The Anchorage Assembly meets at 5 p.m. Tuesday on the bottom floor of the Loussac Library.
Paid downtown parking meters on Saturdays and a proposed development deal involving a new city health building and shops, housing and offices on Tudor Road are the big things to watch.
A retail marijuana shop slated to open downtown has a few familiar faces among the owners.
Here are six things to know about the agenda, which is also available on the city website.
1. Downtown parking showdown
Assemblyman Forrest Dunbar wants to bar the city from requiring paid metered parking before 11 a.m. on weekends and holidays, creating a "grace period" for drivers who drink too much and leave their cars overnight. That change is set to start this weekend, when a test program for two-hour metered parking on Saturdays takes effect.
Andrew Halcro, the director of the Anchorage Community Development Authority (ACDA), which manages downtown parking and pursues redevelopment projects, sent a lengthy email to Assembly members last week outlining why his agency opposes Dunbar's measure. He said it isn't based on data, disrupts months of focus groups and goes against city law that bars parking overnight in the winter.
Dunbar changed his original ordinance from noon to 11 a.m. to accommodate the test program.
Expected Assembly action: Vote
[Read the latest version of Dunbar's proposed parking ordinance]
[Prior coverage: Assemblyman wants to keep free parking on weekend mornings in downtown Anchorage]
2. Speaking of Halcro …
Halcro and former Anchorage Assemblyman Patrick Flynn are both part-owners in a downtown pot shop planned for 541 W. Fourth Ave. The Assembly is set to hold a hearing on the business' operating permit Tuesday night.
Flynn and Halcro are among 23 shareholders in Great Northern Cannabis Inc. Flynn, who ended his tenure as the downtown Assembly representative in April, owns about a 4 percent share. Halcro and his wife, Vicky, each own just over a 1 percent interest. The corporation is already running a wholesale commercial grow operation.
Halcro actively promotes development downtown through his position at the ACDA.
"I think having a voice in the (marijuana) industry is good for downtown," Halcro said in an interview. "We have a team that's going to do it right, and try and make sure the industry operates under very strict standards."
Expected Assembly action: Vote
3. Tudor development deal gets hearing
A city deal with two developers, Mark Lewis and David Irwin, could involve land trades and tax breaks for a new city health building on city-owned land at the corner of Tudor and Elmore roads. The proposal includes two privately financed developments — a grocery store, shops and housing on the Tudor property and a senior housing development at Eighth Avenue and L Street downtown, the site of the current health building.
Expected Assembly action: Vote
[Development deal would give Anchorage new health department, grocery store and senior housing]
4. Prostitution immunity ordinance
The Assembly is expected to debate a measure from Assemblymen Felix Rivera and Fred Dyson that would grant immunity to a criminal charge of prostitution when a person reports a more serious crime. Immunity would extend until the close of the investigation or prosecution of the particular crime that's reported, according to the latest version of the measure.
Expected Assembly action: Vote
5. More money needed to finish Loussac renovation
The Berkowitz administration is asking for an additional $150,000 to finish the Loussac Library renovation, bringing the project's budget to date to $15 million. The project price tag was $13.5 million, but construction teams encountered "previously unknown" structural problems, according to a memo to the Assembly.
City manager Mike Abbott said in an interview this month that a contingency fund is covering the additional expenses.
Expected Assembly action: Adoption through consent agenda
6. Up for introduction: Sullivan deficit
The Berkowitz administration wants the Assembly to approve $600,000 from the city's general savings account to cover a 2016 operating deficit at the Sullivan Arena, the first in at least a decade.
Expected Assembly action: None required
[Sullivan Arena posts $600,000 operating loss for 2016, well before Aces exit]
Correction: An earlier headline associated with this story erroneously described "public officials" selling pot. The story only refers to one public official, Andrew Halcro. Patrick Flynn is a former public official.