Juneau: August 31, 2026 Assembly Committee of the Whole Worksession

Okay, we're back at it. All right, I'll bring us back. I believe we have corrected the— or anyway, fix the technical issue. Madam Mayor, would you— I don't know where we lost folks, so maybe start over. So I'll object for purposes of an amendment, and my amendment would be to postpone this decision, even though in light of Ms. Youskany's and Ms. Wall leaving us, I understand their timeliness of the issue, but I think we should postpone it until the VIT has done their work.

Also, we need to collect some more data. Looking at the attorney's memo, when she was talking about defending ourselves, looking at the less burdensome option, and the MOU is a less burdensome option because it's a voluntary compliance. And so far it has worked. They are agreeing with the 5 ships limit. They're agreeing to the passenger caps.

This year we will see the first time that they have arrived later and there's no hot berthing. So, so far they're doing all right with us. And again, sick is a little different case 'cause that was an MOU with the dock owner. It wasn't with the cruise lines. And we have ours with the two cruise lines.

I think data's gonna be important on this, and we can keep it in the back pocket in case one of them doesn't play well with others, then we can certainly bring this back out 'cause it's certainly gonna be there. And VIT is coming up with some data, and the manager just said something about the police and— or excuse me, the fire department. And BRH is looking at data too. So, um, and as being one of the ones that have survived the lawsuit that we had with CLIA, um, it's a long process. It's, uh, money, and this won't be with the cruise line.

So I don't know if we could use marine passenger fees like we did before. So in a time when the budget crunch, it's hard to come up with $1 to $4 million, as the attorney to spend on this when, like I said, so far, um, the cruise ships are abiding by their limits. So again, I think we should postpone until the time, um, when VIT has finished their findings, but keep it in our back pocket as needed. We've heard the amendment to the motion. Objections to the amendment?

Miss Wall. Thank you, Mr. Smith. Obviously I'm biased, but I'll try to make a case for why you guys should send it to the full assembly. Um, again, for me, this is about community trust. You all might trust the industry, the larger public does not.

And so, um, I think we, uh, owe it to them to bring it to a public hearing so we can hear from them. I also think, as we've talked about data and hearing from— debating this issue into the future, Um, that public comment continues to be very important. So even if you send it to a public hearing right now and send it back or postpone it, you'll get an opportunity to continue to collect that data of how people feel about this in their— this community, which is, um, important perspective. So, um, I think getting it out of committee is a, is a good idea, even if we ultimately don't Um, or this body doesn't have the votes to, to move it forward.

Miss Youskandies, then Miss Adkisson, Mr. Kelly, and Miss Hall. Thanks, Mr. Chair. Uh, I would respond to a couple of things within that I, uh, that would make me object to that postponement. I think Ms. Wall makes an excellent point of why, even based on legal standards, why it would be good for us to go get public comment on this.

This is the first time we've talked about legislating limits and had a draft of an ordinance that we could put before the public and hear what the public thinks about that and hear whether they think it's a good time to do that. Um, respond to the timing of the VITIF. I spent, uh, quite a lot of time with the mayor on the charge of the VITIF. We had multiple drafts between she and I and Ms. Wall, and so I'm acutely aware that there is nothing in the VITIF's charge that has anything to do with a 5-ship limit and whether it should be legislated. It has nothing to do with their work.

Additionally, that is not the place of a VITIF. That is a great opportunity for us to involve members of the industry and members of the community and let that process play out in a different way than the way we do our committees and ordinances, but when it comes to exerting local control as a local government, this is absolutely a policy decision that the Assembly needs to make. It is not going to come from an advisory body that is set up.

And then to speak to— yes, obviously my time is limited, but I will speak as someone who also survived the CLIA lawsuit. I came in when it was already going and sat through many an executive session, and I agree, it's hard. Uh, it's a hard position to be in, and we were mighty glad when we got out of it. But it is important, I think, for a community to have that local control. And I don't think— I'm somebody who thinks that the tourism industry gives us great benefits and also has great drawbacks.

And I think if you have a relationship with an industry where you can't do something like an ordinance with— we have already said that, you know, we will be sued. But if that is a reason to make you put everything in your back pocket, as a member of the public, as someone who doesn't sit on a dais, I would absolutely not have trust of that industry, and I would absolutely want my local elected leaders to do something about it. Um, so for all those reasons, I think at the very least, let's send it to public comment to get public comment. But I think it's, uh, it's also a good choice to, to act on it, perhaps.

I have, I have Miss Adkisson. Very good. Uh, thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'll echo the comments of Ms. Hughes-Scandies, um, when we're talking about the VITIF.

Uh, I really don't think that anything coming out of the VITIF will inform this conversation in any way. We're not discussing MOU versus having legislated limits. We are only discussing things like, okay, let's say in the future we want to expand tourism. Let's say in the future we want to not do the opposite. How do we make those decisions?

That is not the kind of thing that is how it's going to help us make this decision later down the line. This is something I would argue we have all the information to make, you know, and not— it's not today, you know, once we get the public hearing, the public process done. And frankly, I'm a little frustrated to hear the conversations we're having today because for the many years that I've been on the Assembly, I have seen overwhelming support for the 5-ship limit. It's consistently a thing that scores very highly in all of our surveys. It's something that everyone has kind of rallied around as a good thing and a good first step.

And the only reason we haven't made it code is because we were not legally able to. Like Ms. Wall mentioned earlier, if we had, we would have been sued and we would have lost. And now we have the opportunity to make this very popular public good ironclad, and we're hesitating. And that seems to me like we were just wanting to kick the can down the road, like we're not wanting to make this official. And, um, we don't— we regulate every other industry, uh, this is another industry, and this is something that everyone has agreed upon and has time-tested.

I think there's nothing wrong with bringing it to public testimony, but I can guess that that public testimony is going to be very in favor, and I don't think waiting will tell us any more than the last few years have already told us.

Mr. Kelly, next. Thank you. Um, I'll— I have an objection for a couple reasons. My first, though, will be to, uh, just ask a question. So the mayor specified specifically that it'd be postponed in her amendment until after the VITF had completed.

Uh, this could be for the chair of the VITF, or this could be for staff. Uh, what when would that be? Or this could be for the maker of the amendment.

Staff, or— yeah, Madam Manager. Thank you. Uh, um, our recommendation would be sometime in December, just to make sure that VDEV has time not only to make their recommendations but also time to draft a report. They're, um, supposed to be done late fall.

Thank you. Second objection. Go back. You can go ahead with speaking to your objection or whatever. Yeah.

All right. In that case, I am going to move to amend the mayor's motion to send this to public hearing and then back to committee.

So you've heard the amendment. To the amendment.

Now, is there objection to that motion, Miss Waltz? I'll object. I, I feel like that's a job that can be done at the meeting depending on where people are at in terms of the information received. That's Typic—. You know, typically how we would do it.

We have an amendment to the amendment. Is there more objection or comments on the amendment to the amendment? Miss Yuskandis. Uh, thanks, Mr. Chair.

I, I been saying this all night. I, uh, I would echo that it would be good— I mean, for me as an assembly member, it would be good to send it for public comment, but I do think I would want to leave open the possibility that public comment we might act on at the meeting. Um, I was going to ask the lawyer, uh, whether that's doable, but I think I already know the answer. You know, you get to assembly, we can make any motion we want. So I don't know that I need to object to this in committee, but That's how I'm feeling, because I don't think we'd be bound at assembly by a decision made here.

I thought the same thing, and I'm seeing a nod from the attorney. In that case, I'll move to withdraw my motion. I get the amendment. The amendment has been withdrawn. We're back to the amendment.

Um, Madam Mayor, then Miss Hall, then Mr. Steineger. I first want to clarify, I'm not saying that the VIT should weigh in on this. I think that they're doing data that would be helpful, especially with congestion.

Downtown. They're really trying to tackle the whale watching issue with Statter— at Statter Harbor. So I think all these things line up to things that would help build public trust. And I went through all the emails and I appreciate them all. And thanks everybody for responding.

