Well, welcome everybody.

Uh, thank you for joining us on what is today, the first day of summer, maybe.

Hopefully, summer is actually starting a bit late.

Um called to order the regularly scheduled meeting of Tuesday, July 14th, 2026.

Please join me for a flag salute.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

The assembly of the city and borough of Sitka would like to respectfully acknowledge the traditional first people of Sheetka.

With gratitude, we proceed on Clinkit Ani.

Sarah Roll Call, please.

Mayor Eisenbais.

Present.

Ms.

Carlson here.

Mr.

Christianson.

Here.

Mr.

Mosier.

Here.

And Mr.

Selene.

Here.

And Ms.

Riley is absent this evening.

Thank you.

Any correspondence or agenda changes this evening.

Seeing none.

No ceremonial matters.

That will bring us to our special reports.

We have two scheduled special reports tonight.

Public works and Centennial Hall.

By the order written on my sheet, we'll start with uh Mark, please.

Good evening, Mayor and Assembly.

Mark CV public works director.

So closing out the last quarter of FY26.

We ended with the department budget spent down to 86% overall.

We're currently still at 93% staffing, which seems to be the magic number because we've shifted some positions, but remain at 93%.

Uh those empty positions are all currently within building maintenance, and we do have two scheduled personnel losses coming up.

Our office coordinator will be retiring at the end of this month, and our building maintenance supervisor has relocated his family to New York and will be joining them as well.

So two more positions opening up for us.

We have been able to fill all of our attempt positions except for two.

We have a mechanic temp and a second custodial temp right now, which are our only temp positions open at the time for major projects.

The only two we currently have in construction are still the airport and Lake Hirsch Monastery Kincaid Road and Utility Improvement for the airport.

We're still looking at a substantial completion at the end of September this fall.

We did just receive another grant for that project for work that was completed prior to 2021.

So we'll be working on processing that.

So these projects are happening at the correct time.

We do have six proposals.

They've gone through the administrative clearing with the finance department.

So we'll get a team together hopefully the end of this week, next week, to select a proposal and move forward into negotiations for that contract.

Awarded, we also have a repainting hillside tank for the water department that has been awarded.

We have a school district boiler maintenance overhaul for the oil fiber boilers that are secondary to the electric boilers that has been awarded.

And we should have contractors on site for the performing arts center audio visual upgrades as well.

Outside of those major projects, uh we also had a first one of our first public surplus auctions.

We were able to sell quite a bit of equipment.

The total proceeds from that came to around 137,000.

There will be a portion of that that goes back to grant agencies that uh gave us grants on some of the equipment.

So a large portion of that proceed, almost not quite half, may end up going back to the granting agencies.

Additionally, we had our second uh household hazardous waste event and the spring cleanup during that event.

We had approximately a thousand participants.

We had over 900,000 pounds of scrap, 148 vehicles, and about 200,000 gallons of household hazardous waste that were collected and shipped off island.

Our water department's also been pretty busy.

They're working on the final approval to operate for both the UV and membrane filtration plants from those projects that were about a decade ago.

Uh they fixed that Kirkman Brick today.

Wastewater is still wrapping up the Thomson Harbor Lift Station project to close that out.

Building maintenance has been busy with our school district maintenance, and we did get the chlorinator back online for the pool, so that is operating and it's calibrating right now.

We're hoping by next week we have that running uh so that we no longer have to uh hand mix any chemicals.

There's a couple sensors we've found that uh through putting the new chlorinator in, they need to be replaced as well.

Uh grounds has been planting, making our grounds look nice, keeping things trimmed, working on trail maintenance, and they've also done trips out to Goddard and Tom Young uh to redo the deck, do the annual maintenance out there and work on the tubs.

Streets has been working on their potholes, they wrapped up a heavy snow removal season.

Um we've got the sweeper out now, sweeping, they've been painting crosswalks, uh, potholing, and we started painting some curbs as well this week.

Central garage.

We brought in through three new police department vehicles, so those are online now, as well as a new 12-yard dump truck replacing the one that we uh basically had to sun down because it broke over this snow season.

Uh, there also was some extensive mains for that, and we were able to shift over all of our vehicles onto our summer tires.

So just a few things.

Just a few not much going on.

Uh questions for public works.

Mark, could you explain a little bit on the mechanical temp and like what what you see is his uh what detail is gonna do for us?

The mechanical temp.

No, the two temps that we have not been able to hire are a mechanic temp that was going to be working in the garage and a second custodial, and we're we're backfilling that with one of the grounds of custodial pimps.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mark.

Appreciate it.

And that'll bring us to Centennial Hall and Tony.

Well, I heard a bannable comment earlier, so uh good evening, Mr.

Mayor and Assembly.

Uh, my name is Tony.

Uh the building uh manager.

And uh we're gonna go ahead and go through our quarterly report.

Uh as of right now, at the beginning of the season, while we're kind of halfway through, we have uh um hired five temp visitor desk attendants as well as four temp pedestrian safety attendants.

So we are at full capacity right now.

We have one full-time temp that we're working with right now.

Uh we're getting 40 hours at least from him through the summer, so we're gonna be looking at hiring another building attendant at the end of the summer.

Uh tourism, it's been pretty busy past few months, uh, from the beginning of April through July.

The totals uh show that we've hosted over 260,000 visitors, and then we still have at least three months to go, full months to go.

Uh, the month of June alone, we've had it at least 146,000 come through here in Sitka.

So we're definitely on track for uh a bigger season, I think, than we had last year.

Um staff here.

What we've been doing is we've just been maintaining the pace has been pretty fast during those days that we have at six or seven thousand people in town.

Uh so we maintained the building, we maintained the grounds, we make sure everything's running uh the way it's supposed to be.

Um, event and meeting highlights.

Um during this last quarter, uh Harrigan Centennial Hall has continued to serve as the hub here in Sitka, providing the citizens' commissions and uh providing for citizens' commissions and CBS staff.

Um, the big highlights that we've had in the last uh three months.

We have had the Alaska State Volunteer Firefighters Banquet that came through, uh Northwest Managers four-day conference, uh C Alaska three-day summit, sustainable southeast partnership uh spruce route, and that was an all-hands one.

That was that was a big event.

Um then we have the summer the music fest um the whole month of June coming up.

Uh we have uh state elections, we have the NRA banquet.

Uh municipal elections are coming up in September through October.

Um, then we'll kick into the Alaska Day festivities starting um about uh mid-October.

Um we have a QEK for uh Chuck Miller, and that's in late October, and then we go into the absentee voting for uh the general elections, well fest, and then at the I just threw this last one in there because I'm kind of excited about it.

We have the the train uh set up for the end of the year in December, so that's coming around the corner as well.

Um, some of the statistics for the building from uh will go from the beginning of this year, January 1st to now.

Um we've had at least 760 bookings across the auditorium and the meeting spaces, um 121 uh nonprofit, 306 general public events, six commercial, ten state, um, and three hundred and twenty-three city of sitcom meetings.

Um I added in this last piece just because I think that um we kind of lose sight sometimes on what kind of building this is.

We host a lot of profit or nonprofit and general meetings here and um and different types of meetings, but we do still um during these last you know months offer a lot of services to the community as well.

So uh we've had three weddings at least, uh one gender reveal.

I believe it was a boy, uh piano recital.

Uh we had an awards banquet from on Edgecombe High School, uh chess tournament, and uh we have had unfortunately um one too many celebration of lives here.

Uh we've had at least four birthday parties as well.

Um, for the Herrican Centennial Hall budget, we ended the fiscal year at 94 percent.

Uh we've throughout this last uh fiscal year.

Uh we've been trying to hire and keep full staff.

We hadn't had a chance to do that throughout the year, so that's where some of the extra funds are going.

Um we also have a maintenance contract uh with with uh dimensional communications, and we do also uh work with our janitorial as well.

Uh some of the future projects we have, uh continued um auditorium lighting.

Um we continue with that.

Uh we're gonna refinish the auditorium floor and stage, hopeful.

Hopefully the stage this year as well.

Um yeah, that is all I have.

Questions for Tony, please.

Yeah, what percentage of the salaries for the visitor uh desk attendance and the pedestrian safety attendance comes from CPV funds?

What percent?

Yeah.

Uh I am not sure on that one.

Is it less than half or more than half guessing?

Of how they get paid out.

Yes.

So yeah, the CPV money um from the big ships, does it go to help with those?

Yes, it goes to the attendance as well as the safety pedestrian attendance as well.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Yes.

Thank you, Tony.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Moving on in our special reports.

Uh is there anyone here for government to government, municipal boards, commissions, committees, any other municipal departments, school district?

Uh thank you.

Uh that'll bring us two persons to be heard.

This is public participation for any item off of tonight's agenda, not to exceed three minutes for any individual.

All right, we'll move on to consent agenda.

I move to approve the consent agenda consisting of item A, approve the minutes of the June 23rd assembly meeting, and item B approve two new looker license endorsements applications for JL Sitka Inc.

DBA Coldwater Bar and Gorilla at 330 Seward Street.

Second that's been moved and segmented to approve the consent agenda.

Is there any public comment?

Sarah.

All right, on the motion to approve the consent agenda, Mayor Eisenbais.

Yes, Mr.

Christensen, yes, Mr.

Mosher.

Yes, Mr.

Celine, yes, and Miss Carlson.

Yes.

Motion passes five zero.

Thank you.

Item C, please.

I move to appoint Maria Capenzo.

Uh crooks to a three-year term on the library commission and reappoint Scott Wagner to a two-year term on the Gary Paxson Industrial Park Board.

Second.

That's been moved and seconded to appoint to the library commission and reappoint to the Gary Paxton Industrial Park.

Is there any public comment?

Assembly deliberation.

Sarah.

All right, on the motion to appoint Ms.

Crooks and reappoint Mr.

Wagner.

Mayor Eisenbais.

Yes.

Ms.

Carlson.

Yes.

Mr.

Mosher.

Yes.

Mr.

Christianson.

Yes.

And Mr.

Staline.

Yes.

The motion passes 5-0 on item C.

Item D, please.

I move to approve ordinance 2026-16 on second and final reading.

I move to approve ordinance 2026-16 on second and final reading, amending Title IV Revenue and Finance of the SICA general code by amending chapter 4.25 sales tax, section 4.25.330, security limitations, sales of security deposits, and auction bonds.

