Mat-Su Borough: Platting Board Meeting - June 4th, 2026

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Good afternoon, everyone. I am opening this meeting of the platting board at 1:02pm Madam Secretary, the roll, please. Platting member leaving. Present. Platting member Gilson.

Present. Platting member Carney. Present. Platting member Traxler. Present.

Planning Member Kevin. Present. Plotting member McBride. Present. Planning.

Members that are absent and excused today are plotting members Chevetta and Galloway. Madam Chair, we have a quorum. Thank you very much. We stand for the pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible.

Can I get a motion to approve today's agenda? Madam Chair, I move for the approval of today's agenda. Can I get a second? I seconded. Thank you very much.

Are there any objections?

The agenda has been approved. Can I get a motion to the approve May 21 meetings minutes?

Madam Chair, I move to approve the minutes from the May 21st regular meeting. Thank you very much. Can I get a second? Thank you very much. Are there any changes or objections to the meeting's minutes?

Seeing none. The motion has been approved. Okay, I'm going to open public testimony for persons to be heard present or online for items not scheduled for public hearing.

Anybody present that want to speak? Anybody online? Online system is not functioning. Okay, I'm closing public testimony.

All right. So today we have Irons in the Fire Crest. The request is to create six lots from lots one and two, Palmar Acres, number one, to be known as Irons in the fire crest, containing 1.93 acres. Parcels are located west of South Felton street, north of East Helen Drive, and east of North Pattenmore Circle, lying within the southwest quarter. Section 5 to Township 17, North Range 02 East Seward Meridian, Alaska, in the city of Palmer and in Assembly District number two to the board.

Do you or any member of your immediate family have a substantial financial interest in any property affected by this decision, or will you recognize a foreseeable profit as a result of this decision?

Seeing none. Have you received or otherwise engaged in ex parte contact with the applicant, other parties interested in the application, or members of the public concerning the application or issues presented in this application, either before the application or during any period of time the matter is submitted for decision outside of the public process provided by the borough?

Seeing none. Are you able to be impartial in this decision?

Seeing an affirmative, Madam Secretary. The mailing report, please. There was 136 public notices mailed November 12, 2025. Thank you very much. Staff report.

Thank you. Chair Chris Curlin, Platting Staff. The request is to create three lots from lots one and two. Pat Mar acres number one, ranging in size from 0.46 to 0.93 acres. Water will be supplied by the city of Palmer.

Soils report was submitted by Kurt Haller, professional engineer stating all lots have the required buildable area and contiguous usable septic area. Test hole and soils. Data can be found at exhibit B. Comments received were as follow. MSB Pre Design and engineering has no comments.

MSB Permit center has no comments. City of Palmer Public Works provided specific instructions concerning the water line to be used and a reminder of driveway permits. MTA had no comments. GCI has no comments or objections. NSTAR and MEA did not reply.

The public Three comments were received in a previous mailing for this case. They are at exhibit G. No objections. One not in favor. But that's when it was six lots. Now it's three.

We've heard nothing back. Irons in the fire crest is consistent with state statute and borough code. All lots have the required frontage and usable area. No objections were received from outside agencies or departments. Staff recommends approval of irons in the fire crest with these five findings of fact and seven conditions of approval.

Thank you. Thank you, Chris. Are there any questions for staff? Just real quick, Chris. I'm going to assume that it's standard practice not to include the city requirements on the plat.

There's no note referencing the comments from the city on the plat through the chair. Correct. That's construction. Thank you. Any other questions?

Okay, seeing none. Would the petitioner's representative like to speak? No, he does not. So I'm going to open for public hearing. Anybody present that would like to speak.

And the system is down for public testimony. Telephonic and online system is not currently functioning. Okay. Hello, Gary. I'm closing public testimony.

Gary LaRusso for the petitioner. Ben Crowley is here. Any questions? Initially we had six lots. We were going to run sewer but it's the age old problem with running.

City sewer is way too expensive. So there's three lots with a water system.

Any questions?

Yes. Not your office. Thank you, Gary. All right. Can I get a motion from the board?