This certainly is a topic for consideration. Try to answer most of them, but I didn't get to all of them to answer, but I did find that several probably don't even know that we have a 5-ship-a-day MOU, and several of them also didn't know that we have an MOU for passenger limits. So some of it is just our fault for educating— not educating the public as well. Um, but we also have to remember we did have ballot initiatives and they got defeated, and the last one didn't even get enough votes to make it there. So we are listening to the public, we're just not particularly listening to the emails right this second, because if you count the emails, there are definitely more to legislate than there are against, although there were several against today.

So I just wanted to clarify that I'm not asking— I'm not trying to change the charge of the VIT, but I think they'll have lots of information that would be helpful.

Miss Hall. Yeah, thank you, and I would like to speak in support of the mayor's amendment. Um, you know, it was said that both parties need to show up in these negotiations, and You know, I get that we can do this one-sided, the assembly with a very, you know, several folks weighing in from the community, but we still need both parties to show up for our negotiations over the use of the marine passenger funds. And I'm not saying we're bowing in to the industry. I'm saying I think we have a lot to gain by continuing with collaboration.

So I, I would prefer to wait until we have more of the data, particularly the impact on our hospital. You know, it'd be good to be able to have these conversations in a collaborative instead of more combative role. I would guess maybe that's too strong of a word, but for that reason, I will support the amendment. Mr. Saniger. Thank you.

I'm speaking in support of the mayor's amendment as well, and try and confine my comments just to that notion of whether or not we wait for the VITIF to complete its work.

Folks are right, it's not directly in the charge to consider this very specific ordinance, the distinction between negotiated agreement versus ordinance for the ship limit. However, what is in the charge are almost all of the things that Attorney Wright listed when she talked about what would be critical in defending an ordinance of this nature. And that work is work that I think needs to be done so that when we do make this decision, if— or if we make this decision, or if we bring it back before the body, you know, we're doing so having done the homework to make her job easy to defend the actions that we take. Because I don't want to waste a lot of money on attorney work if we haven't done the homework ourselves before we jump into a decision. I'd also push back against the notion that because this is a policy call within the purview of the Assembly and not a decision that the VDF can make, that it's something that we should do without waiting to listen to a diverse panel of citizens weighing in on tourism, because most of the things that come out of the VDF are are gonna end up being policy calls that have to come before this body and aren't things the VITIF can vote on and enact themselves.

There's no power of the VITIF to vote on and set policy. They're there to gather data, have community conversations, take public input, get input from a diverse group of, you know, professionals that are dedicating a lot of hours to come to those meetings and inform us. And if we start making policy decisions that, you know, maybe they're not directly in the charter of the VITIF, but they are very much related to it, you know, in advance of them having the opportunity in the room to make those recommendations and look into that data, you know, I question why we even bother with having a citizen group like that if we're going to just say, well, the policy decisions are ours, we'll make them, let's not bother to have these types of groups go out there. So I think this is pretty consequential. There's a lot of risk involved and there's a lot of information we still need to get on it.

And so I think it's prudent to wait.

Thank you. All right, um, that was first round around. Go into second. Ms. Wall. Thank you, Chair Smith.

Um, I, I, I got the sense, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, that the VITIF is recommending data to be collected, um, which is very important, but that data collection wouldn't happen until next year. And so, you know, we are looking at a long ways off to getting that additional data that will be very helpful as we think about whether— what the industry looks like in the future. But I just want to dispel any myth that that will result in us being ready to make this decision quickly. And why I think time matters here is there are lots of people in this community paying attention to the case law. We will see an initiative from our citizens.

I would suspect that it won't be a 5-ship limit, and we will have to— if it passes, and I, depending on what people put forward, I think it will given what I think the community thinks about this issue. And this city will have to defend that through, through lawsuits. So that's another reason that I'm really kind of focused on the community trust aspect here. I think we are losing it. We have data that shows that, and this is one middle of the road thing that we can do to help keep that on board.

Thank you.

Ms. Suskandis. Uh, thanks, Mr. Chair. I'll just say I think the VDF will do a lot of great work, and I'm— one of the things I'm most excited about is the community dashboard aspect of all the data they want to collect. But I suspect that if we got sued tomorrow, this magically passed and was 30 days later tonight, and we got sued tomorrow, and Attorney Wright had to defend this, I suspect that we would be having conversations with Bartlett and CCFR, and we would be pulling the data that we have, and we would be making the best damn job we could do of that.

We would be using our cost allocation formula. We would be using— I believe that you can always get more ready, But also, I believe that if we were sued tomorrow, staff would have a good sense of what to do to start defending the city.

To some extent, personally, I just— I think it's so important that when we're trying to make a decision like this, the city might get sued for a lot of stuff. The city does get sued every day. That cannot be how we make our decisions. I would say, even as that data collection is some of the work that I'm excited to see come out of the VITIF, I know the speed of government well enough to know what that will take as a government to collect data. It might involve an RFP, how long that will take, how long the data collection will take, how long it will take the contractor to give the data, all that to say that in that space of time, If it is as, uh, Ms. Wall suggests and there's a community initiative, uh, from folks who are acutely watching the case law, I would welcome it at that point, and I would probably help it as a community member myself, because I think there is a certain aspect of this that we just have to decide as policymakers whether we are willing to take that step to exert local control and I am deeply biased in my day job working at the Alaska Municipal League, but I truly think that for our 5-ship limit to be this great thing that we have come to with the industry, which I do think it's a great thing we're celebrating, and it is, you know, Director Pierce gets to go and brag about it at various places.

But I think if after the case law that we have in Maine, we can't take what what I wanted to keep as kind of like the light version of like, let's just say 5 ships and put that in ordinance. We can't do that, then I question whether the city will ever be ready.

So, and I guess I'll say on top of that, if we can't send it to public comment, then, then I question what it would take to make the city act.

I think almost everyone has spoken. I'll chime in here twice. Anyone? Um, for me, I just look at this as we have a 5-ship limit now.

We are seemingly effectively negotiating and discussing and having a positive relationship with the cruise lines, which I think is a— what is a good thing. Um, if we're at war, it will be messy for everyone. Um, I guess I'm kind of like don't kick the dog if it's not misbehaving. So, and I'm not interested also in doing that potentially and getting into, um, um, okay, okay. Uh, uh, the other is it looking and getting into a just a legal battle when again We're seemingly achieving community goals in a collaborative way, and a lot, you know, having a good relationship so that Miss Pierce may bring up, you know, is anyway, we can work together to try to solve these issues.

So I guess I just don't see why now is, now is the time. And I mean, hearing Miss Wall's point on, and I'm reading, you know, the, the data collection piece, I'm like, Maybe it should be waiting for longer, but I'll support the motion as— excuse me, the amendment as proposed by the mayor.

We have a motion and an amendment to the motion. We have objection. Miss—. Madam Clerk, would you please call the roll? And Madam Clerk, can you please restate?

Thank you, Deputy Mayor Smith, for Madam Mayor's amendment to forward ordinance 20— sorry, to postpone ordinance 2026 until after VTF has finished their findings.

Madam Mayor? Yes. Ms. Wall? No. Ms. Hughes-Scandies?

No. Mr. Kelly? No. Ms. Adkisson? No.

Mr. Steininger? Yes. Ms. Hall? Yes. Mr. Brooks?

Yes. Deputy Mayor Smith?

Yes. Motion carries with 5 yeas and 4 nays.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

We now have the main motion as amended. Is there objection to the motion as amended?

Very good. We have an objection to the motion as amended. Any discussion?

Madam Clerk, would you please repeat the motion as amended and call roll?

For the motion to forward ordinance— or to postpone Ordinance 2026-39 until after the Visitor Industry Task Force has finished their findings. Miss Hughes-Scandies? No.

Miss Wall? No. Mr. Brooks? Yes. Miss Hall?

Yes. Mr. Steininger? Yes. Miss Adkisson? No.

Mr. Kelly? No.

Madam Mayor? Yes. Deputy Mayor Smith? Yes. Motion carries with 5 yeas and 4 nays.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. That moves us through our first agenda item, and let's take a 10-minute break and be back at 8:17.

Got off. Yeah, yeah. No, I was, I I'll bring the Committee of the Whole back to order. Um, we are under our second agenda topic, third-party management of certain parks and recreation facilities. Um, we have a memo, um, from the Parks and Rec Director, But, Miss— Madam Manager, did you want to— would you— anyway, anything you want to preface?