Sorry.

That's been moved and seconded to approve ordinance 26-1-6.

Is there any public comment assembly deliberation?

Sarah.

All right.

On the motion to approve ordinance 2026-16 on second and final reading.

Ms.

Carlson?

Yes.

Mr.

Mosher.

Yes.

Mayor Eisenbais.

Yes.

Mr.

Selene?

Yes.

And Mr.

Christensen.

The motion passes 5-0.

Thank you.

Item E, please.

I move to approve ordinance 2026-17 on first reading making supplemental appropriations for fiscal year 2027 additional SICA Recreation Foundation support parks and recreation master plan.

Second.

John, I understand Kevin has an introduction to this item.

Correct.

Evening, Assembly.

Mayor Eisenbeis, Kev Knox, Parks and Recreation Manager.

The item before you, as mentioned, is a request for a supplemental appropriation for $20,000 from the general fund to support the parks and recreation master plan.

That support would uh go through the parks and recreation budget and to the SICA Recreation Foundation.

The foundation is uh working to uh complete that 20-year master plan, uh has engaged with a uh uh a contractor after uh putting out an RFQ.

Um and the RFQ was put out according to uh city um procurement policies.

Uh that master plan will support a long-term asset management and capital improvement prioritization, uh which the assembly has previously noted is a prior prerequisite for launching major individual projects.

Um of the the development and uh the funding uh or in the funding of this master plan aligns squarely with the goals uh and actions in the CBS strategic plan in particular item four of plan and invest in uh sustainable infrastructure for future generations.

Uh active community discussions have highlighted pressing infrastructure deficiencies lately uh that will that we plan to address specifically regarding athletic fields, uh dark park accessibility and modernizing our other outdoor recreational facilities.

Uh previous planning efforts as noted in the memo uh in 2019 work with the National Park Service for some technical support.

Also in FY23, uh there was uh funding that was set aside to uh work on a uh master plan and asset planning process.

Uh both of those efforts installed due to uh outside consulting support uh losing its ability to help with the uh recreation committee's uh planning process and then also our in own internal municipal uh municipal capacity constraints.

Uh I do want to note that the last time that we had a comprehensive uh recreation plan for the city was 1991, so this is far overdue.

Uh the city uh entered into the MOA with SRF in February, uh contributed 14,900 uh from the original appropriation uh from FY23 as seed funding.

Um after that uh RFQ process uh SRF selected Corvus Designs to lead the process and work with our public engagement and some of the the planning and uh development of of surveys and then the final uh plan design.

Uh Corvus brings uh over 20 years of specialized Alaskan experience uh having developed uh master plans for KetchCan, Anchorage, Juno, Kenai, and several other communities throughout Alaska.

Uh the team also includes a uh a local uh Monique Anderson of Anderson Land Planning is going to work with us, uh, and then Trevor Sandy of uh PE or a PE with RM engineering down in Ketchcan.

Uh he'll help with uh some of the engineering and relevant cost uh costing of some of the the assets.

Uh the project right now is scheduled to span from June uh actually last month it's already started uh and we hope to have a uh a finalized plan for you in January of 2027.

Uh once uh we have all of that uh forward to um we'll be able to uh better um plan for our future uh recreation uh infrastructure in SICA.

Uh the design costs estimates ranged from 61,000 to just a little over 76,000.

Uh the 61,000 was a base plan.

Uh the 76,000 included some additional uh planning of additional assets as well as some uh uh more robust public engagements.

Uh SRF right now has allocated just a little over 20,000 of its own funds, uh, and that's in addition to the 14,900 that the assembly are has already uh uh provided them, uh, and then they're working to raise an additional 27,000 in the coming months.

Um so the request uh before you um would bring the city's total of just just a little under 35,000 uh for more than a 61,000 20 year uh plan.

Uh there's board members that are going to be here tonight that uh will speak to this item as well, and I'm also available for any questions you might have.

Uh thank you.

If we have additional questions, we'll call you back up.

Is there any public comment on ordinance 26-17?

Uh in the microphone in front of you, there's a button on the very bottom.

It'll turn red when it's on.

Maybe grab that other.

There you go.

Okay.

Yep.

Thanks, everyone.

My first assembly meeting.

Thanks.

Really appreciate it.

Um good evening.

My name is Anna Schumacher, and I serve as a volunteer board member for the SICA Recreation Foundation.

Um, I came to position through my work in youth recreation and family services, and because I strongly believe that community supported recreation is one of the many ways we can all arrive at a healthier future.

Um, so like Kevin stated, SRF is a volunteer-led organization working to advance SICA's parks and recreation infrastructure and services.

Um, I'm here tonight to urge you all to um consider allocating a minimum of 20,000 and additional support to the SICA Recreation Foundation to complete a comprehensive 20-year parks and recreation master plan.

Our team has already put the time into selecting a qualified Alaska-based firm to lead the planning process.

Um we worked secure necessary partnerships and additional financial backers.

Um, as you are all likely aware, the last master plan was completed in 1991, which yes is long before I was actually born.

Um so I think it's high time that our community um has an updated plan that captures our community needs appropriately.

Um without a comprehensive master plan, the city lacks a clear community-driven understanding of the priorities for parks and recreation.

This planning effort will ensure that future investments are guided by broad public input and that limited public dollars are directed where they'll have the greatest long-term benefit.

Um, because this plan would guide municipal decision making and benefit the entire community, it is appropriate that the primary financial responsibility rests with the city.

Um thank you for your time and consideration of our request for additional 20,000 in support for the creation of a parks and recreation master plan.

I cede the remainder of my time.

Thank you.

Okay, thanks.

Any other public comment on ordinance 26-17 back to the assembly for deliberation.

JJ.

I've got some questions for Kevin if he doesn't mind coming back up.

Um remember you know we talked about this.

Was it five months ago, six months ago?

Um, when we initially saw this MOU.

Um and it had gone through the Parks and Rec Commission committee at that time.

Um has it gone again through Parks and Rec committee?

This particular request?

Yes.

No.

No.

Okay.

Um they are engaged in there and they will be engaged in the master plan process, but this request came from SRF.

Um, and yeah, it hasn't gone through the committee.

Okay.

They're aware of it, but they haven't voted on it or anything.

Okay.

Um, because that was kind of trying to figure out you know why now.

We're we're currently in the first meeting of the new fiscal year.

This memo is dated the second day of the fiscal year.

So a supplemental appropriation right off the bat.

Do you have any more information there on why the timing of this?

Part of it is because of the timing of the RFQ and the receipt of the estimate of how much the master plan costs from Corvus.

We didn't have a set number, and because we did it as an RFQ process, there wasn't a bid price to set to it.

Once Corvus was selected as the design firm, they came back with the cost estimate and essentially two different scopes of work, hence the two different numbers that we have.

So once once SRF was aware of exactly how much they would need to raise, um that they've kind of embarked on that process at that point.

Okay.

Yes, I don't remember it six months ago when we were first talking about this, it being a seed contribution from the assembly from us.

So I didn't expect to see in six months later a new ask coming forward.

Um so how come part of that RFQ process, one of the scopes wasn't based on money available at the time.

And we weren't fully I mean we didn't have a full number.

You know, bid shopping or something else like that.

So you don't really know how much it's going to cost when you go through the RFQ process sometimes.

Was that shared with the assembly five, six months ago?

In that they were going to go through an RQ process?

RFQ and that it was likely.

As opposed to an RP.

Um likely to come back with an additional ask?

Because I I think I would have had a comment five, six months ago uh if if I knew we'd be here again today.

Um the the discussion as I recall with the assembly was that you know we had this uh a broad range on on what the cost could be.

Uh we weren't sure.

Uh uh they they uh SRF decided to go with the RFQ process just because it offered some more flexibility around developing scope.

Um you know, once the once the contractor was selected uh based on their qualifications.

Um just trying to provide they were trying to provide some flexibility within that.

I don't think they did come forward and say whether or not it would be an RFQ or an RP when the initial ask was made.

Uh but in the discussions previously, I do recall that there were assembly members that were suggesting that uh additional funds could be made available based on on product that might come forward or you know, additional requests could be made.

Okay.

Yeah, because I recall that discussion being oh, for almost $15,000, we're gonna get this big product because we're teaming with this outside group and the value that they're bringing is figuring out all the rest of it.

Um seeing a difference now in in six months.

Um yeah, it just seems like we maybe were we're sold something that that hasn't been delivered, or you know, there's always discovery process.

Um so it's just tough to have the two times the two asks and it not go through you know the the process of the committee, so it couldn't come back through a report structure uh to us to know that this was coming back back in a short amount of time.

Okay, I'm gonna have to think through that a bit more.

Um 61,000 or 76,000 is more.

We we just got a report for health care for 20,000, and that seems to be kind of our our rate um of what we approve at a time or what's asked of us at a time.

Um but we do have a memory here um of what it all takes to add it up.

So thank you.

Kevin.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um I should ask uh questions for Kevin while we have them in front of us.

No, this is just comments.

Okay.

Uh Kevin, I do have a couple things for you.

Um so number one, um, as an employee of the municipality liaisoning to Sitco Recreation Foundation.

Uh, do you believe that they are currently in compliance with the MOU?

Yes.

Okay.

Uh because when I read the MOU, um the very first responsibility is that SRF will seek and secure funding necessary to fund the creation of the master plan.

Uh so that is not the municipality's goals right there.

Um I will scroll down a little bit and and indicate that it does say in funding contingency that the CBS may contribute additional beyond the stated amount.

Um, but this MOA indicates that SRF is going to do the heavy lifting on this.

Um they do have fundraising methods.

Um apparently one of the fundraising methods is going to be um asking the municipality for, right?

Um and so Kevin, when I when I asked that question, it's because I wonder how solid this MOA is with them.

Um and I wonder you know what direction this is is is heading um with us with the municipality working on one side and with this organization working on the other, because if we're instantly scratching the first line of responsibility, what's next and what is this paper actually worth?

There they are currently engaged in additional fundraising efforts.

Uh they've have requests out to local organizations and other funding uh agencies that uh haven't given specific uh dedicated funds yet, uh, but are you know moving towards that at this point?

Um the timeline on this project is relatively compressed in trying to get a final product in front of this body and in front of the the public or the community uh by January 2027.

Um so you know they're just moving quickly at this point.

