the ballot in October. And Mr. Woods. I don't think you could have picked a group of people to put in for an appointment that had a wider range of, like, well demonstrated strengths.

You guys are awesome, well and truly. And I'm not just saying that. You guys come from wildly different backgrounds, and it's really cool seeing some really cool people putting in for it. Pretty, pretty please run again. Pretty please.

All right. Thank you all. The next Assembly Work Session is scheduled for Thursday, July 30th at 6:30 PM. The next Assembly regular meeting will be held on Thursday, August 6th at 6:30 PM in the Borough Assembly Chambers. And I will entertain a motion to adjourn.

Mr. Whiteside. Move to adjourn. Second. Moved and seconded. Voice vote on the motion.

All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed, same sign. And we are adjourned. Thank you, everyone.