Madam Chair, I move to for the approval of preliminary plat of irons in the Fire Crest, Southwest 1/4, Section 05, Township 17, North Range 02 East Seward Meridian, Alaska contingent upon conditions of approval 1 through 7. Thank you very much. Mr. Lebeing. Can I get a second. I'll second it.

Thank you very much. Discussion from the board.

Any objections?

Motion passes.

All right. Now we have Connolly Homestead. Their request is to create seven tracks from partial U04 638000 L06 to be known as Connolly Homestead, containing 144.29 acres, plus or minus. The property is located directly east of Delinda Lake, directly west of Butterfly Lake and west of West Parks highway within the northwest quarter. Section 01, Township 17, North Range 05 West Seward Meridian, Alaska, in the Big Lake Community Council and in Assembly District Number five to the board.

Do you or any member of your immediate family have a substantial financial interest in any property affected by this decision or. Or will you recognize a foreseeable profit as a result of this decision?

Seeing none. Have you received or otherwise engaged in ex parte contact with the applicant, other parties interested in the application or members of the public concerning the application or issues presented in this application, either before the application or during any period of time the matter is submitted for decision outside of the public process provided by the borough.

Seeing none. Are you in? Are you able to be impartial in this decision?

Seeing an affirmative, Madam Secretary. The mailing report. There was 41 public notices mailed May 11, 2026. Thank you very much. Staff report.

Thank you. Chair Cayman Reynolds, Platting Staff. Topographic narrative was submitted. See Exhibit B. No lots have slopes exceeding 7% except for a 20% slope in the northeast corner.

Proposed tract A. Tract A has a well and structures with remaining area in all proposed tracts being undeveloped, consisting mostly of dense timber and undergrowth. All proposed tracks are over 400,000 square feet and are exempt from soils and engineering data. Apportionment to MSB 43.2 0.281 AI. All assets have over 10,000 square feet of usable building area. There were no objections or concerns received from bureau departments or outside agencies or the public at the time of the staff report.

At the time of staff report write up, there were no responses to requests for comments from U.S. army Corps of Engineers, Community Council, Big Lake, MSB Emergency Services, Community Development Assessments, Planning or Development Services or MTA, MEA or OnStar. Proof of navigability was submitted. Please see Exhibit C. Two comments were received after staff report was written. Added as handouts, both objecting. One cites concerns that overland access, parking and canoe boat storage will become overburdened beyond capacity.

Those areas are already crowded and difficult to use. The other raises concern with the flagpole tracks. E and G citing these accesses go directly over drainage Streams comment suggests access to tracks E and G only from delindia Lake. As an alternative, staff recommends approval of the Connolly Homestead subdivision with these six findings of facts and six conditions of approval. Thank you very much.

Would the petitioner like to speak or questions for staff?

No questions for staff. Would the petitioner's representative like to speak now or later?

No. Okay. I'm going to open for public hearing even though nobody's here, nobody online because it's broken. Closing public hearing had to do it. Okay, now the petitioner and come up and speak.

Hello, Patent Planning Board. Tim Carmen with Bull Moose Surveying representing Bob Hoffman, our licensed surveyor and the petitioner, Mr. Connolly. Yeah, like it says, we're making these large tracks as long as I don't think there's any issue like the public comment said with access. So we should be good there. Any questions?

I have a question just out of curiosity. So there's a line going right through it. Seismic trail. I'm not sure what you would actually. I believe it was the original US survey.

If you look at it, they show a seismic trail there. Hasn't been used in 20, 40, 50 years. It's all overgrown and you can't even when I was out there myself surveying, I couldn't find it on the ground. So. Yeah, I was just curious if snow machiners were using it.

No, there is a trail because I believe all the property, Joel could correct me as to the south and east is all state land and there's trails that go literally skirt the property that everyone takes there. So. Okay. That are active and still being used. So most of these lots are float plane access, correct?

Correct. It looks like that there's one of tract A is already developed and they might be using. Yeah, that's the homestead property there. Yeah. And then the what's.

I guess the lakes are mislabeled, but that's been a major issue with the state. But the labeled on here Butterfly Lake also has canoe access through all the way through the canoe system there. So there's also boating access into the properties on that lake at least. But there is a public right of way on the north of the property. That is it does have an active trail that runs through so you can.