So this request has come forward, there's re other requests out there that are working their ways forward and and you know trying to get additional funds.

Um the I think the the foundation has been doing its its earnest work and and trying to bring forward those funds um as as quickly as they can to demonstrate that they're doing the you know those first couple of lines within the MOA to show that they are you know dedicated to this, but I think the fact that they've put up over 20,000 of their own unrestricted funds is a portion of that as well.

So I mean that's 20,000 plus the 14.

So they've got uh almost 35,000, actually probably a little over 35,000 already dedicated.

Um that includes the 14.9 that you have already put forward.

Okay, and then uh correct me if I'm wrong, but I heard earlier that this project is already started.

Yes.

So the the contract's been signed.

Um some of the work has been uh started already, including some uh asset condition assessments that uh some of my staff have been doing, um, but then also uh some analysis of the data that we have uh to be able to provide the contractors so that they can start doing uh some of the report compliment of the case.

Okay, and I hope that's scoped and scalable then because you don't have full funding right now.

Yes, it is.

And you signed a contract for services and and uh bear in mind that all the the contract is signed between SRF and and Corvus.

It's not between the city and Corvus.

Um so SRF has you know full responsibility there in working with Corvus.

Um they have a uh a split scope um and a split um payment system, so they don't have to come up with this full 61 plus thousand up front, they're paying in installments and then and those scope pie those pieces of in the scope are also divided up.

Okay, that raises a couple other questions, um, but I think Kevin has some points as well.

Any other uh questions for Kevin while he's no, I'm good.

Thank you.

Um thank you, Kevin.

Yeah, I appreciate it.

JJ.

Yeah, I was thinking through my notes, but and I so appreciate you come back to me.

Um you mentioned there's an engineer out of Ketchikan gonna be doing some costing of assets.

Uh we have an asset manager within our municipality.

Uh can you help me understand why they're we're paying for someone else to do that?

Because they have specific experience and knowledge around recreational and athletic facilities, and in particular within Alaska, and the our asset manager is also not a PE.

Okay, I um the majority of the assets I'm thinking about are you know picnic tables and no, no, we're talking bigger, larger complexes, and you know, we're talking about like the Kim Sham complex or the Landry Field or you know, lower molar playgrounds, things like that.

So looking at them in a larger, larger pictures than just the individual small assets within.

Okay, this is uh becoming different than I thought we were getting into six months ago.

Thank you.

Thank you, Kevin.

Appreciate you.

And Kevin.

Thank you, Stephen.

Mr.

Mayor, um so um uh after reading through this and then now um hearing these comments.

Um I guess I'll share both sides of my my opinion.

I hear what you're saying, JJ, I hear what you're saying, Mr.

Mayor, and I agree with that a lot of it, like in four.

Um like it would have been ideal if they had given us a bigger number during budget time, but from my perspective, the way I see this is that um they didn't quite know, so maybe they should ask for more, but they didn't quite know.

And so, like I'm thrilled to support this because I I feel like this is something where I ideally it would have been better if it stuck strictly to the MOU.

And I understand also it it leaves a bad precedence if we just do MOUs and then you know don't follow them.

So I totally 100% get that.

Um, and I don't want to start not abiding by things.

Um, but in this case, it was in the MOU to uh be able to add a little more.

The way I see this is that we're leveraging, you know, we're giving uh this to a community partner, uh Sick Recreation Foundation helped us buy an electric uh vehicle.

So there, and I just happen to know this because I'm on the parks and rec uh as the liaison, and I've talked to some folks from them uh that group before.

Um they're just locals trying to say raise money, it's hard sometimes.

So in this case, I would encourage and respectfully request that we we vote yes on this this time.

Um and uh I I think and then another thing I was thinking about is you know, we had that uh vote uh at the ballot, uh I think it was last year, where we uh asked voters if they wanted to uh change the the where the funding goes from the SICA community hospital fund to the athletic fund, and it was passed by pretty high margin.

So in my mind, it shows that there's strong support for this kind of thing, and I do remember when we were talking about that at the table before we got it to uh the vote that um that was something we could you know we needed a master plan.

Um so I a hundred percent respect and get what you're saying.

I just think in this situation, I would I would respectfully uh request that uh we pass this tonight.

Um, and uh if they come back for more, that's gonna be a completely different story.

Those are just my two cents, Tor.

Yeah, I I think the questions about whether or not the about you know, the them uh if we how the money they came up with the money and things are not really in my mind the question uh because it's no surprise to me that they are having to struggle to raise money from donations.

I mean, that's anybody who's been around Ron Props knows anybody who listens to Raven Radio during their drive knows that.

Um it's no surprise that it's costing more than they really thought it was.

I mean, almost everything we do these days is that way.

Um I mean, reality hits, and you that's what it's gonna cost.

Um the real question is do we want to do this?

I mean, do we want this plan to happen?

And are we willing to spend some money to do it?

I'm not I don't have a lot of heartburn about well, we thought it was gonna cost less than you said you were gonna raise all this money because it's not easy raising money.

Uh and so uh like I said, my question is is it worth us spending 20,000 on it?

It is nice that we're not having to raise all the money and do that.

That might uh but Kevin brings up a good point that there's a lot of interest in this, um, not just from the people who emailed us who are involved with it, but generally people like to say, and we you know, one of the underlying themes we've had in recent years is doing asset management, knowing our schedule on things, knowing what's coming down the pike, um, knowing being able to at least somewhat determine how much money we need to raise for things because a lot of the times you were like, we'd love to have a new ball field, but we just really don't know what that would involve.

And so at least this way, when if we have a plan like this, if they come up and say some facility that they recommend and it's gonna be millions of dollars, we can say, well, you know, we don't have that.

Uh or maybe it's comparatively inexpensive, and we we just don't know the answers to this, and this is what we have to do.

Um so you know, this isn't personally my top of the list of stuff, but it's a comparatively small amount of money to get a to at least be able to lay it out and know what we have to do so we don't get hopefully surprised as much by the pitching mound, you know, that we ran into a few months ago.

So um I I can I can uh support this because again it but I think the question everybody asks is do you want do we want to do it?

And the answer is no, well no.

But if the answer is yes, the other stuff is peripheral.

Is to so I guess my closing comments, I want to kind of wrap up um some of what I said and what some other assembly members have said, and I think well it was not the way that Tor had intended to say it, it's how I want to say it as well.

And and his comment was do we want to do it?

That is a question to me.

Do we want to do this?

Because at this point, uh the originally we were talking about ownership of the project, right?

And we were gonna have a little seed money in this, and it was gonna be SRF's thing.

Uh at this point, this has become our project.

Um, and so now I'm I'm wondering if we're adding complications into this that are not necessary, um, which is a a discussion on its own, because I think at this point we are veering from the spirit of the MOA.

Um this is not what I saw happening.

Uh this is not what I had saw the future of it.

Um and I appreciate the electric van being brought up and the all the work that uh SRF did to bring us an electric van.

Um but as precedent was set there, the the fundraising efforts were substantially short, and uh the municipality ended up having to kick in.

So if we continue down this road, um not only have we set precedent previously, but then we set it again.

And I think that's potentially a dangerous road to head down, and it's a signal that if an organization comes forward with a small ask gets approved, uh becomes committed, um, that we then have no choice but to finish off, right?

And that's my my concern with this.

Um really does the municipality want to own the project at this point?

Because I don't think any of us are debating the worthiness of it.

It's the ownership of it.

So I don't think that I'm going to vote in favor of this until that question for me is um is figured out because I think we have an MOU right now that that works well and with an extended timeline.

Um SRF and all their good efforts should be able to continue their their fundraising efforts, uh, if not reduce the scale and scope from their contractors and still deliver us a good project or product.

So Kevin and then JJ.

So uh Steven, I I completely get it.

I I understand.

Then that is a concern, even as you said it, you know, we we start doing this and other organizations come in, ask for a little and then ask for more.

I I completely get that.

But it's something that occurred to me when you were saying that do we own it or not.

Uh as far as I understand, um they're still contributing quite a bit to the project, and they're still gonna be managing it, so to speak, with a little bit of help from the staff.

Maybe we could ask Kevin real quick to come up here and answer that question if he thinks that's changed or what have you.

You know what I'm saying?

Like in my mind, ownership would be we pay 90% of it or a bunch of it, and then we we're like having our staff kind of do the project, so to speak, and things like that.

As far as I understand, the only difference is just um the 20,000.

And you're right, 20,000 is it's not a small thing.

Uh it is small compared to our overall budget, but it it is taxpayers' money.

Um so you know, what do you think about that?

Getting Kevin up here to see.

Uh, if you'd like to, you're able to call him up to ask questions.

Hey, Kevin, can you come up, please?

So Kevin, you heard what I was saying, so maybe if you could just talk to that.

Um yeah, I mean, I think it's important to realize that uh when the city first tried to embark on this project back in fiscal 23, uh, we weren't able to get it done uh due to you know capacity.

We just didn't have the the staff capacity to be able to get um bid documents out or engage in uh discussions with contractors or anything else like that.

SRF was able to, you know, it's a little bit more nimble and and was able to get out there.

Um I think the small amount of additional um funding that would come from the city um is it you know still has the potential of being less than half uh if if SRF is able to raise the additional funds and and get to the the mark that they would like to uh to get to.

Um the the 61 that that's smaller scope is like the minimum scope that they would like to get to.

They if they're able to, they wouldn't definitely like to get to the larger scope.

So the product that will be provided the community um and to back to the the city would be uh quite substantial, and as Tor pointed out, um you know, a very useful tool for um you know parks and rec staff uh to grounds and facilities, um, yeah, and and future planning.

And it's you know, again, it's a 20-year product.

I mean, our last one in essence went almost 35 years or a little over 35 years, so um, you know, hopefully this this one would go for the 20.

Thank you.

Yeah, uh anything else for Kevin?

I've got a question.

Okay, great.

Yeah, thank you.

Um so what I'm noticing here through this conversation is that uh we're being asked tonight for this 20,000 because you want to deliver the product by January 2027.

Um is there flexibility in that timeline to give our our partners more time for their fundraising?

The original scope uh that was brought forward by Corvus uh was actually a one-year uh project uh that uh that base level or actually both uh scopes uh brought us into June of 27.

Uh SRF negotiated with Corvus to be able to extend.

I think extending anything beyond June would be you know relatively problematic for that that um that number uh those numbers would probably go up.