Or—. Yeah, I'll just briefly summarize this topic. So, um, you have 2 memos in your packet. One is from Parks and Recreation Director Wheeler, and it really addresses in a lot of detail some of the pros and cons and potentials of third-party management of our facilities. This was a conversation that came up in our budget discussion and the Assembly wanted to look at what it would take and what that would look like well in advance of, you know, having to make those decisions, acknowledging that it would, it would take a lot of time.

And so that's kind of why this topic is before you today. But just in summary, his memo talks about two really main points to consider when discussing the potential for a third-party management of a recreational facility. And the first one of those is the high capital cost of maintenance. So not only do these facilities have high operating costs in personnel and in fixed costs, those maintenance costs, um, you know, both short-term and long-term maintenance, really drive a lot of the expenditures. And a third party is likely not incentivized to maintain those, so that would be to the level that we would need, right?

So that would be something that we would need to consider when making these budget decisions. The second challenge to take into consideration in your deliberations is balancing the needs of diverse user groups. So Parks and Recreation does a great job at, you know, making sure that the teams get the, the time, ice time, and that the ice skaters get ice time, and that the public gets ice time, and, and just balancing all of those different interests. And sometimes those different interests aren't necessarily for the highest highest paying customer, right? And, and I'm not saying everyone's happy with how they balance it, but I know they put a tremendous amount of effort into that.

Um, so, so that is the memo from the Parks and Recreation Director. You also have a memo in here on Eagle Crest, because of course that is another recreational facility that you've talked a lot about third-party operations of. And just to briefly summarize, we did reach out to Goldbelt, we being the Eagle Crest Board and the manager's office, and had a conversation that was summarized in the memo that we're happy to enter into these conversations as direction that the Assembly gave us at the joint meeting to reach out to Gold Belt. But just to kind of put on the record that, that transferring ownership of Eagle Crest was not something we were willing to debate. Really, that stems from the restrictions that the Land and Water Conservation Fund has on that land and how difficult that would be.

But that would be open to leasing or some of those, those conversations. And then the second, that there would be there would be no ability to kind of tie this project to any approval of Goldbelt's West Douglas development. Obviously, understanding that, you know, economically for Goldbelt, you know, making it work and making that profitable, those two are tied, but that that couldn't be tied in our discussions. And they were receptive to that. We had a meeting, kind of all decided we need to revisit this after Eagle Crest has done the work with SE Group, which they've been hired to kind of draft a strategic plan for Eagle Crest that will bring them a list of both their capital needs and their investment needs, but also kind of an à la carte menu of some of the development ideas.

And so if you recall, um, you, uh, had a joint meeting with Eagle Crest and you postponed conversation on the ordinance discussing their empowered board status until the September meeting. Um, and, and the work won't be done by then for, um, from the SE group. So I just wanted to highlight that. So I spoke longer than I intended to summarizing these memos and happy to answer any questions.

Questions, Ms. Wall.

Thank you, Chair Smith and Manager Kester. I really appreciate this, um, being here and starting this conversation. Um, and I appreciate Eagle Crest being on this list too. Just, you know, sometimes we treat it separately because it's not part of Parks and Rec, but I think, um, you know, it makes sense to be having these conversations at the same time. Um, I, I get a little anxious when I think about the, the Eagle Crest timeline because I remember, um, you know, when we got to budget time and we basically said like, will you go out in 3 weeks and try to find an investment partner?

And I totally understand why they want to do planning. That is the natural course of action to figure this stuff out. But also, we may end up— we will likely end up in a situation come budget time that all of a sudden we don't have any money to keep Eagle Crest operating, and we have to kind of think about alternatives. Do you have a sense of the, the timeline for this? And, and has there been discussion about parallel processes here where they're talking to investors or potential partners, Goldbelt and others, have been discussed while, um, working with SE Group?

Or, you know, will SE Group be having any of those conversations? And I, I know you might not have those answers, but thought I'd ask in case you do. Well, I would just highlight, I believe the new general manager's first day is today, and so that certainly will help with their capacity to do— to have those conversations. And I know that the Eagle Crest board, as indicated in this memo, which they did help me review, so I made sure I didn't get any facts wrong. They do want to have the discussions beyond just Goldbelt as a third-party operator and be— and can talk about it in a variety of contexts.

So maybe there's à la carte things that can be done at Eagle Crest. Maybe it's all summer operations, maybe it's all operations. So having kind of that planning process I think is important before they engage on like any official recruitment for, you know, they have to know what they want. I will mention we do have a member of the Eagle Crest board in the audience who's been deeply involved. If you have more detailed questions, I wouldn't mind hearing from Mr.

Kell. Sorry. Calvin, I know your name, but I blank sometimes out here. Would you mind joining us so I can ask my question? Mr. Smith, if that's okay.

I didn't mean to— I wouldn't mind if that works for the chair. I, I'm open to it. I don't know if Mr. Calvin had been— anyway, if Mr. Calvin, if you feel comfortable willing to speak to the issue, um, or respond, we would appreciate it, but understand.

Thank you. Jim Calvin with the Press Board of Directors. Jim Calvin, Press Board of Directors.

To address your question about whether we're having conversations sort of parallel with the planning process, the short answer is no. We really need to get the planning process behind us. It's going well. We hope to have the heart of the meat of the project done end of October, at which time we will sort of understand— we'll have a vision for our future, what kind of development makes the most sense, what scale of development makes the most sense. The planning work, the strategic plan, includes optimizing winter operations, being just as efficient as we can, generating all the revenue we can at the lowest possible cost, and meantime looking hard at summer and considering all forms of partnerships and investors, but making sure that we have done a good job of identifying what's, what's a good fit for our ski area and what's a good fit for the market that we hope to draw from, which is principally the, the cruise market.

So yeah, we're right in the sausage-making part of that planning process. And at some point we do envision an effort to reach out in a formal way with potential investors whether it's seeking letters of interest or some sort of a formal RFP process. But soon this fall or this spring, we hope to be talking to people who have an interest in investing in Eagle Crest and helping us generate summer revenue.

Thank you. Other questions on this topic? I mean, if people have Eagle Crest questions, maybe we ask those while Mr. Calvin's up here.

Not big. All right, other questions? All on the topic. Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'm—. This would be a question for you, Mr. Calvin, if you don't mind. Um, does the, the design in the way that you guys are having it done currently, like like, is that going to somewhat dictate the types of partnerships that could be done for operations, or is it still with the purview that, like, someone could completely, uh, do everything, or is it being designed to be segmented? I guess is kind of my question.

As Manager Kester indicated, we're, we're looking at both the à la carte approach, which is, you know, one development at a one investor at a time, again depending on what we determine has the most, the greatest opportunity for success.

That would be sort of a step-by-step, relatively comparatively slow trek into the future where we're generating sufficient summer revenue to start supporting winter operations. That's a very deliberate very careful approach. On the other hand, we still have on our radar that which direction that we were pointed in with the gondola, which is kind of hitting the home run, having a very large-scale attraction that, that can draw 50,000 or 100,000 visitors. The problem we know with that is that it takes a lot of capital to develop that, you know, the infrastructure you need to serve that many people and entertain that many people. And we have no illusions about We certainly don't have that kind of capital, and whether there's a partner out there that might be interested in helping us in that regard, whether it's Goldbelt or others, we just don't, we just don't know yet.

We, again, we have to, after the gondola, we have to go back to the drawing board, figure out what makes sense in terms of summertime lift development or a full suite of other potential developments in the summertime that it could be 8 or 10 different attractions that each draw 15,000 visitors, or it could be, you know, gondola type where we have one big attraction that's drawn 100,000. We, you know, we just need to step back and take a careful look at all of the opportunities, the range of opportunities, and make sure that we're making good choices as we proceed from here. Thank you.

Missy's Candies. Mr. Chair, I have a question on this topic, but not about Eagle Crest or not to Mr. Calvin. So go ahead. Oh, or I'll wait and make sure no one has Mr. Calvin questions.

I think, I think you're able to step away for now.

No, that's the cursing.

