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Tensions over a levee that’s taking shape in backyards along Juneau’s Mendenhall River have come to a head, with one homeowner filing a lawsuit against the city seeking to exempt his property or be paid for it. 

Win or lose — city officials say the levee will go up. 

Stephen Bower owns a home beside the river and alleges that officials did not go through the right process for approving the levee intended to keep floodwaters out of Mendenhall Valley homes. 

The court filing asserts that the barriers will not benefit Bower’s property, as his home was not damaged during the 2023 or 2024 glacial outburst floods.

“He doesn’t want to pay for this barrier,” said Scott Perkins, Bower’s attorney. “He doesn’t want this barrier on his property — and, in the alternative, if the barrier has to be on the property, he deserves to be compensated for the amount of land that he has lost.”

If he prevails, it would upend the city’s plan to pay for the levee. 

The lawsuit takes issue with an ordinance the Juneau Assembly passed — it created a Local Improvement District, or LID, in order to spread 40% of the barrier construction cost among 466 landowners who would pay about $6,300 each for flood protection over the next decade. Landowners had the opportunity to vote down the LID in February, but only a quarter formally objected. 

Both the U.S. Constitution and the Alaska Constitution forbid the government from taking private land for public use without paying them for it. “Taking” is the key word here.

Emily Wright, the city’s attorney, said the city isn’t taking the land, since Bower will still own the part of his property with the levee — which is meant to be temporary. But she said if a judge rules that the land is being taken, the city would have to pay all of the landowners hosting the barriers. 

“Then we probably have to pursue an eminent domain action, which requires just compensation, because if we’re not on people’s property because of the LID, we have to have permission to be on their property somehow,” Wright said. 

If a judge strikes down the ordinance that created the LID, the city also wouldn’t be able to charge any landowners for the project and the Assembly would have to decide whether and how to cover the estimated $3,132,000 that was to be divided among landowners. City Manager Katie Koester said that the full cost of the project won’t be known until it’s completed.

“We’re still actively pursuing grants, working with Tlingit and Haida on CDBG community development block grant funding,” Koester said. “We will continue to aggressively pursue those funding sources.”

The court filing also alleges that the city didn’t get the right permits through the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to do the project, which would have required an environmental assessment. Nate Rumsey, a city engineer, said the city didn’t need that permit because the last flood prompted an emergency declaration. Instead, the city got what’s called a nationwide permit through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Rumsey said he anticipated a lawsuit like this, and if Bower wins, the levee would still be built — with some alterations.

“We have alternatives, from an engineering perspective, available that could allow us to still provide protection to the rest of the community,” Rumsey said.  

The city has to file an answer to the complaint by the end of the month. Perkins said a handful of other landowners may soon join the lawsuit. A court date has not yet been set.

A new Juneau advocacy group called the Affordable Juneau Coalition filed three ballot petitions with the City and Borough of Juneau last week.

The group seeks to cap the property tax rate, remove sales tax on food and utilities, and make in-person voting the default again. 

The city uses a mill rate to calculate how much property tax residents pay to the city. One mill is equal to $1 per $1000 in property value. 

Right now, the city caps the mill rate at 12 mills. The new petition would  drop it to nine mills, which could lower property taxes in the future for property owners. But lower taxes could mean the city would have less money to pay for services. 

The petition to exempt essential food and residential utilities from sales tax could also save residents some money, but at a loss to the city. The city currently taxes food and utilities at 5%, which brings in a combined $10 to $12 million in revenue annually. 

If voters pass the initiative, the city would likely have to cut back on spending to make up for the lost revenue. The Juneau Assembly considered removing sales tax on food in 2022, but ultimately decided against it. 

The Juneau Assembly made by-mail voting the default in 2023. Last year, a group of residents tried unsuccessfully to repeal that ordinance.

The new petition filed this year seeks to amend the language in that same ordinance to make elections poll-based again instead of by-mail. The group cites increased cost to conduct elections and slower results as the reason behind the initiative, according to documents submitted to the city clerk’s office. 

By-mail voting has been used by the city since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In-person voting is still available at city vote centers.

The city’s law department and the city clerk still need to review the three petitions. If they are approved, the Affordable Juneau Coalition has 30 days to gather just over 2,700 signatures for each petition to secure a spot on the ballot this October. 

Another group also filed a petition early last week to put hard limits on cruise ship tourism’s growth.