Um but um you know adding a few months.

I'm not really sure.

Uh I mean you'd have to ask SRF folks uh to better speak to that, you know, what what a couple two maybe three months would add to their fundraising efforts.

I think the discussions it sounds like that they are having right now will you know they'll get answers here in the next month.

Okay, because that seems like you know everything's you know, scope schedule budget.

We were kind of somewhat told to budget with an undefined scope and an undecided schedule.

The other people just chosen the scope and schedule, but now we're at being asked to adjust the budget to meet a schedule that just doesn't seem necessary.

Um so if there's anything.

I guess we have one person, yeah, but I don't want to call you forward to ask about that.

Um yeah, I think we it would be nice to have had a more robust conversation here to understand some of these details, but I appreciate your contribution to my question about timeline.

Thank you, Kevin.

Appreciate it.

Scotty Kevin, I was gonna ask you on the uh planning for assets, and then like the the end product that you're building is gonna be a plan to build a new outdoor covered facility.

Is that correct?

Not necessarily.

I mean it it'll depend on what the priorities are of the the community because that's really what this ends up doing is it goes out and goes into the community through surveys and through public engagements to set prioritizations if you know people want uh uh say a new track or if people really want new ball fields or if the top priority is a brand new state-of-the-art dog park or you know, whatever it might be.

Um be on outdoor facilities.

I'm sure there will be other things that come up too that you know covered or indoor types of facilities might be something that people want to see.

You know, none of these are things that are you know within a plan that that could come forward, none of them are like you must do.

It's they're all suggestions, they're all like these are the desires and the wishes.

So and it'll also you know, like what we'll be looking at what we already have and how to maintain that best, and then you know, asking the community what what do we not have that you would like to see in the future.

And then that's what you mean by robust.

They're they're gonna have the community and query everybody and see yeah.

And that then that's where staff lack the capacity to be able to go out and and do all of this planning and and create the surveys and and really get you know uh a really good high quality product out of it.

Something that the community can trust that's something that this body can trust as being a uh a robust long term vision.

Juja yes, because we need a professional engineer to tell us triangle sand is expensive.

We learned that quite extensively during the last budget period.

Um so I don't really see the need to have a professional engineer do estimates.

I mean, I've done estimates that turned into contracts and it was just fine with that bid package.

Um it's actually not a great business case to have your your licensed engineers um putting together your your initial numbers.

Um but if that's the like deluxe package that we're interested in, um sure I would vote yes, but in six months when the other fundraising resources have been exhausted.

Uh this seems like a really um artificially fast timeline for me, especially when you know out I haven't seen any outreach and outreach is usually at the beginning and then uh then you analyze and then then you do the numbers and to to do all of that before January uh is just a I've never seen um a master plan or facility assessment move that fast and in my you know past professional career I I did those.

I did a lot of facility assessments and stuff, and this is I'm beset my vote tonight has nothing to do um with not supporting recreation and not supporting um our department.

Um I'm just not I'm really trying to get to yes, but I haven't seen um or heard or read any information tonight that that can get me um through my logical decision making process uh to to that place.

So um really wished um we we could get there, uh but I will be voting no on this.

Real quick, it's a little bit to reiterate.

I was saying earlier, I don't have a lot of heartburn how we got here uh as far I mean you know the old it's things get messy.

I mean to re I mean the old saw about laws and sausage, right?

Um to me the real question is do we want to try and have this master plan and is it worth this money for us?

Um and like I said, if if if we don't think it's a good use of money, that's fine.

Um but how we got here, I know other people have different priorities than me, and that's fine.

Um but uh you know, and I I'm not pounding on the desk or anything in here, but I think it's it's probably a good idea to have good information allow us to make decisions uh going down the line.

And something like this could be useful for a really long time.

I mean, uh it's the last one.

Probably don't want to wait another 30 years, but 15, yeah.

Yeah, it'll be useful.

Um, and so uh and definitely five or ten.

Uh so again, I I think it's a worthwhile project, and to me that's that's the deciding factor for me.

They uh and again I I said may have different priorities than other people, but to me that's that's the real factor.

So I I'm gonna vote for this now.

Uh but like I say I understand different opinions on this.

Well, I still got one more, your honor, and that's like you know, like for when they built the ball fields on top of the fly ash, you know, and then now we hear that that uh you know um is so waterproof that it's making the the whole ball field like really suck.

And like if our guys can't figure it out, can you know the professionals that are planning assets would they you know would it help make the existing ball field not uh suck, you know.

I mean that's what because I'm having a hard time, you know, looking at it with everything we got coming down, running out of money and everything.

So I'm yeah, I mean I I think that would be if that's one of the community goals is to get better turf out there, then I think my assumption is that they would incorporate it that into the plan.

I mean that's what we've been told anyways that will take community feedback, but I just don't know if that's through the process what would come out of it.

Good.

Thank you, Stephen.

Uh Mr.

Mayor, smile I don't think it's gonna change anything, but just I'm not you know, fingers crossed Hail Mary here.

So I get what you're saying.

In my mind, um the basically the sooner the better.

And again, Kevin uh kind of reference this uh when we were having a discussion regarding the uh put to put on the ballot the vote to change the uh hospital fund uh fund to athletic um recreation, whatever the title was.

Uh there was a lot of discussion there about um you know creating something new versus something old, and there was uh you know, uh in my mind an agreement within the community, a kind of informal agreement that we were gonna do.

And I'm not trying to lock anything, I'm just saying that there was kind of an understanding that we do need, and it's desirous to have a master plan for athletics and recreation, because then we can start planning and for the future for some of these long-term goals.

Um I completely get where you're coming from, and I don't think that anybody here doesn't support everybody supports uh this stuff, I believe.

I just feel like this in my mind it's the sooner the better to get going with this.

And um, I said I completely understand with your misgivings.

I totally get it.

Um but my mind I don't think this is gonna hurt us.

I think this is gonna be uh a good thing for the community.

Anything further from the assembly Sarah.

All right, on the motion to approve ordinance 2026-17 on first reading, Ms.

Carlson.

No.

Mr.

Celine?

No.

Mr.

Mosher?

Yes.

Mayor Eisenbais.

No.

Mr.

Christianson.

Yes.

Okay.

Um so the vote is three two and first reading in our charter for an ordinance.

Um, this will proceed to second reading at the next meeting.

Um, the only way it wouldn't have is if there is four votes to kill it, um, and there was not.

So it'll proceed to second reading on the 11th.

Uh, thank you, Sarah, for that uh informational piece as well, so that the assembly is aware of our process forward.

Uh, it is the top of the hour, so we'll go ahead and take a recess.

Assembly, please be seated when you are ready to continue.

The assembly is seated, so we will jump back into our agenda this evening.

Uh that would bring us to item F.

I move to approve ordinance 2026-18 on first reading authorized in the lease to block four lot one on the of the Gary Paxton Industrial Park to Northern Southeast Regional Aquacultural Association Inc.

Second.

As it moved in it's been moved and seconded into approved ordinance 26-1-8.

John, you have an introduction.

I do, thank you, Mayor.

Hold on to it, everybody.

I don't have uh finance here to help me out, and uh I don't have Gary White here to help me out tonight either.

Uh both of them are unable to be here.

Um but I also wasn't at the initial meeting, which was in April, I believe, where um NSRA was looking to renew two leases that they had, one for lot two and one for lot three, they were both set to expire in May of 26.

Uh over time, those lots have been combined into I think it's called block four lot one now for the hatchery subdivision.

Um it's the same footprint as those other two uh combined, and uh at the time they had proposed what would have gone through the board and been recommended for approval was I believe it was $800 per month uh payment with an initial 10-year term and four successive uh tenure options.

Um I can't remember if it was tabled, but it was it was essentially sent back to administration with not a whole lot of guidance.

Um but given that that happened, uh I sat down with uh with NSERA and with Gary White again to uh look at the terms since the uh impression was we should would mod should modify and look at some better terms.

So uh received a letter from NSERA and uh their counter proposal was to change the monthly rent from 800 up to a thousand.

Uh and then on the 10-year renewals, uh the cap on the allowable rent increase went from 10% to 20%.

All the other terms remain the same.

Um so this is gonna equal a 12,000 dollar annual payment and a question for the assembly, and I'm I'll try to clear this up now, or I can wait until we're in the deliberation phase.

Um a lot of the discussion that happened in April was that these below market rate leases are uh generally a subsidization, and is the GPIP fund healthy enough to provide that subsidy, knowing that the general fund might have to cover that subsidy at some point.

So in some options here, it seems like I'm asking you to choose one of three things, and I'm not necessarily asking you to do that.

What I'm asking you to do tonight is either approve the lease, deny the lease, or if you want to further modify it, just give me some direction on what those modifications would look like.

Um but on the fiscal note piece of it to account for that subsidy, the the cleanest way to do it would be the lease revenue goes to the general fund that 12,000 per year, and then the general fund would give that 12,000 back to the GPIP enterprise fund.

So you can account for what should have come in, but what did come in, and GPIP is still um earning what they had agreed to in the um in the lease agreement.

Hopefully that's clear as mud, but I'm happy to answer any other questions when we when we get to that point.

Um so that the lease is is here for your consideration, and the appropriation that is along with it is assuming um it is assuming that the terms are acceptable.

If we have to modify it, we would um put a substitute ordinance in if we were given direction from the assembly uh to replace this one.

Thank you for that introduction.

Uh is there any public comment on ordinance 26-18.

All right, good evening, Mayor and Assembly Scott Wagner, General Manager for Insor.

So I think John did a good job of covering kind of how we got to where we are.

I will note that it was not tabled at assembly, it failed at the assembly, and there was no good, I would say, direction or consensus on how we should proceed.

So I did reach out to John and Gary and asked to sit down and come up with some potential modifications to for reconsideration at the assembly.

And you know, I think that the two that were noted, one is the initial monthly uh rent payment, and that is a 42% increase over what we're currently paying for the combined two leases on both lots, and then the 10-year renewal, um, raising that from a 10 to a 20%.

Um, you know, both of those have the ability to, you know, the concern is with the enterprise fund, and those both of those actions will help to bring more revenue to the enterprise fund than we are currently paying.

So that's kind of why why this is before you, and like John mentioned, if none of these are acceptable or needs more work, it'd be great to get more consensus and direction on how to resolve those outstanding issues.