No, yeah, thank you very much, Mr. Calvin, for being here to answer those questions. And yeah, you can return. Go ahead, Ms. Hughes-Candies. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I can understand there's— for all of these, to do something like this from the city, the city's got to be thinking both we own an asset, how do we take care of an asset? How do we not get sued? Always, who's carrying the risk? Those are the things that I think of that are always kind of making us say, oh, this is actually not as easy as you think it is. On top of that, I can imagine that depending on the third-party group that we'd be working with, then they have varying levels in something like a negotiation of what they will or won't agree to.

From your perspective, I guess reading this memo, I, I think it takes time to come up with anything, and my concern is if we don't do anything, then this group— not me— is faced with a very difficult budget next year, and it's kind of too late to ask for anything. But, but there is that missing piece, which is you have to know what's the other guy going to agree to. So are there aspects of this that you think are universal that I guess, how would you approach that from a systematic, like start to figure out the insurance and the maintenance maybe? Yeah, thank you for that question. I would approach that starting with a series of metrics.

Metrics that you gave me through which to analyze the suite of recreational services that we provide. And some of those metrics could be cost. So you could say I want to prioritize reducing services, or either reducing or transferring services to somewhere where we'd have the greatest savings. I want to prioritize transferring services to somewhere where there's the greatest opportunity for a partner. Obviously we can want to transfer services to a third party and it won't matter if we don't have that willing partner.

Partner. Other things that you could think about is the user group that, that you could say, hey, I want to prioritize services that service, you know, kids over adults. And those are just examples of metrics that I would ask you to come up with. And, and they're not exactly the same as a COTS scenario, but they are kind of— there is some overlap because of course your dance partner and them being willing to dance is probably the most important variable, and it's very difficult to figure that out, right? But, but I think I would ask for you to, to set that framework and then staff to do some of the work of analyzing each opportunity through that lens and bringing it back to you.

Thanks, that's helpful. Mr. Steininger and then Ms. Wall. Thank you, and I, I really appreciate that this was put together and brought to us now because like was said by a previous speaker, you know, having to make these decisions in short order during the budget cycle is— won't come to a productive end. I'm looking at one of the statements here in the memo, and it talks about challenges in enforcing contract provisions with even minor contracts such as janitorial services are difficult. And, you know, that being kind of a, you know, a warning about this.

If we structure this where we retain ownership, how do we ensure that they're doing the maintenance?

And that, that I very much understand. That would be a detail. And once you pick that dance partner, figuring out what song you're dancing to. But I'm kind of concerned by the just general statement of we're not able to enforce contract provisions. And probably a way bigger topic than just what we're talking about here, but maybe a little bit more kind of explanation on that and the challenges behind that we find in enforcing contract provisions.

So then kind of general statement, I know that's well beyond this topic.

Yeah, so I think that I'm not going to use the Parks and Recreation example, which might get me in trouble, but I've heard from a lot of you and the public concerns about the transfer of capital access to a different contractor. And some of the— all of those concerns are difficult to follow up on, right, without details like, okay, well, a constituent had a concern. Did they call Capital Transit? Did they have the exact details so that we can How do you follow up on each one of those? And then were they in fact violating their contract, or were they, or is it just a different contract?

And what are those contract expectations? So it's, and then the bar, of course, is, you know, it's difficult, right? You, there's risk when you go to enforce that, those contracts. So I mean, I'm sure I shouldn't have used that example. It's just so fresh in my mind because I've been thinking about it a lot that that's the example I use.

I have a feeling that Deputy Manager Barr is like leaning forward, like, would you just stop talking and let me say something? Deputy Mayor Barr.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm happy to give another example in a kind of category, a category of an example. And that is, you know, we like it or not, right? We live in a low-bid environment for many of our nonprofessional service contracts.

In fact, I think probably all of our nonprofessional services are low-bid in nature.

That just presents a very real challenge sometimes, that when we are awarding to the lowest bidder, sometimes, sometimes that lowest bidder is great and we don't have any problems, and sometimes it's not. And I think in the memo it references janitorial contracts. Maybe it doesn't. That's something that sticks in my head. It's just one that we, that we employ a full-time contract compliance specialist in Parks and Recreation that does the work of enforcing that contract, and it is a lot of work.

And I, over the years, have had very real, real questions that we simply aren't able to glean the answers to about whether or not if we didn't live in a low-bid environment, if we would need to dedicate that much staff capacity to contract compliance and enforcement. It's in the charter, right? Like, we— it's not something that is easily changed, but that is That is an area definitely where we have struggled and had to dedicate a lot of time and effort and resources to contract compliance in the past. Go ahead, Philip. And I don't want to, like, rabbit trail us off in a direction that this memo is not really about, but, you know, something maybe not answer now but contemplate.

Is there— are there tools that we as an Assembly, as a governing body, can give you as managers that might help in enforcing contract compliance, things that we can change. I would be interested in hearing more about that, and I suspect others might be as well. I don't know. Yeah, thank you.

Ms. Wo—. No. I think I'm good right now. Thanks. Mr. Mr. Brooks.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just to keep touching on that a little bit, we— so we don't have just a general contract compliance, you know, office or department that generally oversees things in general across the departments. It's kind of a case-by-case thing.

So we manage different contracts in different ways. Our purchasing division within the finance department assists with all, almost all contract development and certainly is available for consulting with departments on contract compliance, but each individual contract lives within the department that it lives in. So compliance starts with that department and whichever staff position is primarily responsible with the management of that particular contract. And then if compliance on any given contract becomes more than that individual position can handle with the support, with kind of the normal natural support of the purchasing division, it escalates, you know, through the department's chain of command and/or to the manager's office in the Law Department. Thank you.

I had one.

Um, you know, it definitely gives me, um, concern knowing, you know, should things not change in October with our budget situation or revenue situation, you know, some of the choices we might have to make. And knowing that some of those choices are trying to get a third party or something, I mean, that's not done quickly. Um, I also am balancing that with, you know, knowing that there are impacts to staff and making you all do a bunch of, you know, work that may not be necessary. Anyway, I guess, is like the retreat an okay time to potentially, like, you know, I guess because we'll know results of the election, maybe have a little time to do some work? I mean, is Is that like a time you could maybe come back to us with some, some guidance concepts, or anyway, be able to do some work and bring it back then?

Yeah, thank you for that question. I do think that, you know, regardless of what happens on the ballot, the budget will be a topic at the retreat. So it does make sense to talk about that. As far as a timeline for some of these transitions to make, to, to happen, you know, they will take time to be successful. It may mean having to, depending on the budget decisions that you make and that you're faced with, it may mean having to, you know, close facilities while some of those, for budget reasons, while some of those conversations happen.

But it's always so hard to have very real conversations and take advantage of opportunity when that question is still out there, right? It's, you're not, we're not like really of what are we really facing, even the kind of willingness of our partners to step up to the plate, I, I would suspect would be greater with more information. Thank you.

Questions?

Sure, I'll do a motion. Madam Mayor, guide us. Um, I'll try one, and I'm open to suggestions if anybody else has something else. And he just asked the question on the retreat. So, um, I move we direct staff to bring the third-party management options back to us at our November retreat.

What's the date of our retreat, folks? 21St November, um, during our budget discussion. And, um, we'll know the results of the election. This one is a really tough one for me.

Director Wheeler kind of took my wind out of my sails about third-party management, and I appreciate our Finance Director Wall saying we better get on this sooner rather than later. So I'm hoping November is soon enough, but the election is— plays a big part in this one. So I hate to be there because right now it doesn't sound like third party is an option, But we'll keep that, and this is just for Parks and Rec. I think we need to treat Eagle Crest a little differently.

You heard the motion from the mayor. Miss Wall.

Um, just another, another potential suggestion. I'm not sure if I'm objecting or not, but just, just for discussion, I guess. Um, I, I appreciated Manager Kester saying like, here's the criteria that we would kind of bring you back for all of these. And I feel like in my head anyways, I already kind of know what those are, and I know where that would land. Like, to me, the two things that are— all of these are, you know, could we— could consider at some point.

But when we went through the budget process, to me The pools in Eagle Crest popped out for a few reasons, because they are very expensive and because they have known potential partners that have resources that could, you know, feel very feasible. The other, you know, the field house and the rink, I think we, we heard engaged user groups. Groups, um, but those facilities are much smaller part of our budget, um, and those user groups would, would have to organize and fundraise and a bunch of other things. And so although I'm not opposed to you all talking holistically in November to make real progress, I would actually offer the alternative that Eagle Crest is doing their thing, make sure they stay on a timeline that we get options before the budget, um, and that you engage, um, in the discussion with the YMCA of Alaska and Glacier Swim Club about pools. I do not want to— I don't want— I know how hard this is going to be.