The Juneau Assembly unanimously passed a resolution Monday night urging Alaska’s congressional delegation to oppose cuts to federal agencies. The move is a response to the local effects of the Trump administration’s widespread federal firings.

In 2024, more than 700 people living in Juneau worked for the federal government. It’s not clear how many are still employed after the firings. 

Assembly member Alicia Hughes-Skandijs introduced the resolution. 

“I just want to make sure that we’re doing like every single thing we can to let the people who are our representatives in the federal government know that we want you to do something about this,” Hughes-Skandijs said after the meeting. 

The resolution was passed through the consent agenda, which means they didn’t discuss it, and there wasn’t public testimony. 

Hughes-Skandijs said the firings will negatively impact Juneau’s economy and vital services residents rely on. Her resolution does not name the Trump administration, which carried out the terminations.

“Is that person who was the breadwinner for their family going to stay in Juneau?” she said. “The fallout effects of a bunch of federal workers getting laid off, I think, has the potential to have a major impact to our community.”

Hughes-Skandijs also pointed to the National Weather Service’s role in public safety by monitoring Suicide Basin and issuing warnings ahead of each year’s glacial outburst flood. 

She also acknowledged the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center, which the resolution calls a “cornerstone of Juneau’s tourism economy.” 

The visitor center, managed by the U.S. Forest Service, recently saw a near-complete termination of its staff. Some have since been rehired, but the staffing situation ahead of the approaching tourism season remains uncertain.

In her annual speech to the Alaska Legislature last month, U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski condemned the ways the Trump administration is carrying out the mass firings, calling some “unlawful.”  

U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan downplayed the firings in his own legislative address and said that Trump advisor Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, is making “noble progress” to reduce the national debt. 

Both Murkowski and Sullivan recently co-sponsored a resolution to keep the U.S. Postal Service independent and public. 

The Assembly also read through a proposal to set aside $200,000 to help staff the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center. The Assembly will vote on it at its next meeting on May 19.

Less than a year after Juneau voters shot down a ballot initiative to ban large cruise ships on Saturdays, advocates are trying again to put hard limits on tourism’s growth. 

On Monday, local advocates went to City Hall to file a petition that would impose a five-ship daily limit, cap the annual number of passengers at 1.5 million a year and impose a daily limit of 16,000 people on most days and 12,000 on Saturdays. The petition also seeks to shorten the season to only last between May and September. 

Karla Hart filed the failed initiative last year and the new one this week. She’s an outspoken advocate against the growth of tourism. She called the new petition a compromise. 

“I really want to win this year,” she said. “What prompted me to file this year was the complete lack of any indication that the borough Assembly has any plans or any intention of doing anything that relieves the impacts on the community as a whole.”

The City and Borough of Juneau has already signed agreements with cruise lines that put in place a five-ship limit, and limit the number of daily passengers that come to town beginning in 2026.

The difference is that those agreements are non-binding and voluntary. But if the initiative is passed by voters, those limits would become law. Hart says she wants the initiative to hold the city and cruise lines accountable. 

“Negotiations mean nothing. My intent with this initiative is to simply say, ‘you the industry agreed on these limits, and so let’s put them in law so that they stick,’” she said. 

Residents in nearby Sitka have also tried multiple times to limit cruise tourism. They’ll vote on the latest attempt in a special election in May. 

Juneau had between 1.6 and 1.7 million cruise passengers visit during the past two summer seasons. The 2025 season – which begins next week – is expected to yield a similar number.

Hart filed the petition the same day the Juneau Assembly voted to approve a tidelands lease for a fifth cruise ship dock in downtown Juneau.

The petition still needs to be reviewed by the city’s law department and the city clerk. If approved, the group then has 30 days to collect just over 2,700 signatures to land a spot on the local election ballot this October. 

Correction: A previous version of this story misstated the current year. 

The Juneau Assembly voted Monday night to approve a tidelands lease for a fifth cruise ship dock in downtown Juneau. It paves the way for the construction to move forward after a years-long process. 

“With or without this dock, we will still have five ships in town,” said Deputy Mayor Greg Smith, who voted in favor of the lease. “This is not the question on, ‘what is the future of tourism?’ That is still undecided and unknown. This is ‘should we allow a fifth dock and the benefits that it brings?’ And in my opinion, it is worth supporting.”

The company behind the project is Huna Totem Corp., an Alaskan Native village corporation that owns Icy Strait Point cruise port in Hoonah. Norwegian Cruise Lines, which originally bought the property for $20 million, gave it to Huna Totem in 2022. 