Thank you.

Good evening, assembly mayor.

Uh, my name is Chris Yestad, fisherman and in SERA board member.

Um so when I read this on the agenda, I I kind of tried to put two hats on, obviously, as a fisherman.

Um I'll start with that.

Um, the way NSRA budgets work is it it everything is paid for through cost recovery, and that is one or two boats go out, harvest the fish um from NSARO and sell it to the processors at their pre-bid price.

Um, but during that, um, us fishermen are not allowed into these facilities while this is going on.

So these fish are not available to common property.

Um so obviously, as expenses go up, which this lease um is slightly going up, um, but the market rate is substantially more.

Um the cost isn't necessarily to NSRA but to the hundreds of fishermen that are out there by losing opportunity within our areas.

Um, just as an example uh for this opening on Thursday, I have zero access to NSRA fish because cost recovery is being performed at their facilities, or there is um we're waiting for broodstock to come in, but this Thursday I have no opportunity to go after um and anything that NSA produces.

So it's a pretty big deal to me.

Um, most of my season so far this year has been comprised of NSRO fish.

So having opportunity to go after anything NSROP produces is huge, and um you know, obviously, leases are one of our big expenses.

Um, but on the other side, you know, I try I tried to put on the how can this be justified to you guys?

And and I was there at the last meeting, I heard the subsidiation um discussion and um in the memo, and I was like, well, okay, how could we how could I justify this to the taxpayers?

And one way I see it is we we offer a lot of lower rates.

Um, you know, we have property tax that isn't paid by some people.

Um geez, who is my train of thought here looking at the time.

Um but there are other programs that we do that.

Um of the things is yes, it could be viewed as a subsidation, but it's not saying that we're really losing anything with the market rate there, because with that we have empty lots in the GPIP park right now, and are we subsidizing those because they aren't bringing in revenues?

So NSA brings in a lot, and it may not we may not get direct value to the city, but we get a lot of indirect value.

And I got two seconds, so well, I got a lot more, but that's all I got out.

Thanks, guys.

Anyone else on 26-18 assembly deliberation?

Yeah, Tor.

Yeah, um I've been bottled this a little bit because of the um as as a GPIP liaison, but more I'd like to go back to when we created G the GPIP board or the GPIP, and there's a real I think it was called an enterprise fund because we didn't know what else to call it, honestly.

And it you could also argue it's more like CEDA, it's more of an of an economic driver.

And if you look at the leases they've done over the years, they reflect that.

Um, forest of the bear, the the haul out for that matter.

Uh, you know, the the idea has always been to get things going and getting it done.

Um, and so I don't and again the idea was eventually GPIP goes away.

I mean, the board at least, and it just becomes city property as we get it fully working, which we're a lot closer to now than we used to.

So I don't have as much, I'm not too concerned about okay, are we keeping that fund healthy?

Because it's hopefully we eventually don't have that fund.

I mean, it's gone.

Um, and the goal of that whole enterprise uh I think it was I think we called it an enterprise fund more in the actual meaning of the word enterprise, like you would a business.

Uh it's an enterprise to get work enterprises going in sitca.

That's what the goal of the GPIP is, and it's not like the electric fund where it's a in perpetuity.

Um so uh I don't I think this is a better one.

I like the fact that we have a bit more ramp up for down the road.

Uh but you know, there's a lot of economic activity.

You can make the argument that Ninsera produces more economic activity than other things we've done to try and make economic activity happen.

Uh some of it's very clear fish tax, but also sales tax from guys.

I'm sure Chris, when he goes out, goes and buys groceries, you know, and that kind of thing for his crew.

Um and um and uh at LFS.

So um I don't have a problem in this now.

I understand it was a little bit of a shock, it seems very low, but also Chris brings up a good point that what are we gonna do with that land anyway?

And I don't you know, yeah, we can hold them over a barrel, but do we want to?

And but and I also fund gets truly out and they do need it, that's when they would come to us.

But I don't want to do it until we need to, because every time he le they lease a piece of land or they sell it, that's one less responsibility, and hopefully at the end of the day, that's we we have a little ceremony where we disband the GPIP board.

I disagree with you on a lot of that.

I can't wait for the GPIP board to go away.

It's been a ball and chain on town.

Silver Bay was 33 million dollars in the black after the first year they opened up Fortress of the Bears has been on a cakewalk forever, million dollar outfit, and that the lease is out there, and then now with the town boating to haul out boats and GPIP holding out people, and you know the grid was just so overrun, people trying to get their boat ship shape.

Yeah, I'm gonna vote for it, but I can't wait for GPIP to go away.

Kevin.

Thank you, Steven.

Um I would say uh I I agree with Tor on this one.

Um I think you know, um I understand the argument about uh the the fund enterprise fund not making money.

I I I kind of definitely agree about what tourist discussion about it, uh, whereas it seems like it was just something we didn't know at the time I wasn't on here when we did it.

Uh created that just because there was nothing else better, but this is not the kind of thing where it was meant to be like the electric department warrior uh for a very long time and customers are paying for it.

This is um for the benefit of the entire community, even those who are not uh fisher fishermen, because the in my opinion the benefit is exponential and probably very, very difficult to calculate.

Because you know, you have sales tax, you know, the people who these fishermen who make this money, they are paying taxes on the fish they catch.

They're paying sales tax on anything that they buy for themselves or families for personal use or for the crews.

Um the revenue that comes in to the city directly is a lot from that, and not to mention the multiplier effect from every dollar that that the fishing community spends in town uh gets circulated all throughout the town.

So um I understand it's an issue we're gonna have to deal with.

The the fact that um the GPIP fund is not uh in the in the positive as far as uh the their financials are concerned, but this is I think we should be looking at more as this is an investment in our community and our economy.

Uh a lot of folks is talked about with the tourism, uh, but fishing is is extremely important as well.

Um, and uh on one of the legs of our community, and I think we should support it.

Uh thank you.

JJ.

Uh John, I have a question or two for you.

Um maybe maybe Scott, if you can chime in.

Um, how many agreements or ballpark does the city have with NSRA for leases?

Is it like less than five, more than five?

Uh if this is approved, it should, it's just two, right, Scott?

The Medovici, and then this one.

Yes, Scott, please come forward if you have something to add.

And a tide lands lease, right?

Yeah, so yeah, we have uplands and Thailand.

So there's multiple parcels of Thailand and Upland Medivgia Sawmill.

Um are the two primary, but there's multiple tide lands as well related to those operations.

And is this lease kind of similar enough um to help you administratively manage all of all of your leases, or is this a out of the ballpark one?

Out of the ballpark in what context?

You know, we we're looking at this from you know the city's perspective of you know, minimal management over time.

Um, I didn't want to kind of just check in with you guys to see how you'd be able to um administer this over the course of the initial term and then the subsequent four terms.

Uh yeah, I mean the previous uh lot was a lot three at Sawmill.

That was a 10-year, we had to come renegotiate every 10 years with the assembly.

So this basically takes out of that park unless there's an issue with with the lease or terms that somebody have to deal with, but no, it's more an automated process.

So more of a a like exchange to an existing lease, so it wouldn't be cumbersome for you guys.

Okay, thank you.

Um thank you for that.

Appreciate it, John.

Um my comments are uh we do we do quite a bit to streamline things and help us out, and then we kind of have these these ones that I just don't kind of fit a mold.

Um but we've we've started that uh you know this fiscal year um like a lease management program, so it's nice to see uh that that's happening and we can come to some consistencies with that.

And the terms um I'm gonna say thank you to the groups for being solution-oriented with this without you know, very prescriptive guidance um from the assembly.

I think the updates to this did take the spirit of the conversation from the assembly well and um put it into the words.

Um so I'm you know not trying to get too far out of you know the the future of of GPIP.

Um but I think if when we do move towards uh kind of eliminating that from our structure, uh something at least like this could could work well for our you know whatever fund enterprise or not um administers that land.

Uh John, was that part of the thinking behind how this lease came to be for these updates kind of.

Uh yeah, that's uh I've talked to you all about this before on uh I I've started working on that report on um GPIP as a whole, what the status is, what lots are still there, what they're being leased at, or if they've been sold, um what's still remaining, and then um have they substantially completed their tasking from the um authorizing ordinance that that set them up.

Um so it is nice to have uh a clean break from Tidelands leases versus uplands leases.

Um, you know, we've got a dock out there that is more of a harbor type structure.

So I think yes, this is built in a way that it will it will they'll be able to manage the the two different ones, the Tidelands one versus versus uplands, wherever that ends up landing if depending on the future of GPIP.

Great, thank you.

I didn't want to get too far into a discussion direction on the future of GPIP, um, but it is important to note that as a potential that would happen within the term of this lease.

Um so it is a consideration.

Um, and I appreciate that.

That scoping that's been done um and and foresight there.

Uh so I think this um meets my my criteria and uh appreciate everyone for for going along the ride.

So I believe I intend to vote in favor of this.

Um, but I do the pros and cons have always been very important to me.

Um so I just want to talk through a couple things.

Um and Scott, I'm gonna ask you this question only because I believe that this is a public figure.

Um I don't believe that it's a number that is is hidden.

Um if that's the case, please don't answer the question.

But I'm just curious um what the cost of operations annually are at the NSURA or at the that particular hatchery.

Um and if that's not a public figure, please let me know.

But I thought it I thought it was, I just don't remember what that number is.

Well, it is.

I can't remember the exact figure off the top of my head, but um it's I would say it's in flux because our current building has existed since the late 2000s, um, primarily as Chum and Coho.

We're currently building a new Chinook facility that is not operating yet, but hopefully we'll be next year, and that is gonna substantially increase our operating costs, but those have not been part of our budget that we budgeted this current fiscal year for FY27.

I would have to guesstimate I could pull up on my phone if you really need a hard number, but it's probably I'd say close to a million dollars.

A million dollars is great.

I had thought it was 1.2 that I had heard at one point, but it sounds like that could have been when I heard the number.

So I thank you for that.

Um the reason I asked that is because I'm I'm running a whole bunch of numbers here, and numbers can be construed one way or another.

Um when you hear that the assembly is increasing NSERA's lease by 42 percent a month.

Well damn that's 300 bucks.

Right?

It was the same argument when uh the assembly had a pay increase of a couple hundred bucks a month, and that was a 50% pay increase, right?

