Local Government

City and Borough of Juneau officials are scrambling to apply for a state grant that could pay for at least half of a new library in the Mendenhall Valley.

The original deadline to apply was in January, but the Division of Community and Regional Affairs moved it up to November 4th.

Ten Alaska communities had projects funded in the first two years of the library construction grant program. City Library Director Barbara Berg says Juneau is in line to get money this year. She says a new branch in the valley won’t happen without it.

“If we can’t get the grant, then we’re not going to move ahead with anything. That’s integral to making this work,” Berg says.

The plan is to build a new 13- to 15-million dollar library on city property at Dimond Park. With the state grant picking up half the cost, Berg says the city’s contribution would be less than 7.5 million. That can include the value of the land, local fundraising, and other grants. She says the nonprofit Friends of the Juneau Public Libraries has already raised about a million dollars for the project.

“This is an opportunity to do something that has been planned for many years, and we will get something that can serve as the civic heart in the valley,” says Berg. “Improved access to meeting spaces for people, and above all better service to the people in the valley.”

The valley branch is currently located in the Mendenhall Mall, which was supposed to be a temporary site when it moved in there in 1983. Berg says the city pays about 192-thousand dollars a year in rent for the space, and special events are limited to times when the mall is open.

The branch is the busiest of Juneau’s three public libraries. Berg says it gets 53 percent of all visits system-wide and 46 percent of all checkouts.

Library officials will meet with the CBJ Assembly Public Works and Facilities Committee on Monday. They’re hoping to get assembly approval of the grant application on Monday October 17th.

Link: Juneau Public Libraries

A Juneau-based nonprofit that aims to curb the use of plastic shopping bags in the Capital City won’t be deterred by voters’ rejection this week of a citizen’s initiative to tax those bags at certain retailers.

The group’s director says the measure raised awareness of the pollution and environmental damage caused by plastic bags, and members will look for ways to keep the conversation going.

Turning the Tides Director Dixie Belcher wasn’t surprised that voters rejected the group’s plastic bag tax initiative by more than two to one.

“Plastic bags are either banned or taxed in two-thirds of the world, but that has never come from a vote,” Belcher says. “It has always come from a city council, or from a legislature, or from the country. When it goes out to a vote, it’s always voted down.”

Opposition came from people who disagreed with the structure of the tax, levied only on large stores like Fred Meyer, WalMart and Safeway with average annual gross sales of 15-million dollars or more over the last five years. Most people thought the tax would be passed on to consumers.

“There’s a lot of people that just plain don’t want a tax,” says Belcher. “And I think that they didn’t like that it would just apply to four stores – which really wasn’t our idea – that came from the business community.”

Belcher says just having the measure on the ballot raised awareness of the pollution and environmental harm caused by plastic bags, especially on oceans. Turning the Tides regularly sponsors movies and speakers on the issue, and gives away free reusable bags at events around town. Belcher hopes they can build on the momentum of the campaign.

“I think we’re going to be talking to teachers, to school teachers, with the possibility that some children could make bags in the schools that they could take home and their families would use,” she says. “We’re just going to continue to do that sort of thing and also try to reach people that we haven’t reached.”

That includes public officials and the business community.

“There are definitely people in the business community who are 100 percent behind it, and there are definitely public officials who are interested, and I think we have more now,” says Belcher.

Randy Wanamaker, who was re-elected to the assembly on Tuesday after a year-long absence, says he met a lot of people during the campaign who opposed the bag tax. But he says the same people were concerned about the city’s ever expanding landfill.

“This is something that helped people talk about solid waste in the broad, strategic sense,” Wanamaker says.

Belcher thinks some voters who opposed the tax would have supported a ban on plastic bags. While Turning the Tides probably won’t attempt another citizen’s initiative, she says it will continue to push for change on the grassroots level.

“It’s a huge problem, and I think plastic bags’ days are numbered,” she says.

An Arrow Refuse proposal to offer curbside recycling in Juneau and barge trash to the Lower 48 has come as a surprise to city officials. The city and borough has issued a request for proposals for recycling services and has been negotiating with another company on a major facility.

The Juneau Assembly has repealed a controversial zone change on a small parcel of residential land in the Mendenhall Valley.

The Assembly last month overrode the Planning Commission and CBJ Community Development staff and zoned the area light commercial. Then the city attorney said it was illegal.

The heavily wooded corner of Atlin Drive and Mendenhall Loop Road was previously owned by the U.S. Forest Service. While the parcel is 2.68 acres, it’s also wetlands, reducing the usable land by 40 percent.