And it goes down to the lake on the other side. So there are. The lakes are interconnected on that side by public access and trails.

Is there any questions for the petitioners, Representative?

I don't see any. I'm sorry, I just had a real quick question here about the access to track B. I'm just Curious, if you will. Why the north south running boundary between track A and track B? Why if it looked like it went due north, it would actually connect into Airport Way. Was there a reason that you didn't want to do that?

Say again? I'm sorry. Well, I'm, you know, I'm just looking at the boundary between track day and track B. Yeah. Okay. And at the very northern edge, it kind of veers east.

Oh, gotcha. It kind of follows the. The. If you look at the hillshade, it kind of follows that. Okay.

Top topographical. Based on topographical. Yeah. Same thing on the south end of that. On the other side of the property, more so.

Yep. Yep. Any other questions, Mr. Kevin? No. You got your mic on?

All right, you're good? All right. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right.

Can I get a motion from the board, Madam Chair? I move to approve the preliminary plat of Connolly Homestead, Section 1, Township 17, North Range 5, West Seward Marine, Alaska, contingent on staff recommendations one through six. Thank you. Mr. Kevin, can I get a second? Second?

Thank you very much. Mr. Leaving any discussions from the.

I don't see any. Any objection.

Seeing no objection, the motion passes.

All righty. Platting staff comments.

Tyler Young, Planning office to the board. We discussed last time about training for legal coming down and offering training. We sent out a poll, we got a few responses back. Legal has changed, has vetoed one of the days. So we are down to right now, hopefully being able to do that training on 1pm Thursday, June 25 or 3pm Friday, June 26.

If we could nail down a date while we are all here, that would be great. If not, we will go back to legal and come up with new days as to when this can be done.

June 25, 1pm which is a Thursday, June 26, 3pm which is a Friday.

This is training being offered by legal for new. For all planning board. Just in terms of planning board process, ex parte communications and a chance for the board to be able to have a discussion with the borough attorney's office directly for any questions that may or may not, you may all have or may not have. There is a one probably more ideal. We were just to be clarified.

This would not be a Thursday that we normally meet. This would be an off Thursday. We were told by the Bureau's attorney's office to separate planning board meetings to this training. This will still be publicly noticed. This will still be open to the public.

But Thursday, June 25 at 1pm is.

Okay.

So I'm just the opposite. I can do the Thursday, but I can't do Friday. Okay. This will also be streamed just the same, the same way. And planning board members would be able to contact the borough attorney's office afterwards with any questions.

I would like to try to have as many people here as we possibly can, though.

Okay.

Yep, we do. We can always come back with new days. And the borough attorney's office is also willing to do off hours too, if that is a possibility. Do it at 5 or 6pm if that works out for the board better.

Okay.

Okay. Is. Would a later time be better for everyone here? Okay. Yeah.

I can't do the Friday, but okay.

I can resend out the poll. As long as I have majority answers by Wednesday the 10th, then I'll have enough time to notice for that potential 25th. So I'll resend something out later today and just get new responses. Even if you guys have already responded to me, if you could respond again with the new date and time and if it works for you, and we're. Going to stick towards a later date at this later time in the day, preferably either on that Thursday or two weeks beyond that, we'll see what we can come up with.

I'm okay. I'm flexible. So Thursday at 5 o' clock would work for me. Just saying.

Seems like the majority you're just missing. Carla. I still gotta look at my. Because I set up all those dates would be good, but I do the 23rd, so I just gotta go back and we're gonna see what I think. I'll be okay.

So right now consensus is Thursday, June 25th at 5pm is what we're going to try to go for. And we're going to get, I would say, at least an hour here at the assembly chambers. As long as we could get the building or get the room. We'll fully publicly notify everybody at that point. Okay.

So that's what we're going to try to go for. We are going to send out one more poll just for everybody. And we would appreciate everybody's response. Yay or nay at that point. And we will move from there.

Right. And then for June 18th meeting, we have four cases to hear.

Any other comments?

5:00-Clock on Thursday? Yep. I still have to check with the legal to make sure that time works for them. So this is all still a little up in the air in.

1700 Hours. Okay. Any comments from the Platting board?

Nope, and none for me. So I'm going to adjourn this meeting at 1:22pm.