I would much rather us live in a community where the city is managing our facilities because it has worked well in Juneau, But, but political winds change, and there are plenty of nonprofits out there that do a great job running recreational facilities. We have a few that might be interested. Um, and so I, I would almost prioritize, uh, tonight getting that conversation started. So I'm going to leave it, and I can make an amendment if anyone else feels interested in that, knowing I will not be here.

Missy Scandies, I had you next. Thanks, Mr. Chair. I, uh, am digesting what Ms. Wall said just now with the Eagle Crest and pools as things that popped out. It seems to me, just because of that dance partner being a vital piece of the equation of what it's going to take I think again, I feel similarly.

I think I would feel more passionately if I knew I would be here, but my sense is that this is going to take some time. And I guess I do feel that it's a poor choice to wait until after the election to start the process because I, I just, I think we've already done a year of like banking on the easy thing. So, um, it's certainly not to say that, that it was easy last year, but I sort of feel like the Assembly is already on a path right now of exhausting our options. So if they're— if the alternatives are to not have a facility and to have a facility still be open, I would choose use things run by the government every single day, but I'm more of a big government person and I'm happy to pay taxes and I'm— I want— I think the city does a great job managing stuff and I would say city for president. But if it's not having a pool or having a pool run by a nonprofit, then I, as someone who lives here, I want a pool run by that.

And I do know that that works in other communities. Um, so I guess I would just say start the conversation earlier, but I don't have a recommended alternative, or I'd make an amendment.

Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I, you know, I think getting these discussions started sooner than later is, you know, the kind of proactive actions we need to be taking. To kind of, you know, primer the next year's budget discussions.

But it's, it's difficult as presented in my mind anyways when we're, you know, talking about a third-party partnership with overseeing some of these city facilities. Um, the pools as the example in the memo from Director Wheeler.

You know, both require significant amount of deferred maintenance. And I would imagine that some of these other facilities probably have some as well. And it's a hard thing to sell a partnership when we haven't, you know, and it's hard to sell the partnership for those kind of facilities when we've been using money to start new projects instead of addressing these or putting them into a condition that would make them, uh, more digestible to those nonprofit or third-party groups. So I was like, I, I would like to see the discussions getting started, but I don't know what the current condition of these facilities do for a negotiation like that.

Miss Hall, I should have asked this in the question part, but you know, so I'll object for the purpose of the question. Have we had any third parties reach out to us besides the one you mentioned at the, the field house? But has there been anyone clamoring to take over operations of any of our facilities? No, nothing that's not discussed in the memo, which includes a conversation with YMCA, kind of pre-pandemic, uh, some emails exchanged with manager's office about the field house.

So I guess my comment would be that it just seems like having staff spend a lot of time on searching for this solution, you know, I'm a grandparent of Glacier Swim Club club kids and had my own kids in it. And, you know, they're— the people running the swim club, you know, they're stretched really thin. And I just can't imagine the amount of money that it costs each family to have their kids swimming. I just— I, you know, that's just one example, but I think it's not very realistic to hang our hat on third party taking over our facilities.

Miss Wall, just want to make one more point that, like, my interest in moving more quickly with real potential ideas is, to me, next year you have to make the decision, do we close or not? And the only 'or not' in my mind If we don't see the ballot initiatives pass, you know, is working with someone who has resources to help, is in, you know, has a mission or really wants to see these things continue. So to me, I don't want to see any of these close. And so that's where the urgency comes from.

Mr. Senninger. Thank you. Maybe to speak to the urgency, because I completely understand the point that you're making, that so like if this is a road that we're going to go down, we should be working, working to figure out how that works now. But I would say that, you know, if you were an interested party out there and you're hearing the sentiment of this body, which I agree with, which is we do not want to close or degrade the service, and we will be informed of our ability to, to go towards that ends in October. You know, that third party is not going to spend a whole lot of time putting together a proposal between now and 5 weeks from now, you know, because they'll know the context of that will change dramatically or could change dramatically.

I also expect that by asking for an update in November that you know, the manager's office and Parks and Rec, if the ballot initiatives go in the other direction, they're not going to wait until November 18th to start prepping the memo on it. You know, it will probably happen fairly quickly, and they'll start doing the legwork behind the scenes if we look to be in a situation where we'll be forced to make a very hard decision. Um, so I, I'd rather sit on this until then. And, you know, but I do I, you know, that is 5 weeks wasted. So I completely understand, you know, that that could bite us a little bit in our ability to be fully formed if we have to be.

Um, but I also don't see somebody putting a lot of effort into it on the other end.

Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And, you know, as, as we, um, get into the preface of these discussions again on what we might have to do for next year's budgetary, um, needs, um, we're already, um, seemingly set in this mindset of, uh, all in the purview of cut and reduce. But we could very easily shift into the creation of more property owners.

Every reduction we need to make can also be achieved by creating more lots, more property owners, therefore paying more property tax in perpetuity. So do— and like, we spent so much time and effort last year on, you know, what these reductions were going to be, and I don't think they turned out in any of the way we were expecting, and that was a lot of staff time and resources. So as we go into this next discussion, are we going to put all of our eggs in that one basket of reduce, reduce, reduce, or can we spread some of the effort and resources and look at a way to, you know, make it to where those revenues can be created without necessarily having to take it from any one group or impose higher rates on any specific thing.

So we still have a motion, we don't have objection. I mean, I— hearing Mr. Steininger's point, I'm kind of— though I imagine staff may already be there, like Should the election, and especially, you know, significant revenue-generating ballot measures not be looking to pass, kind of like, we should be beginning those conversations immediately, as I imagine you maybe would. But I don't know if we need to amend the mayor's motion with that, or if that's kind of understood that if if, if we're, you know, if the revenue picture is not like to be changing significantly, like, we're, we're election certified, what, the 21st or something, and, um, of October, and sorry, 20th. I don't know if we need to amend that. I mean, I think again, maybe it's understood.

I do just Yeah, I do hope everyone knows, the public knows that, you know, should it not change, these are very much what these will be. A big— these will be a focus amongst many other things. So we have a motion from the mayor. Do we have objection to that motion? Seeing no objection, that motion is adopted.

Madam Mayor, and something else? No, I was going to do my second, uh, because I was treating Eagle Crest separately, um, unless we don't think we have to. But, um, we're supposed to have a draft ordinance amending the status of Eagle Crest at the September Committee of the Whole, and I don't think we're ready for that. So my motion would be to postpone action on the draft ordinance until Eagle Crest, um, is finished with their strategic plan. And again, open to amendments.

Matt, whoops. Oh, go ahead. Sorry, Mr. Chair, go ahead. Uh, could you restate?

I just want to make sure I understand your original move to look at their power structure. Is that what you're talking about? So we were supposed to see a draft ordinance amending the status of the Eagle Crest Board of the September Committee of the Whole poll. So I don't think we need to do that at this moment in our life. So I'm postponing the action on the draft ordinance, and I'll look at the attorney— the draft ordinance, remind me, because it's not in here.

Maybe I need to change my—. There's no ordinance number because it's a draft ordinance. Is that your question? No, my question is, what did the draft ordinance do? Because it wasn't in here.

Oh, um, thank you. So, uh, this disempowered, um, the Eagle Crest board. It changed it to an advisory board, and you all looked at it and then set it out for, uh, the 28th of September, which is actually now the 21st of September. Could you change your dates? Okay, I'm gonna change my motion completely then.

Um, I would move that we table the draft ordinance and postpone any action on Eagle Crest until the Eagle Crest finished Strategic Plan. You've heard the motion. Is there objection to the motion?

Seeing no objection, that motion is adopted.

We made it through 2. We are now through Item 2. Moving on to Item 3.

Madam Manager Gloff Funding. Thank you. This is a big topic though. I have been like foreshadowing and talking about it a lot, so hopefully there's not a lot of new information here. And I just want to emphasize that because this is such a big topic that is ever evolving, and that topic being kind of long-term funding considerations for our GloFF recovery, response, and mitigation.