Developer Richard Harris and consultant Murray Walsh have been seeking the zone change since January. They weren’t successful until August, when they appealed a Planning Commission decision to the Assembly.

City attorney John Hartle said the zone change violates the city’s land-use code, but the developer’s attorney reads it differently. Walsh told the Assembly Monday night the turn of events was “horribly demoralizing.”

“I understand the yearning for clarity in these things. It would be a good idea to change the code so that we’re not faced with this kind of thing again,” Walsh said. “This has gone on eight months. Lots of emotion, lots of trial. And I just think that the assembly should stick with the decision it’s made, give us what we asked for, and give us a chance to earn our way into something the whole community will be proud of.”

The entire Atlin Drive neighborhood, including Saint Paul’s Catholic Church, has been against the zone change, primarily because Harris has no plan for the corner. He has said he just wants the flexibility that commercial zoning would give.

Linda Wild has testified several times on the issue. She told the Assembly it was time to get beyond dueling attorneys and emotional reactions and focus on a common goal – quality use and development of the property that’s compatible with the neighborhood.

“Mr. Harris would be well advised to remain in dialogue with the neighborhood to garner their support for a specific project rather than the ‘trust me’ of a blanket light commercial designation,” Wild said. “I’d sure hate to see 48 housing units or a Denny’s on that little corner.”

All but one Assembly member – Johan Dybdahl — voted to repeal their action. The corner remains medium density residential.

The City and Borough of Juneau will remain part of the Tongass Futures Roundtable.

A resolution to repeal CBJ support for the group failed on a tie vote at last night’s (Monday) Assembly meeting. Mayor Bruce Botelho recused himself from the discussion and vote, because he currently serves as facilitator of the group.

Earlier this year, timber representatives pulled out of the roundtable. The Southeast Conference, and several other communities as well as the State of Alaska also quit, citing the group’s inability to increase logging in Southeast Alaska.

Assembly member Merrill Sanford proposed that Juneau do the same. He says roundtable members have done little to address timber supply.

“There should be enough in the Tongass National Forest to supply two, three or four sawmills in Southeast Alaska,” Sanford said, “and we have done nothing but hurt the economy of our small towns by not having an integrated resource available for them and this group is not working on that. They said that was one of their primary goals.”

The Tongass roundtable started five years ago in an attempt to find consensus among stakeholders of the nation’s largest national forest. It included the U.S. Forest Service, conservation groups, the timber industry, and Native organizations, including Sealaska Regional Native Corporation.

CEO Rick Harris told the Assembly the roundtable has been effective in improving communication among the users and residents of the national forest.
And while there has been less progress on timber, he says it goes beyond that to other Tongass resources.

“Kind of the moniker was timber and beyond so that’s what we’ve focused on. We can understand people’s frustration that we have not found a solution to timber but that’s been a 30 to 40 year fight as it is.” Harris said he believes the roundtable has made substantial progress.

The Parnell administration has formed a state Timber Jobs Task Force, which represents one side of the policy debate over Tongass issues. It has no representatives from the conservation community.

The City and Borough of Juneau is considering a program that could increase the quality and availability of child care in the community.

The lack of child care in Juneau is notorious, says JEDC’s Meilani Schijvens.

“There’s a joke here in Juneau that if you wait until you think you might be pregnant you’re probably too late to sign up for child care, if you want an infant spot,” Schijvens quips. “You need to sign up when you think you might be in love.”

A recent study by the Juneau Economic Development Council indicates about half of children under age six in Juneau are in unknown child care situations. That means they are either cared for by parents splitting shifts or by unlicensed providers.

The turnover rate among licensed child care providers in the capital city is nearly 20 percent higher than the state average.

According to JEDC, the pay is so low that qualified child care providers quickly move on to other jobs for better wages and benefits.

The Association for Education for Young Children, or AEYC, has posed a solution, called the HEARTS program.

It stands for hiring, educating and retaining teaching staff. The program is similar to others around the country, which offer incentives for child care providers so they can earn credentials in early childhood education, increase their earnings and stay in the business.

AEYC’s Nikki Morris says the HEARTS program would award each licensed child care provider more per hour based on their level of education.

“They can see that as they increase their training there is compensation that goes along with that,” Morris says.

The HEARTS program also would offer providers incentives to stay in business by helping to offset costs like first aid and CPR certifications. It would waive some fees and taxes for licensed child care providers.

AEYC Executive Director Joy Lyon says the incentive program would result in better child care options in Juneau as well as provide working parents with the assurance that their young children have a quality day-care experience.

The HEARTS program will be reviewed by the CBJ Assembly Finance Committee. It would cost the CBJ just over $143,000 a year. Click here for the HEARTS Initiaitve.