January 7, 2026 Assembly Finance Committee Meeting Summary
January 7, 2026 Assembly Finance Committee Meeting Summary
The Assembly Finance Committee convened to address the FY2027 draft budget calendar, receive updates from partner agencies (Alaska Committee and Southeast Childhood Collective), and deliberate on three major capital projects: the View Drive flood buyout program, the Municipal Building renovation funding, and a sales tax exemption for composting. Committee members engaged in detailed discussions regarding scheduling conflicts, funding mechanisms for non-federal cost shares, and the prioritization of capital projects amidst revenue uncertainties.
Consent Calendar
- Approved the minutes from the December 1, 2025 meeting without changes.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Alaska Committee (Wayne Jensen): Stated that the organization is deeply grateful for the City and Borough of Juneau (CBJ) partnership. While acknowledging that they have reserves and would attempt to reduce reserves if funding were cut, they emphasized that the grant is vital for their operations, particularly regarding the Gab Alaska program and legislative reception. They expressed a position of seeking continuity of the grant.
- Southeast Childhood Collective (Blue Scheibler & Nikki Love): Expressed strong appreciation for the City's historical support in stabilizing the child care sector. They advocated for the continuation of funding, noting that without such support, child care programs statewide are closing. They highlighted the necessity of their proposed $16 million family and child care center to address workforce shortages, specifically for children aged 0-18 months.
- Municipal Building Project (Manager Kester): Argued that providing decent, safe office space for employees is a moral obligation. He expressed that the proposed partial remodel of the Burns Building is significantly more cost-effective ($8.5 million) than a full renovation of the current City Hall ($40 million) or a purpose-built facility, while also reducing operating costs by 50%.
- Flood Buyout (Manager Kester & NRCS): Presented the View Drive buyout as a necessary emergency measure. The position was that while the
Meeting Transcript
Mr. Allen, are we ready back there? All right. I call the January 7th, 2026 Assembly Finance Committee meeting to order. Miss Wendell, will you call roll or no role? Thank you, Chair Wall. We have all assembly members present in chambers besides Mayor Weldon, who is present on Zoom. Thank you. That brings us to approval of minutes. You have the December 1st, 2025 minutes in front of you. Any changes to those minutes. Seeing none, those are so moved. That brings us to agenda topics, and we will start with the FY2027 draft AFC budget calendar. Ms. Flick. Thank you, Chair Wool. In your packet on page 10, you will find a memo from Chair Wool and myself bringing to you some options and just wanted to get some discussion on how to approach the FY27 budget, given the um number of decisions that are expected to need to be made. Two joint meetings that are just there for discussion. Nothing has been scheduled. We've not talked to the other boards. So don't get excited about anything. Just um if we wanted to have some additional um joint meetings, those are a couple of dates that might work with the parties that might work. Those are just notating that there's two kinds of meetings on those particular nights. That we want to, you know, wait for some of that feedback before we make decisions. We'll start that tonight. So if they are going to be services that we may potentially be considering um altering in our budget, now is a good time to start asking those questions of our partner agencies. We'll start that tonight. We've got two folks who are gonna two organizations who are gonna give us an update on what they've been up to. We also have put tentatively here joint meetings with the airport, Dawson Harbors School Board, Bartlett and Eagle Crest kind of earlier than we normally would. Some of those folks will be done with their budgets. And so that will be a time for us to um, you know, review what we typically would. If others aren't quite done, then it would be a time for us to give them the direction that they'll need. Um so when when we finalize things, we're on the same page. In the past, we've done that kind of right at the beginning. Um, so this will be a bit earlier. Um, other than that, I'd say there's a we've built room in here. We don't exactly know how things are gonna go when we get into April and May. Um, and so I would love feedback now or as we go in terms of how you guys want to be having these decisions. So maybe what I'd ask is um if you have questions tonight, definitely ask those any feedback tonight, kind of um on what you want to see in this process would be helpful. And then we can maybe talk about a few dates um before we move on this evening. Thanks. So I'll uh see if folks have questions first. Mr. Smith. Thanks. Um and sorry if you said it a a shift that I see is it just remind me. In the past, we would have likely heard from it at least the airport docks and harbors and Bartlett at the all day retreat on Saturday. Um this is meant to move that earlier. And it may be that we don't make, you know, they come back with tweaks for us later in the process, but this is basically meant to take what used to be at the all-day retreat and move it into January, February, and March. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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