I don't— I'm not asking you to make decisions today. I'm asking you to provide guidance. And next steps so that we can make sure we stay on our aggressive timeline to, you know, solve this, this problem both in the short term, manage it adequately, and solve it in the long term. So just to briefly update you on our work towards a long-term solution, Army Corps of Engineers issued a request for qualifications for interested parties. They have, I believe, until September 10th to submit their proposal, not their proposal for the project that they propose, but really for their qualifications as a company/team to solve our problem.

And then the Army Corps of Engineers is going to hold a kind of a pitch session, right, where those ideas later in September get pitched to Army Corps. That stage of the process This is fully funded and controlled by the Army Corps of Engineers, so that is their process. As we get further along in the process, we will become more involved because a project, as it is funded, as is the current funding path, which is an emergency funding through the Flood and Coastal The federal FCCE, Flood and Coastal Control Emergency account, requires a 25% cost share for permanent advanced measures. However, I got a phone call from Senator Sullivan's office today that they are working on amending the word of language to have that same 90/10 tribal lands cost share that applies to the kind of regular Army Corps of Engineering path. So there's like the word of path that's like, different authorization, and then there's the emergency path, which is kind of the path that we're pursuing right now.

So we are actively working with the delegation on that cost share amount.

But it does bring up, you know, the very real long-term need for a cost share.

Just to talk a little bit about the cost for our short-term mitigation, that's of course our HESCO barriers. We have spent a little under $10 million of like CBJ taxpayer money on that, and that is thanks to like grants and partnerships. Army Corps has spent significantly more than that, and they have, you know, agreed to that they're responsible for the ongoing repairs to those HESCO barriers. And you do have a map in your packet that details those repairs, and we don't have a cost estimate on that because we're still going through with Army Corps, We— they've done their site visit, we've done our site visit, and then we're coming together and saying like, okay, did you capture this? Did you capture that?

There will be maintenance responsibilities that we'll be in charge of, including inspection, unfortunately protecting against vandalism. We've already seen the barrier slashed. We've already seen warming fires being built right up against the barrier. So there, there will be responsibilities just for that short-term mitigation. And coordinating.

We are responsible for land acquisition. We're responsible for permitting all, all of those things. So that's kind of one of the items in the midterm mitigation bucket that, that we have been paying for.

And, and just to, to let you know, we are also responsible for the permitting and a lot of the land acquisition. I'm sorry, not the permitting piece, but a lot of the land acquisition and ongoing maintenance for a long-term solution. To. So that'll be a conversation that we will continue to have to have.

In addition to that, we have recovery expenditures, like response and recovery. So that's our Emergency Management Division. You could easily argue that half of that division's time is spent on, on GLOF, and we could invest more resources in that. Engineering and Public Works spends a tremendous amount of time on all things GLOF, both preparing for this long-term solution and the short-term solution.

And our CIP projects have suffered. Our ability to do CIP projects that are NCLAF-related have suffered. So when I talk about, like, what do we need, like, you're going to ask me, and I'm frustrated that I don't have an answer because I've been working on it for months to try to get you an answer of, like, well, Katie, how many zeros do you need to adequately address this problem? And I don't have that answer because there's a lot of assumptions, right, on— and one of those big assumptions is, does the Assembly want to What does the Assembly want to deprioritize? We have deprioritized many things, including probably most of— Director Wheeler is not here, but many of his parks projects, right, that just have not been the highest priority for us.

And so, you know, being able to give you numbers on like, okay, if you want to still be able to spend— spend is the wrong word— adequately maintain our facilities, because when I say we're not spending on CIP projects, The bulk of those are like water, wastewater, parks maintenance, you know, facilities maintenance. These aren't like— and you didn't build a new thing over here. And so, so those projects have suffered. So those are the type of assumptions that need to go into providing you with what does it cost to provide this new service. And we've been absorbing it, right?

I mean, kind of, you spend $10 million in, in fund balance, but we, uh, from a staff perspective, have, have been absorbing that, right? We've been absorbing, uh, spooling up the EOC and the tremendous time that that takes, even like library staff from library business and, and those types of things. Um, so I don't have like great numbers for you, but I, I want you to understand that the policy decisions are continue doing what you're doing and ignore a whole lot of other things. Fund that, that service as a new service, or somewhere in the middle. And that's the policy level conversation that, that you need to have.

How do we fund that ongoing service? And I think that you've got a couple of mechanisms. You could fund it through a service area, so you could establish a service area for properties that are protected by the HESCO barriers, and those property owners would vote on whether or not they want not to be taxed to provide that service. Um, right now the HESCO barriers protect, I believe it's like 1,800 homes. Keep in mind, a long-term solution protects many more homes.

And one of the reasons why the HESCO barriers are not a permanent solution is because they don't protect against even close to what we, we being the scientists and the engineers, think is a wor— as a worst-case scenario, right? They protect a 63,500 CFS. 90,000 CFS is a worst-case scenario that is likely over the next course of the next 25+ years, right? That, not to mention how tremendously vulnerable they are to damage during our events and otherwise. So those conversations of like, okay, if we establish a service area because we're protecting these homes and this infrastructure, how big is that service area?

That's another question that this body needs to weigh in on. And the information's always changing, right? Because we're always doing things a little bit differently. I do think that it would be reasonable to expect both for, you know, all kind of levels of mitigation, a service area loan will not be able to cover both the cost of short-term mitigation and long-term mitigation, right? So I think I have a figure in here for the area that the HESCO barriers protect.

It's about an $800,000 $800,000 property value. If you, um, $800,000 in 1 mil, right, 1 mil of property tax assessed on those homes would generate less than $1 million. So it is one of the approaches that you all could take is a combined approach, acknowledging that there would be general fund spend and also potentially the service area, right, to give the voters who live in this district a voice in in what's protecting them. That's all part of the conversation that we need to have, and it will be informed by the election also, because of course, if the voters reestablish the mill rate cap at the 12 mil, you'll have more flexibility to respond on an area-wide basis, right? Because you'll be able to say, hey, we need to spool up and use the mill rate capacity.

You know, otherwise you would, would, you could take that to the voters, right? Because the language as passed by the voters says if you, if you want to increase that, you would need to take that to the voters. You definitely have to take it to the voters being affected if you're creating a special service area. So they have to have a say in, in what that looks like. And then the assembly sets that mill rate annually as part of the budget process.

We have a number of service areas, right? We have a roaded service area. We have fire service area, those different things. All of that to say, those are pieces that we'll be struggling with. I do think, and I'm just going to put a plug into our state having some participation in the funding of an enduring solution, I think is important, mostly because we have, you know, local government, federal government, tribal government, and state government all working together And you know, every nonprofit that comes before you and says, I need you to pony up, CBJ, because it sends such a strong message to my funders, that's another reason why that's really important.

So I would expect us to be having that conversation with whoever our new governor is and our legislators. And the other piece that I'm gonna want you to weigh in on is timing. I think we have a much stronger argument when we go and say we need a big chunk of money for this project, Congress, if we have both our own bond for match in place and we have participation, you know, by our partners in different layers of government. And that's a policy question for you guys, right? When do we take this question of local match for an enduring solution to the voters?

And, you know, who are those voters? Are they— is it the service area? Is it area-wide? And those, those types of questions. And I think, you know, under the aggressive timeline that the Army Corps has, they want to give us kind of a rough order of magnitude idea of that cost by December.

So we're very much like on a kind of accelerated timeline.

The other piece that I need you to weigh in on is the creation of a flood flood control district. This is a very customary way, and Attorney Wright has a memo in the packet to manage flood hazards. Certainly the Mississippi River has, has very well-developed flood district. Just want to, you know, take a moment to acknowledge the homeowners who are hosting those barriers and kind of what they have contributed to protecting our community and really the community at large, right? And the, the community resiliency that that has demonstrated it.

CBJ doesn't do this. CBJ does this because our community, you know, are asking us to and are partnering with us. So part of that conversation is, do we compensate property owners for hosting those HESCO barriers? And we have, of course, taken the position that the HESCO barriers are protecting your property, and therefore we don't need to compensate you for that. However, as this— as finding a longer-term solution takes longer and longer, it just— it's something we should ask ourselves, right?