Um so when you look at a million dollars annually, um, the amount being asked for subsidiation is about $30,000, uh 12,000 a year versus about 41,000 um annually at market rate.

So $30,000.

Um I believe Chris Yestad who spoke earlier, um, a prolific fisherman.

Um if he was alone in an un in an area with no other competition, $30,000 could probably be a couple sets.

Um so we're not we're not looking at massive amounts of money here that the organization could not absorb, right?

This is not this is not something that is going to stop in Surah, stop the production.

Um however, this is a community good, right?

I think everybody here has spoke to that.

I think everybody here has established that.

Um I heard something that just made me jump for joy, a new king salmon production facility.

Um great, let's give them the land for free at that point, right?

Um no more chums, lots of king salmon.

But I also know king salmon are expensive to produce, right?

So just want to throw that out there as the numbers aren't substantial in anybody's budget necessarily.

Um SRO could absorb it, we could absorb it.

Um this is a community good, I think.

Uh if NSRA wanted, they could pack the room full of people uh asking us to to give them a subsidized rate.

Um that we are working in conjunction with NSERA on this, as we have in the past, and we'll continue to do uh going forward.

Uh so that I hope that our spirit of negotiations as we go forward will always continue to reflect that mindset, right?

I want to maintain a good partnership here.

Um, although with all these renewals, um Scott, I don't think it'll be you or me the next time we we have to sit down and do this again, which is also ideal, right?

Um, there's a lot more that he could be doing uh this evening than uh then sitting here having to to ask for aliase really, um, whether it's subsidized or not.

So um all that being said, again, I think I'll vote in favor of this.

Um, but it's the the yin and the yang of it all.

Further comments from the assembly, Sarah.

All right, on the motion to approve ordinance 2026-18 on first reading, Mr.

Mosher.

Yes, Mayor Eisenbais.

Yes, Mr.

Celine, yes, Ms.

Carlson, yes, and Mr.

Christianson.

Yes.

The motion passes 50 first reading on item F.

Now Scott can go do all those better things that he has to go do this evening.

Unless you really want to stay, you are excused.

I mean, yeah.

Uh item G, please.

Additional new business items.

I move to approve resolution 2026-06 on first and final reading authorizing the municipal administrator to execute a legal services contract with David Grossman and Associates, PLLC for contingency bias, civil legal claims, harm and protected damages from contamination, microplastics, including tobacco product waste, PFAS, and one, four dioxane.

Second.

I'm really glad that I just get to say resolution 26-06.

But is there any button?

Um Rachel, you have an introduction for us on this I do, thank you, Mayor.

Um, so this came out of uh the last AML conference in December.

There were um law firms there presenting on uh this issue, which is uh a nationwide settlement.

So kind of getting the big picture for what that is.

Um these the the one that has been settled is is the PFAS they're per and polyfloral known as forever chemicals.

So they are chemicals that don't go away, they're in everybody.

It's like 99.5% of people have them in their bodies.

Um and the the way our system deals with harms that large is by making those companies pay money back to the harmed entities or people.

Um so the lawsuit that we would be joining is a it's it's actually a settlement, so we wouldn't be joining a litigation class, we would be joining a settlement class against its DuPont 3M, other manufacturers of these PFAS forever chemicals, they're they're in like everything.

They're in sting resistance stuff, water resistance, fire fighting chemicals.

That was my question.

Is this the fire fighting foam?

Yes, it's the firefighting foam.

Um so what what happens when you join the settlement class is um the law firm sends somebody out to do testing to find out if you actually have those chemicals and if you reach certain levels, then you're a member of the settlement class and and are entitled to some of the funds from that settlement.

Um the settlement for the PFAS is I think in the teens of billions.

Um and it's specifically for municipal and public water systems.

Um there will be other settlements negotiated for the microplastics, um, the tobacco waste products are like cigarette butts, um, and then the dioxane, those those have not reached a number yet, um, but this would put us in a position where if the testing comes back positive, we can be one of the municipalities in the settlement class that can then receive those funds.

There's no cost to the municipality.

Um these law firms are operating on contingency, so you know, whatever whatever proportion of that settlement that we become entitled to if we have these chemicals in our testing, the law firm takes their 33%, the rest comes back to the municipality, um, and there's no strings on how that money is spent.

The idea is that it's for remediation or replacing the equipment or chemicals that we have with things that don't contain these chemicals, um, but it would just go into the general fund.

Uh thank you, Rachel.

Um, I'll add on this introduction um that myself and John were also present.

Um, I can be a resource as well, because I spoke with some some representatives as we go forward.

So public comment on uh resolution 26-06.

Assembly deliberation.

Scotty?

Rachel, did it it is it dioxin?

Because it didn't say that on there.

And I'm just curious, like, you know, is that like gonna be for Blue Lake that if we test it a little bit differently, you know, before the water was filtered, we could we could we'd have dioxin in our drinking water.

Is that what I'm reading here?

The the current the current settlement class is for the PFAS specifically, that's what the um settlement has been reached on, and the dioxin negotiations are ongoing.

Um but in in theory, yes, once once a number is reached there for that settlement, then there would be another round of testing to see if we test into that settlement class as well.

So going from a super fund site to a DEC state run drinking water, and we have a waiver for you know turbidity in Blue Lake.

This is specifically if dioxin comes up in our water, 33% goes to the lawyers that we're joining right now, and then the borough gets the rest.

Pardon me.

Yeah, yeah, get gets the uh it's it would be 33 percent in fees, and then the remainder goes to the borough.

Jan?

Rachel, uh this sounds to me a lot like I mean, I think it's fine to do it, it doesn't cost us anything.

Uh it sounds like one of those things where you know, a company, you know, other class action lawsuits in the country where say your ID was compromised or something with something like Blue Cross or something, and then they send you a ten dollar check after uh after it's all sudden done because there's just so many people.

Do you anticipate us actually getting any real monetary value?

This particular settlement is for municipal systems in particular.

Um so individuals who are harmed who have say downstream cancers from these chemicals, there's a separate litigation going on for those individuals that that may or may not produce proportionate amounts to their harm.

Um, but this is specifically for municipalities, so the size of the plaintiff class is limited to the number of water systems um in the United States, which I think is in the thousands, um maybe 10,000 at the most.

Um so it's it's not you know the the 400 million Americans who have this in their bloodstream.

Okay.

Thank you.

I have a question again for so as I understand it, one of the risks of joining a class action like this is that um we essentially hold the producers harmless if we ex if we accept it.

Um correct me.

So sorry, I read King of Torts.

Uh to me, a little bit of the risk is if we test positive for this, and we're gonna be giving up our right to sue sue individually, correct?

Yes.

And my concern is that the you know, obviously the companies are trying to make this go away, and I could see a scenario where we accept it, and yet all of a sudden our costs are significantly more than the settlement, and we're gonna be on the hook for that.

And so my my little bit of concern is that we will be giving up our right to sue for actual damages down the road.

Um, that may be greatly in higher than the amount of the settlement we get.

That is a legitimate concern because you are giving up the right to sue individually.

Um the flip side is that in an individual suit, you need to prove both the extent of your harm and causation.

Um, and by opting into a settlement class, we do not have to prove uh the amount of harm or that these chemicals or this particular manufacturer caused caused those chemicals to be present.

Rachel, I'm so sorry, but you know, my square head mind, I just saw the Japanese, the mill caused our dioxin in the lake from the mill.

And but whoever these companies are making all the PFAS, they're liable for the acid rain from the digesters that went back into the lake now, years later, and if we test positive for a dioxin, this is good for getting some compensation from the initial mill.

This this is the producer of those chemicals paying into a settlement uh for alleged harm caused by those chemicals.

So that the intermediaries, how it got from the producer to the municipality, we don't have to prove that.

That's the benefit of it being a settlement class, as opposed to to what Mr.

Christensen was asking about suing them individually.

If we were suing them, the you know, the borough against DuPont, we would have to prove that causation.

It you sold it to the mill, the mill got it into the lake, all of those steps.

But because the settlement class has already been settled, and the agreement is that if you test positive, you qualify.

We don't have to prove any of that causation.

We just need to get the testing done, and if we meet the threshold levels, then we're eligible for the settlement without having to prove any of those intermediary steps.

The reason I'm focusing in on this is I have all the paperwork from when the mill was sued and the city was sued by the EPA.

And the you know, the waiver that we have for a landslide that goes into that lake with the turbidity and that turbidity makes the dioxin come off the bottom of the lake.

And the EPA only tests filtered water.

They don't taste the test the water that's going into our filter.

Our filter takes the dioxin out of the water, and they test it on the other side.

I could I got the paper, so I'm like, I'm just I'm blown away on how this Yes.

It's it's not the EPA doing the testing.

The attorneys will come here um and work with our our water folks to do the testing.

Because I actually have the paperwork where the EPA was supposed to use uh trout traps to handle a two to three-year-old trout, and all the traps were minnow traps that gave the results to transfer the super fund to the DEC of the state when it all switched.

That'd be interesting.

So admittedly, when we first heard about this, I was uh extremely skeptical.

Um, I think we've known about it for a little bit, and you know, didn't didn't necessarily want to go down this and you know, give a law firm a third of our settlement.

Um but uh representatives uh through AML.

Um I've had a lot of really good conversations with.

I met one of the partners of um this law firm.

And one of the nice things about this, um, so there is a and I I don't have the website anymore, I apologize for that, but there is a there is a list out there of sites that are presumed contaminated and sites that uh are not presumed to have.

We are on the list of presumed contaminated sites.

Um so there are others, Kevin, kind of part of your question.

There are others that are not, they may not have.

Um I was uh encouraged to hear that part of this settlement um, as we proved the amount of damages could be used to pay back previous things, so our secondary water treatment plant uh could be completely reimbursed from this settlement uh should it go down that way.

Uh AML believes enough in this law firm, um, whether who approached who, I don't know, but uh they have facilitated discussions uh at AML with this law firm and have uh I wouldn't say pushed in uh participation but have encouraged participation from these municipalities.

So are there unforeseen consequences potentially?

Um but you know, Rachel was here and has talked a lot more intelligently about this than I have tonight.

Um I have faith that she's gone through it and understands um the high sides and low sides of it.

So I I at this point, you know, knowing that we are on a presumed list, um, I feel like I have to take some sort of action.

