Bond package set for Anchorage voters after Bronson administration flub nearly omitted millions for park projects

Anchorage Assembly members got an unwanted surprise last week as they were meeting to iron out details for this year’s municipal bond packages, which will go before voters in April’s municipal elections.

As members finalized projects to include in bond proposals during a work session on Friday, they discovered that a technical error by members of Mayor Dave Bronson’s administration had frozen the parks and recreation package at an abnormally low cap of $2.3 million. In a normal year, the city’s parks and recreation bond is closer to $4 million, money that is typically leveraged to bring in more funding from government and private entities for trail improvements, park facilities, and other quality-of-life programs lobbied for by residents, advocates and community groups.

Members were discussing ideas for attaching $300,000 in renovation work to Mulcahy Stadium to another bond package, since the apparent clerical mistake would prevent them from fitting it into the skinnier-than-usual parks and rec proposal. But an aide interjected to deliver some more bad news.

“I just want to point out that there is no facilities bond for (2023),” said Assembly Budget Analyst Desirea Camacho.

Members sighed, exasperated.

The facilities bond is normally the vehicle by which the municipality borrows a few million dollars for routine work on its buildings to keep them in good working order. Last year voters rejected a $2.4 million proposal for things like replacing fire alarms and upgrades at the fleet maintenance shop. The year before, a narrow majority of voters supported rejected a $6.9 million package that paid for a pool filtration system, public restrooms and code improvements, but approved a smaller package to upgrade a senior center and library. Typically the city pays off about the same amount of old debt as the new debt it is bonding for, so the effect for property-taxpayers is close to neutral, or else an increase on the order of dollars or cents.

“I am just sitting here flabbergasted and amazed,” member Felix Rivera said at the work session, addressing members of the administration. “I mean, we have not had this issue to such a degree in the past, not that I am aware of. It seems like something has happened in the last couple of months that have gummed the gears to such a significant degree that we can’t get anything done. ... This is unacceptable.”

A message sent to the mayor’s office Thursday with questions and request for comment was not immediately returned.

In lieu of a facilities bond, the administration opted to use funds from the state’s Supplemental Emergency Medical Transport Program to pay $2.35 million for “major municipal facility roof replacements” under the Maintenance and Operations Department.

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Assembly members are not satisfied with that as as substitute.

“We’ve got facilities all over town that need to be maintained,” Pete Petersen, who represents East Anchorage, said at the work session. “If you don’t have a facilities bond you’re kinda behind the eight-ball. And once you’re behind, it’s really hard to get caught up.”

Members were more frustrated by the handling of the parks and recreation bond. The reasons it was capped so low, and in a way that prevented members from adding in additional projects, are technical, involving legal consultations, public notice requirements, and input from a nine-member commission made up of mayoral appointees who meet once a month at the Spenard Rec Center — coincidentally, one of the would-be bond recipients that was left out administration’s package.

Essentially, when the administration initially proposed its bond package, it somewhat arbitrarily specified its $2.3 million total in the title of documents it filed. The administration neglected to bring the proposal before the Parks and Recreation commission, and by the time it presented it to the Assembly this month, it had crossed over the threshold for public notice requirements that are mandated under city code for an item to appear on the ballot. Because the dollar figure was in the title, it was set in stone, according to the lawyers who vet the city’s bond proposals.

“Once we have a timeframe where we have to have a final ordinance no later than 70 days before the election, we can’t go backwards,” said Cynthia Weed, an attorney who works as the municipality’s legal counsel on bonds. Weed told the Assembly that in earlier discussions she had encouraged the administration to either select a higher dollar figure for the parks and recreation package or omit a number all together.

“I wasn’t aware of the requirement to go to the Parks and Rec Commission,” said Kent Kohlhase, who abruptly took over the job of municipal manager in December after Amy Demboski was terminated by the mayor. Managing communication between multiple branches of government and overseeing the public bonding process were not a part of his work during his long tenure in the city’s public works department.

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“This was in no way a political endeavor to derail this project,” Kohlhase said, accepting a share of the responsibility for the breakdown.

Meg Zaletel, who represents Midtown, called the situation “extremely frustrating and frankly disappointing.”

In a typical year, after bond packages are first introduced, the dollar amounts are treated as squishy placeholders, subject to change in December or January as projects and spending targets are added in. Often the Assembly is trying to strike a balance between what community members insist they want and need, versus what voters have an appetite and willingness to fund when they see the top-line dollar figure in the voting booth. The Assembly’s rule of thumb is that if a bond package is above $4 million, it’s a much harder sell to fiscally-minded residents, with the exception of hard infrastructure like road improvements and the school bond.

“I think this whole issue illustrates the problem with a constant churn of staff and the loss of institutional knowledge and the gutting of the municipal workforce,” Zaletel said.

Over the weekend and into Tuesday night, the Assembly scrambled to find an alternative solution. And they did, albeit a densely convoluted one that consumed hours of time. In the simplest terms, they moved to schedule a special election that will happen on the same day in April with one single measure: a larger parks and recreation bond worth $3,950,000 that includes several projects that would have otherwise been left out this year. That item will open to public testimony in February and appear on the April ballot.

With regards to a facilities bond, there will not be one this year.

The other propositions voters will decide are:

• A measure that would increase residential property tax exemptions from $50,000 to $75,000 in order to provide tax relief to homeowners.

• A measure amending the charter rules for filling vacancies on the Assembly and the office of the mayor.

• A measure that would amend the charter in order to use the majority of revenues from Anchorage’s 5% sales tax on cannabis products to fund child care and early education.

• A proposal to create a new service area encompassing most of the Anchorage Bowl to pay for road and infrastructure improvements at trailheads and access points into the Chugach Range. Currently, many of the most popular roads for accessing hiking trails and recreational areas are within smaller service areas that do not have the ability to raise funds sufficient for expanding roads or parking lots to accommodate substantial increases in visitors in recent years.

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• Another potential charter amendment shifting management of the Municipality of Anchorage Trust Fund from the treasurer to a fiduciary board.

• A measure for Girdwood residents giving the Girdwood Valley Service Area the power “to provide services in support of policies that promote local housing and economic stability.”

• A school bond for $37,787,000 for capital improvements to Anchorage School District facilities. The projects include, “roof replacements and structural/seismic upgrades at College Gate, Kasuun, and Kincaid Elementary Schools and the Warehouse/Purchasing Building, construction of security vestibules and security improvements at Birchwood, Bowman, Northwood, Ocean View, Spring Hill and Trailside Elementary Schools, and safety improvements at East High School.”

[After this year’s school bond failed, the Anchorage School Board is proposing a smaller one for 2023]

• A roads a drainage bond for the Anchorage Bowl worth $34,500,000.

• A public safety and transit bond worth $4,620,000 that would pay for “Anchorage Area-Wide Radio Network, acquiring new replacement ambulances and fuel tanks, acquiring and replacing transit vehicles and support equipment and undertaking school zone safety improvements, bus stop improvements and improvements at transit facilities and centers.”

• A $2,625,000 bond for the Anchorage fire service area that would pay for replacing fire engines and facilities improvements.

• A bond for $450,000 to buy a rescue truck for the for the Chugiak 23 Volunteer Fire Department.

Several more measures pertain to hyper-local road service area changes.

The municipal election is April 4.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said the 2022 facilities bond passed. It did not. A larger bond package in 2021 also failed, though a smaller second facilities bond was approved.