Is there— is there— would it be advantageous for us to create a flood control district and voluntary easements from property owners with some compensation to be able to manage this ongoing emergency? Right now, the only authority that we have to enter people's people's property is our ongoing emergency disaster declaration. So having a voluntary easement with property owners would be a different mechanism, right? We would no longer have to be in a constant state of emergency and using that. Again, the policy decision there is like, well, if Army Corps can really get this done in the next 2 years, maybe we keep doing what we're doing.

But those are conversations that this body needs to have. And I don't have a good number. Like, my first question to staff It's like, well, how much will that cost? Well, if it's— we don't know because it's a, you know, we know what other flood districts do for those easements. Those are permanent easements.

We don't want a permanent easement, and those compensations are actually quite low. And so if we're going to enter into a voluntary agreement, you know, what is palpable to our community, our taxpayers, or the people in the special service district, or both, who will essentially be paying that compensation, right, for their neighbors to be posting those barriers. Um, so those are all the kind of, uh, complex next steps that I want this body to, to weigh in on, and I've kind of summarized them in 3 bullets at the end of the memo. But, um, there's a lot to chew on, and, you know, I want to be able to kind of have these conversations with you so I can bring you a starting place, because I am finding that there's so many assumptions based on where I start that it's difficult for me to bring you like, here's my recommendation, now you ask me questions and tear it apart. So with that, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Madam Manager. I guess just an overall question I have is, knowing that we're— there's many assumptions, there's, you know, just a lack of data and information, I mean, You're maybe not looking for like exact direction on all these things tonight, or are you?

You know, I am looking for input on all of these things, and I think on these 3 bullet items that you have on page 27 of your packet, and those could come tonight. Those could come if, you know, a certain number of you want to have a more targeted conversation. Much like the foregone revenue conversation. I think that would, that would help too. So I'd leave it to the body to decide kind of how you want to tackle that.

Thank you. Questions for the manager? Madam Mayor? Um, yeah, we should have broken you into pieces. So that was a long, uh, report.

So sorry about that. Um, so this is— I'm going back to the first paragraph. Um, some of the questions I've been asked in the public is the solution, um, or the proposals they're looking back. Is that just for the emergency water conveyance prototype, or are they looking for everything all over again? Thank you for that question.

They are just looking for solutions that are an emergency water conveyance prototype. Specifically, they're looking to reduce the amount— the height in Suicide Basin so it doesn't go over 1,100 feet. That means that when the basin releases, it will will be only at minor flood stage. So that's one of the criteria in the RFQ. They are not specifying, however, how that happens.

And, you know, in talking with Army Corps, there's actually a great deal of creativity out there that our different, you know, companies have.

Other questions? Ms. Wall.

Maybe I should know this, that we talked about the difference between a permanent and a temporary easement.

We do, we, we do do temporary easements now, or is that, and how do we figure out, do we just negotiate those, or is temporary easements not a common practice when we are negotiating easements. We do do easements now. I, I don't think we do many temporary easements. We do permanent easements, and it'd be like, you know, for a utilities, let's say utilities is going to go underneath your, your yard or something like that, or access easements. The difference between kind of our bread and butter easements.

And this easement is— for an easement of that nature, you still have use of your yard, you still have use of, you know, your property. You just can't build anything on top of it. In this case, you don't have use of your property while those HESCO barriers are sitting on top of it. So it's different on both sides.

Madam Mayor, I think that's one of the questions as a body we have to answer, is whether we want to look at paying people for those easements. So that's a direction I think we would, would help the city manager.

Thank you for that.

I'd—. Pretty easy question, but I just, just to help people with a sense of scale. I know we have— don't have any clue on like what the enduring solution, the— what are we calling it? Emergency water conveyance prototype is. But if it's a $400 million project and a 10% match, that means we need to come up with $40 million.

And if it's a 25% match, we'd need to be coming up with $100 million.

I think my math is right. And then, but there, the, like, we, we could get support from like a legislative appropriation that would, that could help us in that, in that number. But just to give a sense of scale, are— I mean, those are big numbers.

Um, thank you, Mr. Kelly.

That brings up an important question for me. Uh, when would we need to provide these matching funds? So I think that's part of the— the, uh, that is a question I would give the body. In my ideal world, when you send Mayor Weldon and I and President Peterson to Washington, DC you know, probably not in November, but on our next trip, I would be able to be like, and the voters have already approved X million dollars in match. Like, we are like so in, our whole community supports this.

Now, from a strategy perspective, you know, our voters are also going to want to know more information about what they're voting on. And so there's a lot of chicken and egg here. But, and so that's the, that's the timing question that I think as policymakers you have to help weigh in on.

Well, I can start and give some feedback on these points if that is helpful.

Sure. Well, no one's going.

I guess for me, knowing that there's still a lot of unknowns, I guess I like the idea, and I think it's been functional in the past, having a kind of a strike team of 3 assembly members to just work closely with staff and maybe just try to like sort through things in a quick anyway, just in a more— just, just a faster, easier, less burdensome process. Of course, we know that always comes back to us like it did with foregone revenue and those type of things. I mean, they explained what they were looking at and then, you know, said, oh, we didn't bring this one up, and you know why. And anyway, so it's not like, it's not like they're making the decision, but they're helping work through a lot of those nitty-gritty details that honestly would be, I think, quite painful to try to do all 9 of us at a public media and a committee the whole. So I like that kind of idea.

And then I guess just for the other addition is, you know, I don't know what it looks like. And again, that's maybe why a little strike team is a good idea. I like the idea of— I understand it. It makes sense to me to provide some compensation to people, those properties that are hosting the barriers. Again, a lot of details and things to go with, but that's where I'm on, on these items.

Um, Mr. Kelly, then Madam Mayor. I think the mayor was— had her hand raised before me.

Oh, thank you, Mr. Kelly. So I like that idea too. So I actually talked to some people today. Um, I thought the foregone revenue little group worked well, and these are tough questions, and I would rather have a little group go through them and present the best ideas to the body. So I talked to Mr. Steininger, Mr. Brooks, and Ms. Hall today, um, because two of you are going to be gone and one of you is running for election, and Ms. Atkinson didn't want to do it, so I picked those three.

So anyway, if you guys think that's a good idea, let me know. But I was thinking that right now. And just like the Foregone Revenue did, they brought a bunch of ideas forward. I'm not asking them to make decisions. I'm asking them to weed out the bad ideas and come with the good ideas, whether they agree or not, because that's what the Foregone Revenue did, and then let the body decide there.

So, however, I think the timing of the bond is very definitely at the assembly level, and I'm probably looking at doing some kind of compensation for the properties hosting barriers, since I know that's a question Ms. Caster wants.

Excuse me, Mr. Kelly first. Pardon me. Thank you. I agree with almost everything the mayor said. I would have volunteered, but I understand her reason.

Missy Scandies. Thanks, Mr. Chair. I was hoping to get you to restate the kind of key things. I think for me, from where I sit, this does not seem— perhaps with, uh, if there is consensus around a specific policy item, then it seems to make to me to do that, but this seems like a weird one to do that with personally, but I might be in the minority there.

And I say that because we know how closely the flood community follows the conversation, and, and understandably so. And, and so there's a lot of chicken But I so far I hear the bond as a key point where there'll be need— there needs to be guidance. There's the idea of if it goes on for how long. Some people have expressed interest in compensating folks with HSCOs, but I'm wondering what those key points are, because at this point that's not super clear to me. And it would make more sense to me to at least have folks provide some guidance in this general body before breaking off into— I don't even know which piece of that they would be deliberating on.

I'll give it a quick shot. I guess for me it's like, we don't know what the ongoing maintenance costs are, or what the, you know, I don't even remember that term again. The enduring solution is going to be. So do we need to have some amount done in area-wide? And do we need to do some, you know, in a local district?

I don't know. When do we need to do that? Timing. When is the— I don't know. I just, I just see some of these questions being a little bit challenging to just try to be like informing the whole body.

And anyway, I just feel like a smaller team might have a better chance looking more into, are they temporary easements? What happens if people aren't participating? Anyway, I just, I just see. The nimbleness that a smaller group to like sort through some of those things and work on some of the timelines and facts and data in a, you know, with, with the city staff. And again, and then, you know, bring it back to the body for, for full discussion.