Um, and even if that action is we get some settlement, we install better filters, um, we we clean up our water.

Um having been a firefighter, I know that uh PFAS foam was sprayed all over the airport site multiple times.

Um, you know, whether that has anything to do with the water now, um, I don't know.

But you know, everybody from Gus Davis is more than happy to get on this because they sprayed PFAS foam at their airport, and now all of their groundwater is contaminated.

So I think at this point it is a good thing to do.

Um if nothing else, just so that we know uh and if if it comes back negative, that's even better.

But I think we'll be part of this and we'll see what the next what next what the next steps are JJ.

Yeah, if there's any information we have on you know the existing waiver and if some sort of contamination would void our waiver, uh, that would be very valuable to to share at this time.

Um I think the I mean I can just speculate on the amount of money we might receive.

Um, but that waiver is critical for our uh minimal system.

You know, Rachel, I'm looking at this again and it's spelt different.

You know, I thought it was just that thing of you know, enunciate and or putting in print and dioxin is what we got, and this diox diozane, that's gonna be a different thing.

So everything I said was nothing, you know.

There there will be testing regardless, though.

Kevin, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

I I agree with Steven.

I'm gonna uh vote yes.

Um based on some of those comments and just for what I thought in the beginning, but I just occurred to me that we're talking about all this, and I'm assuming everyone here is assuming.

I know I am assuming that our water drinking water is safe, but John, just so for the record, is our drinking water safe for people when this gets reported.

Absolutely.

I mean, second best drinking water in the nation a few years ago.

But um, yes, we do we do regular testing for a lot of these chemicals, and when we um filled out the paperwork for the original agreement, there was a section in there.

It's do you do testing?

Have you found anything?

Uh and the answer was no, we haven't.

So I just said that more just for the public.

We may, you know, what's talked about in the press.

Thank you.

Anything further.

Sarah.

All right.

On the motion to approve resolution 2026-06 on first and final reading.

Mr.

Mosier.

Yes.

Mr.

Christianson?

Yes.

Mr.

Celine?

Yes.

Mayor Eisenby.

Yes.

And Ms.

Carlson.

Yes.

Motion passes 5-0.

First and final reading on item G.

Thank you.

That'll bring us to item H.

Uh item H tonight is appointing uh an individual to fill uh Tim Pike's vacated seat.

Uh the clerk's office did receive two applications, uh, Jeremy Plank or and uh Chris Yestad to serve uh for the remainder of Tim's term, uh which would be um August uh or October 6th, and then uh through the the regular or when the uh election results are certified on October 13th.

Uh so at this point um we do need to uh go through a process um to nominate uh both of them uh to serve as the assembly member for the remainder of his term, and then uh we we can take a I'm comfortable taking an open vote on this one, um, but we can do secret vote if it is uh desired of the assembly.

Sorry, I realize I turned away from my microphone and might not have been unheard as well as I should have been.

Uh this process uh is in code and has been uh followed multiple times in order to fill uh vacant assembly seats.

Uh so this is a standard procedure that we are following tonight uh based off of the two applications that were received.

Um so unless there's any questions at this point, uh if we um if we can have nominations, please.

I nominate Jeremy Plank and Chris Yestad to serve as an assembly member for the remainder of Tim Pike's term until October 6, 2026.

Regular election results are certified on October 13th, 2026.

Second all right, we have uh two nominations.

Um does the assembly want to deliberate on either of these applicants.

Kevin.

I don't necessarily want to like I just want to make a comment.

I guess that is deliberation.

Uh I just wanted to thank both uh people for uh putting your names in.

It's uh uh to serve, it's a big deal, even if it's only for a couple months, and very much appreciate that.

Um so Mr.

Mayor, is this where we just say who you we want to vote on, or we just uh we'll go to that in just a second when Sarah is ready to okay, Roger that.

Can we ask them questions?

Uh yes, if uh if they'd like to answer questions, you're welcome to call them up.

Um, like if GPIP finally uh you know if the decision comes to the assembly to haul out our boats like the will of the people, are you gonna say haul out like Wrangle and Huna, or are you gonna have our guys go to Wrangle and Huna because of the insurance sky is falling?

And I'm assuming that question is gonna be for uh both uh Jeremy and Chris.

If you if you're willing to answer the question, um please come forward um under no obligation.

Do you need my name or anything for the record?

Just once, please.

Uh Chris, yes, Dead.

Um yeah, it it's that I would say that is something that's on my unfinished business is trying to get it so our uninsured vessels can get hauled out.

Um I know when I was serving on GPIP and then assembly um all vessels has been my goal.

So yeah, that's gonna be something I'll definitely push for in the three months that I would be serving.

Uh Jeremy Plank.

Uh I kind of agree with Chris.

I think uh opening up the haul out so you know people can get in and and reviewing those uh insurance requirements.

Um as you guys may know, uh I'm part of Alan Marine and Alan Marine we haul a lot of different people and we have our own different insurance requirements and stuff like that.

So I think that you know there's definitely potentially a path that could be made, you know, through some of the insurance requirements to make sure that our goals of keeping the city and um HighMark protected, but also opening things up for the different uh uh people that need haul out services and expanding that 'cause I think that's also economic diversification, which is another thing I think it's really important for the city as well.

Uh, do we have questions for either of our applicants while they're in front of us?

JJ.

I think for just a paragraph or so um about why you'd like to be an assembly member for three months.

All right.

I can go first.

Um, you know, I've been serving uh for the last uh couple of years through the tourism task force and the tourism commission.

Um I I've been advocating a lot for the for the community.

I I work in a lot of different circles where I I see the importance of of the issues that the city is presented with, whether it's housing, whether it's economic.

Um I have felt the the poll to come and and serve on the city assembly and try to help use the experience background that I have to to make this a good place for everybody that lives here.

And um that's really my goal is to make sure that Sica stays, you know, what it is for for you know people's enjoyment to live in.

Um and so this was an opportunity obviously to come and get a little bit of experience without having to go in for a full term.

Um so I thought it was uh an interesting idea to, you know, test it for a few months.

Um I'm not saying I'm gonna run in the fall, and I'm not saying I'm not gonna run in the fall, but it's an opportunity to see what that looks like.

I guess uh for me it was as soon as I heard that um Mr.

Pike was gonna be stepping down, um, I instantly just went, I I'd be willing to fill that seat.

A a lot of it was it would be an honor to fulfill his term, I guess.

Um I respected him a lot up here and um I don't know, it was just an instant call to me that I I would at least put my name in and see where it goes from there.

Um, you know, even though I've stepped away and have been enjoying myself uh away from it, um, you know, I still want to serve the community.

Um it's a community I care for very much.

And um I do have some unfinished items that I I would like to see across the finish line, but at least help get there if if it doesn't happen within these three months.

Um my time away.

I've also thought of a few other things that I'd like to try to address.

Um three months is a tight timeline, probably, but maybe it can at least get the ball rolling and and the discussion started.

But um, yeah, uh I'm if I could bring value over the next three months, great.

Um if the assembly wants to go another direction, that that's perfectly fine with me as well.

I don't think you could go wrong with our other candidates sitting next to me either.

So anything else for either of the applicants.

Uh thank you both for being willing to speak to the assembly.

I guess I'll just throw out my thought process tonight.

Um I find that I could probably work with either one of those individuals.

Um the reason I'm going to vote uh for Chris this evening is that uh there is no learning curve.

Um and in a very short amount of time, I think we need someone who's up to speed.

Um, but more importantly, uh Jeremy is the chair of the tourism commission, a very active and um the the tourism commission continues to do a lot of good work.

Um we need that commission.

We continue to task them and they operate at a very very high level.

Um and at this point in time, uh Jeremy's role as chair there is more important to me um that to keep him there than it is to uh have him sit on the assembly.

Um as he indicated, Nov or October may change that.

I don't know.

But for my purposes, I find his operation and running of the tourism commission to be extremely valuable, and I think that we would be benefited the most by keeping him in that role and then having Chris serve out the remainder of the term.

So I would just second what you said.

I know that's just one thing, but uh so it's only for a short period of time.

Chris has the experience on the assembly.

Um that's why I'm choosing him.

Anything further before we go into voting.

Anybody require a secret ballot?

Great.

Sarah, on uh voting for candidates, please.

All right, so I'll I will call your name and then if you can um state the individual uh that you would like to vote for um and then we will need a majority vote um for someone to be appointed.

Um Mr.

Selene.

Just uh Ms.

Carlson Chris, uh Mr.

Christianson.

Chris, Mr.

Mosher?

Chris and Mayor Eisenbais.

Chris.

All right.

Mr.

Yestad is appointed to serve the remainder of Mr.

Pike's term.

And Chris, if you'd like to come forward, we'll um have you take your oaths.

Yes.

You think that's bad.

I have to sit next to you.

I don't want to say much.

Okay.

All right.

Um I, Chris Yes Dad.

I Chris Yestead.

Do solemnly affirm.

Do solemnly affirm.

That I will support and defend.

That I will support and defend.

The Constitution of the United States of America.

The Constitution of the United States of America.

The Constitution of the State of Alaska.

The Constitution of the State of Alaska.

And the laws and ordinances.

And the laws and ordinances.

Of the City and Bureau of Sitka.

Of the city and borough of Sitka.

And that I will faithfully discharge my duties as an assembly member.

And that I will faithfully discharge my duties as an assembly member.

For the city and borough of SIGA.

For the city and borough of Sitka.

To the best of my ability.

To the best of my ability.

Excuse me, sir.

The table is this way.

Someone just told me that, and then that's why we installed.

Thank you to both the candidates for putting your names in.

Appreciate anybody being willing to serve on the assembly.

And really appreciate having a full assembly again that we can continue to charge forward.

So speaking of charging forward, as Tim Pike was our deputy mayor, we do now have to appoint a deputy mayor.

It was my assumption and intent that our vice deputy simply rolled up to deputy.

However, that's not in code.

So maybe change code later, but uh tonight I would suggest that our vice deputy mayor um just simply rolls up.

Uh that does need to be voted on by the body.

Um so if uh if anyone has a nomination at this point for uh deputy mayor.

Uh I nominate um JJ Carlson for Deputy Mayor.

Second.

Uh no, you don't need to accept any other nominations.

Okay, um, with only one person being nominated, congratulations, JJ.

Um, you have um ascended the ladder to deputy mayor.