The dock will be constructed in Gastineau Channel, accompanied by a waterfront development called Áak’w Landing. The development — which was approved by the Juneau planning commission in 2023 — will include underground parking, retail space and a culture and science center located along Egan Drive next to Juneau’s U.S. Coast Guard station. 

The tidelands lease is set to last for 35 years. The Assembly’s vote Monday night came after multiple rounds of public testimony both in favor and against the development. 

Huna Totem and supporters of the new dock say it would help disperse tourism downtown and ease vehicle congestion. Kerry Crocker, who leads the local International Longshore and Warehouse Union, called the dock “a big win for Juneau.”

“I spend about 2,000 hours a summer downtown. I’m the dock foreman for all four docks, and we service all the ships that are over 1,000 feet,” he testified. “I can assure you that the downtown congestion will definitely be dissipated with the new dock.”

However, critics of the project, like Joan Wilkerson, said she worries about the dock’s proximity to where she lives and the health impacts the ships could have on air quality. She asked the Assembly to postpone the vote. 

“Adding yet another ship pumping more poison into the air right under our windows is not welcome,” she said. 

Part of the agreement with the city involves the guarantee that no more than one ship will dock there in a 24 hour period. The city has previously signed agreements with cruise lines that puts in place a five ship limit in Juneau, and limit the number of daily passengers that come in Juneau beginning in 2026. 

In the conditional use permit for the dock approved by the planning commission, Huna Totem is required to provide electrified shore power within two years after a power line to connect it is built within 25 feet of its property line. Once the shore power is available, all large ships using the dock must use shore power instead of ship power, which uses fossil fuels.

The Assembly added a few conditions that Huna Totem must agree to before members voted to approve the lease. One is that the corporation must provide the city with written assurance from the U.S. Coast Guard that the dock will not obstruct the Coast Guard icebreaker expected to be homeported in Juneau.

Other conditions include only allowing ships with 4,500 passengers or fewer, and agreeing that the development will not obstruct the downtown seawalk, barring special events.  

Assembly member Alicia Hughes-Skandijs, who was the only member to vote against the lease, said she doesn’t think it’s in the best interest of the residents who will feel the impacts the most. 

“I asked myself, ‘is this the right thing? Is there a rush? Have we truly done the planning to make this decision?’ And I do not think we have,” she said. 

Russell Dick, the president and CEO of Huna Totem, was not immediately available for comment on the project’s approval or to share more information about the development’s next steps.  

The City and Borough of Juneau’s municipal budget process kicked off over the weekend. On Saturday, the Juneau Assembly met for an all-day meeting to begin building the framework for next year’s city budget. 

Throughout the next few months, they’ll break down the city’s current finances, along with the school district, the city-owned hospital, the airport, Eaglecrest Ski Area and Docks and Harbors to come up with a municipal spending plan beginning July 1.

But as City Finance Director Angie Flick warned, they’re having to do so amid state and federal funding uncertainties, President Trump’s tariffs and other factors out of the city’s control.

“As you are considering all of the needs before you, we just need to be aware that there could be some other forces at play here,” she said. 

For the most part, the budget proposed by the city manager more or less maintains the status quo – it’s not cutting or adding any major services. But it does propose bumping up the current property tax rate of 10.04 — the lowest it’s been in decades — up to 10.19.

City leaders say that’s to help offset inflation and additional ongoing costs like taking over buildings that were transferred to the city under the Juneau School District’s consolidation plan last year, along with flood mitigation efforts. 

A mill rate determines how much property tax residents pay to the city. One mill is equal to $1 per $1000 in property value. This means that for every $1,000 in taxable property value, there would be a tax of $10.19 for next year.

While the hospital and school district presented balanced budgets to the city, Eaglecrest Ski Area faces a $2.7 million deficit. Its managers are asking the city to help cover that in order to fund repairs to some broken and aging infrastructure and boost pay to its employees.

While no decisions were made at the meeting, Assembly member Wade Bryson noted that Eaglecrest has had these issues for years despite receiving money from the Assembly to fix them in previous budget cycles.  

“For seven years in a row, I’ve heard Eaglecrest wages aren’t high enough. CBJ government is not going to be able to fix that,” he said. “I think that’s where my question comes in. How bad do things have to get before we recognize that maybe a private sector company needs to operate Eaglecrest?”

Nothing is finalized yet. Eaglecrest’s deficit and request will be taken up again by the Assembly in the coming months, along with the property tax rate and community funding requests.