Those are, those are some of the things that I just think could, could be addressed better in a smaller group. Madam Mayor, you had maybe had a response too. I think you did a pretty good job. What I'm looking at mainly is just funding and different sources funding and including the Flood Control District. I just think it, like Mr. Smith does, I think it'd just be more nimble with a smaller group to bring that back.

And so that's what I'm just looking at, different, different funding mechanisms and sources and what we're— how we're going to do that.

Go ahead, Missus Candace. I'll follow up. I guess that, that helps me understand, and these are definitely meaty issues that there's a lot of detail and there's a lot consideration. I think the city, you know, sometimes we hear about transparency and sometimes it drives me nuts because I say, "We do everything in public. We couldn't be any more transparent." And, you know, and certainly though, I think there's ways for us to be more user-friendly, or there's always ways we could modernize our practices.

But I can say after this much time spent here, there's nothing going on behind the scenes. And certainly we We never mean to give people that impression. If there are— I guess I just want to know more of the specific things, and it sounds like it's going to be— you're talking about them, how to pay with that smaller group, which is a mix of area-wide and sales tax and bonding versus service district, and that's fine. That's, you know, folks can always do that. I just I think it's good for us to keep having those conversations in public because I know how much people care about it.

Miss Hall, I appreciate that. Um, and I, you know, timing of the bond proposition creation, you know, these are outlined, these, these topics are outlined for us, and, and this would all come back to the assembly for that public visibility and conversation. But as we've seen so far in this process, it's constantly changing with, you know, working with Washington on this. And so I, I see trying to figure it all out in a group of 9 is, is just going to be really unwieldy. And so I think you will thank us, or the future assembly will thank us for breaking it down.

Mr. Kelly, thank you. I think one of the, one of the reasons why I, I would support this, and I also, um, I don't take Ms. Hughes-Gandy's comments lightly about, uh, about the issue of transparency. I think I, I would support this approach, uh, for the reason that I think they're coming up with the information that we need. I think there's, if I remember correctly, with the foregone revenue, there was still a way way for us to publicly give input as an assembly about what things that we wanted to see and information that we, we wanted them to gather. And so I would, if there's any input that we have now or at a future meeting, I would encourage that, especially out in the public.

But I, I do, I, I do agree that just find it for the purposes of finding information, I support this group.

And I mean, I think this probably goes without saying, as things and information become available, and it's not like we're— I imagine staff will be bringing us updates. I mean, we get plenty of them. So I feel like, Madam Manager, if you want to—. Yeah, we can update you at every single Committee of the Whole. It just will be— it is challenging to move quickly with all the changing information.

And I just will point out, page 27 of the memo are the questions that I'm just struggling with. And, um, uh, I think that to a certain extent, um, you give— maybe cede more control to staff, more policy, because if staff is the one giving you the, the starting place, then it's harder to deviate from that. And so that's part of, uh, kind of, you know, my reasoning to wanting to like work through this. Doesn't mean we can't still talk about it every single public meeting and chew through those things. I appreciate that the public is very interested and they're our allies in this.

The more we keep the public informed, frankly, the more successful we will be in this mission. So that's absolutely my intention.

Madam Mayor. And just remind everybody that the Foreground Avenue gave updates, and so I expect this too, but I'm going to change the subject a little bit. Um, something that, uh, Madam Manager doesn't have on this, but, um, she did allude to it a little bit about staff. And at some point we're going to have to look at if we need additional staff. Um, so that's something that we need to keep up, and I don't think this group would be appropriate for that.

I think the body is more of that. But, um, we heard it a couple times that they've had to drop the ball a couple places, and, uh, we have to ask ourselves ourselves, um, if we can still afford to do that, or if we need to hire some additional staff to help with this.

We still have the 3 bullets on the table if anyone does want to give more input on any of them. That is, you're welcome to if people have something to say. So, Miss Wall, uh, I just have a random thought that I think I think before I leave this topic, I think is relevant for you all to think about in the future is if we start, you know, thinking about a tax district or a bond, you know, you're investing significant taxpayer dollars into this. Not that we haven't already, but we're making it a choice for people. I think the body should think about— I'm not saying you do it or you don't do it.

I think it's a sensitive topic that should be debated, which would be limiting growth in the flood district, um, whether that's housing units or what. We used to have that in the landslide zone. You couldn't add density. Um, we got rid of that, which I think was a good decision because— but landslides are very different than floods, and I would say a temporary moratorium to consider so that you're not putting a bunch of resources into protecting something and at the same time adding to that problem and making it— I know that's a hard conversation, but just wanted to put in people's ears that as you go down that road, it might be worth having that conversation about whether that might be something to consider.

Seeing no other comments on this topic, Madam, Madam Manager, do you have what you need to kind of move forward?

I think I have the information that I need to keep rolling this ball uphill.

Mr. Kelly, go ahead. I did just want to make a quick comment. Manager Kester, um, pointed out the, you know, thanks the people who are hosting these barriers. I also, um, just wanted to— I recently attended a meeting of the Juneau Flood Solution Advocates. They mentioned that they were very proud of their contribution to helping put eyes on the, on the river.

And I wanted to make sure that that effort was also acknowledged. So thank you. Thank you for that, Mr. Kelly. That's a good flag. I'd also, you know, we've— I think people have done a good job of thanking all our partners and the numerous ones which I won't list again.

I guess one thing that I've wanted to call out is just also thanking the businesses and the contractors that have executed a lot of the phase of the HESCO work. Admiralty North Forty, Coogan Hendrickson Construction, and just to appreciate that work. Yes, they're getting paid, but they were also working very hard and probably not doing other jobs as a result. So just wanted to thank those groups as well.

That moves us through our third topic and into our last. We have an update on public notice process and public notice webpage. There is a memo.

Mr. Bard, anything brief you want to share with that before— go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, you'll recall that you passed an ordinance back in March modifying the ways in which, uh, CBJ complies with Alaska's public notice requirements, um, specifically making it possible for, uh, us to provide those public notices online. Um, when we talked with you about that, we then anticipated putting out an RFP to find a third party, um, to do those public notices on our behalf.

Um, during the budget process, after, you know, talking internally after the passage of that ordinance, we determined that we thought we could accomplish all of that more efficiently, less expensively by doing it in-house. House. Um, the clerk's office, the, um, library through the webmaster, the law department all spent a significant amount of time developing a new website and a process, um, to, um, publish, uh, notices timely on that website, uh, to, to make them available in a centralized location, easy to access for the public. That website launched earlier this month, um, has lots of advantages that I, that I I won't go into that. The memo lays out.

I'll note that we anticipate we have increased some costs, so we're saving about $70,000 by doing this and no longer spending that money with the Juno Empire. We have repurposed some of that money into new advertising spend at all of our local media outlets. Outlets to drive traffic to that public— centralized public notice page and just continually make people available— make people aware through our local media outlets about that resource and how to access public notice. We're also continuing to do the, you know, easy non-web things that we've always done, like post on bulletin boards around town and the like. So happy to take questions, either me or the clerk.

Excuse me, questions for staff.

Seeing your questions.

Good job. This is a neat— this is a neat page. Yeah, comments. Sure, go ahead. It's beautiful.

It's really—. It's wonderful to see everything in one place. So thank you. This is way better than a stack of newspapers in the corner. Seeing some pointing to Miss Hendricks and her team for their good work.

Thank you. Good job, Mr. Steininger. Um, yeah, actually I do have a question, and I'm kind of poking— and great format, very simple, easy to understand. Um, I'm noticing on like the RFPs it says, oh, you can go get more information at the Public Purchase webpage. Is it possible to provide direct links to the notice that somebody's looking at, or is that just not something that works with— I've never used Public Purchase, so I don't know if you can't link directly in or not.

You have to have an account, but yeah.

Okay, seeing nothing else on— Ms. Hendricks, please. There is a button at the top under Quick Links that takes you to a summary with a little bit more detail, and there's instructions with how to get in there.

Okay, that moves us through our agenda topics. Madam Manager, any staff reports?

No, thank you. Our next meeting date is Monday, September 21st. Seeing nothing else before the Committee of the Whole, we are adjourned. Learned.