Appreciate you and your service um filling in for me previously.

Um I guess I should have told you before you accepted that.

I already have multiple scheduled absences.

Um correct.

So you will be most likely leading some meetings um in my absence.

Uh now we do have a vice deputy mayor seat open.

Uh so it open up for nominations for vice deputy mayor.

I nominate Chris Kristad.

You were here for three years, man.

I nominate Tor Christians.

I'll second that.

Hey now, no funny business.

Uh any other nominations for vice deputy mayor.

I see none.

We will go to a vote on this one.

Uh, does anybody require a secret ballot?

Uh Sarah uh for vice deputy mayor, Mr.

Selene, Chris Miss Carlson, Chris, Mr.

Yes Dad.

Tor.

Mr.

Christensen, Chris.

Mr.

Mosher.

Tor.

Mayor Eisenbays.

Chris.

All right.

Mr.

Yestad, you are vice deputy mayor.

I expect a little more enthusiasm next time.

As JJ may be gone as well.

JJ, shall we uh go somewhere at the same time?

Hey, you know what I'm doing all summer one.

Okay, following up with that one.

Um Tim did hold uh several liaisons assignments.

Um the easy way is for us to just ominous dominus and make um Mr.

Yustad do all of those ones.

Um however, I don't think that's very fair.

So uh we do have a sheet in front of us with uh um some vacancies um that has been created uh by Mr.

Pike's absence.

Um so I'll just start from the top and work our way down and we can discuss uh who may be able to fill uh those particular time slots and uh um boards committees commissions uh starting with library.

This would be an alternate seat.

I am actually okay with just taking over Tim seats if that just makes it easier, and less people shift not at all.

Sweet, because I thought I was gonna have to be main for police and fire.

So yeah, I was looking at this earlier, and I was gonna suggest that I take police and fire and give GPIP to Chris.

Uh Thursdays are a fishing day for me, so I I can't hit the meetings during basically the summer skills.

Because I wound up GPIP is all I have.

Oh and so that's why I was thinking I could take something off your plate if you wanted me to.

But I just it just looked like a easy one to if you want to do the same thing for sustainability.

Last year, well let me look at this.

Sustainability.

Oh, you can't do never mind.

Never mind.

Yeah, yeah.

No, that's kind of yeah, the Thursdays are fishing, so I would miss all the summer meetings.

So all right, along that same lines.

Um, when we had Tim as the alternate uh liaison to Sika Tribe of Alaska, it was done that way so that the mayor was the primary and the deputy was the alternate.

Uh JJ, are you okay jumping in on that one as the alternate?

Yes, that makes a lot of sense.

Thank you for sharing.

Great, thank you.

Um that way we have uh leadership talking to leadership on on GPIP there, or uh not GPIP, I'm sorry, uh Sitka Tribal Alaska.

So uh anything else with assignments, reassignments.

Uh great, Chris.

Thank you for making that easy for us all.

Um I appreciate your newly appointed service already.

And that will move us on, Sarah.

Unless we had anything else that I missed on that one.

No, we have to do that.

Okay, got a double check with you to make sure we're on track.

Sounds like we are.

Uh, that would bring us to persons to be heard.

This is public participation for any item on or off tonight's agenda, not to exceed three minutes for any individual.

Everybody's jumping at once, so we will move on to reports.

Um if I have to think that hard, I guess I don't have a report for this period.

Um it's been slow mayoral-wise but busy.

Uh everything else.

Um do have a couple conferences coming up here soon that John will be attending along uh with myself.

So yeah.

Thank you.

John.

Uh thanks, Mayor.

One quick item.

Uh I had emailed the assembly about it yesterday.

Uh, we did receive a four and a half million dollar grant.

Um I can't remember the name of it.

Uh it's an FY27 like legislative discretionary grant, I believe is what it was called.

Uh, but essentially it was uh CPV funding from the state uh that was divvied up to um multiple communities and um receiving that letter yesterday from DCCED.

We have a 30-day timeline to basically pick a project and provide a loose scope to start the clock for the five-year money.

Um so given there are um some differing opinions.

Um the plan is on the assembly's uh July 28th meeting.

We will have a discussion direction decision item on where to focus that uh that four and a half million dollars for a project and then try to get something scoped and uh into the state by the deadline.

Uh thank you.

Uh Rachel, attorney's report.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, I think came up earlier in the meeting uh that lease management uh software is moving forward.

Um Mindy's been working on the purchase order for that, and she's also been doing some training uh with the software company, some representatives from them so that we are informed when writing the job description, um, and then we'll be working with HR to start that hiring process.

Um I'll be on vacation July 27th to August 16th, um, but I'll have my computer be keeping things moving along, um, including that that lease management rollout and ramp up and then the recodification project as well will be coming along with me, uh trying to get all 380 or so of those questions answered and assigned to folks.

Um so that feedback that we need from department heads will be assigned to them as summer is winding down.

Um yeah, just keeping everything moving.

Thank you.

Liaison representatives, Kevin.

Hi, Mr.

Mayor.

So today I attended the Parks and Rick, the monthly parks and rec uh committee meeting.

Um they only had uh two agenda items.

I mean, one agenda item.

There was gonna be two, but um, one of the presenters was not available, so they couldn't uh go forward with this one.

But this was a continuation of the discussion of the dog leash uh issue that is of concern uh to many people in the community.

Uh that is uh in this specifically case what was about talking about the key Gusheen field and the Vallandry field, Vallandry being the one right next to Blachley Middle School and the Keat one being adjacent to Keat Gusheen Elementary School.

Um they decided and voted uh and there was a lot of discussion at the last meeting where they talked about um enforcement and and that you know that's an issue, but they ultimately decided to make recommend I can't speak tonight.

Make a recommendation to create a uh this change it so that those two fields are um off or their their uh sorry the dog leash they cannot have their dogs without a leash during the periods um or they can have their dogs without a leash on those fields, other than the period of March 15th to June 30th, because of the seasonal sports that go on.

Um there was one person in the community uh who stated she was a responsible dog owner and that um she felt that that wasn't going to be enough uh that people are still gonna do what they're gonna do, and the members uh addressed it and recognize that that's it's true, it's hard to do that, but the first step is to uh create a rule in the first place.

So thank you.

Chris, you got a report?

No, nothing for me.

No, no, no, did uh clerk's report.

All right, so we have a number of vacancies on boards and commissions.

Um let's see, we have the health needs and human services, investment committee, library commission, parks and rec, police and fire, and tree and landscape.

Um so if folks are interested, they can stop by our office and we'll get them set up with an application.

And then I also wanted to uh remind folks um that we have the following vacancies that are to be filled through the October 6th election.

Um mayoral seat, two assembly member seats, and then three school board uh member seats.

Um the candidate filing begins on Monday and it runs through August 7th.

Um and that does need to be um there are paper packets that need to be picked up from our office and then returned to our office um by 5 p.m.

on August 7th.

So if folks are interested, they can um contact us and we'll answer any questions that we can ahead of time.

Thank you.

Any other reports this evening?

JJ.

The walking advocacy group I'm a member of um will be working with outer coast students um over the coming weeks to paint uh at least one uh crosswalk on Lincoln Street.

So they've had several updates over the course of you know this project.

And uh there was six finalists um from our community uh showcase last month, and looking forward to you know getting those those added to our asphalt um here in the coming weeks.

Um so if you do see uh some Parks and or not Park Smart, excuse me, some public works, people um, you know uh directing traffic with some students in the road, please be extra careful.

Um they are doing a a community project um for crosswalk safety.

Um thank you.

All right, uh that would bring us to our executive session this evening.

Are you looking for a motion?

Yes, okay.

I move to go into executive session to review the applications submitted for the municipal administrator position under the statutory category of discussing subjects that may tend to prejudice the reputation and character of an individual and invite an assistant municipal administrator Joshua Brent over.

In addition, I move to exclude the municipal administrator and municipal attorney.

Second.

It's been moved and segmented to inter executive session.

Is there any public comment on entering executive session?

Sarah.

All right, on the motion to go into executive session.

Mayor Eisenbais.

Yes.

Mr.

Christensen?

Yes.

Mr.

Mosier.

Yes.

Mr.

Celine?

Yes.

Ms.

Carlson, yes, and Mr.

Yes Dad.

Yes.

Motion passes 60, and we'll be meeting in room four.

Just down.

Uh thank you.

Assembly take a break on your way, please, as it's been over an hour.

I was worried it was going to be that meeting again.

Yes.

Uh motion to reconvene.

One second.

All those in favor say aye.

Any opposed?

Uh thank you.

We are reconvened as the assembly in regular session.

Uh so the assembly met in executive session to discuss uh municipal uh administrator applicants.

Uh at this point we have narrowed down our focus uh to a singular applicant uh by the name of Jenny Alber.

Um she was interviewed multiple times uh by this body in public sessions.

Uh we've gone through a continued search process uh to see if uh there were additional applicants that would uh that would rise out, um, and there has been none.

Uh so at this point the assembly is interested in inviting uh Jenny Albert up to Sitka in order to do a community meet and greet and such as we have typically done with our administrator candidates.

Um so we will uh uh if if a motion uh passes, uh we will be uh working with her in order to get her up here so that we can have uh it sounds like a couple meet and greet sessions at multiple locations, trying to reach a large segment of the community.

Uh and then we'll have a you know, if if some dates work out and some anticipated dates, an assembly meeting right afterwards in which she could uh sit through.

So if there's a motion, and then we can uh if anyone wants to discuss uh the application as well.

All right.

I move to an extended invitation to Jenny Albert Albert to uh come up to Sitka for a meet and greet and to meet our community uh to be determined at a mutual time by our HR coordinator, but as soon as possible.

Second second.

That's been moved and seconded to invite uh municipal uh administrator applicant Jenny Albert to Sitka for a community meet and greet.

Is there any public comment?

Uh any assembly discussion.

No, other than other than uh I'm excited to bring her up as soon as we can and uh have a community meet her as well as us to be able to meet her in person.

Uh the only thing I would add to my statements um at this point uh Jenny is considered a finalist while it is not uh mandatory in years past after meet and greets the assembly has offered um employment uh to candidates.

Uh so that is a potential outcome uh after this meet and greet.

Uh so the the assembly is has focused, narrowed our focus and is uh on a uh at this point a one track search for our uh our next administrator.

Anything else?