Assembly Report for January 10, 2006

PARK STRIP LOSING BALL FIELDS: The municipal administration plans to relocate the softball fields from the Delaney Park Strip to south Anchorage this summer. Except for outhouse races and sled dog rides during Fur Rondy in February, the Park Strip is largely unused during winter months.

ASSEMBLY FURTHER LIMITS USE OF EMIMENT DOMAIN: Urged on by a small but militant group of South Anchorage residents opposed to an extension of the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail, assembly members on Tuesday added "leisure amenities" to the growing list of purposes for which the city may not use condemnation to acquire land for public purposes. Responding to a Court decision which permitted use of eminent domain to further a private development project, the Assembly last year banned eminent domain "to further private economic development" and requires that property acquired be occupied by the government itself or kept open to the public. Under AO 2005-171(S-1) approved Tuesday, use of eminent domaine to acquire property for so called "leisure amenities" would be off limits as well. "Leisure amenities" include parks, trails and pedestrian paths, greenbelts, wilderness areas sports fields, and enclosed sports facilities. Assembly action may be moot, however, because six bills are pending in the Alaska legislature to restrict use of eminent domaine by government agencies in Alaska.

ETHICS CODE SURFACES BRIEFLY, THEN VANISHES AGAIN: A long awaited rewrite of city ethics laws surfaced briefly Tuesday night only to disappear once again into further study. Five years in the making before the City’s Board of Ethics, the new code was first before the Assembly on June 28, 2005, postponed three times and then referred to a committee headed by midtown Assemblyman Ken Stout. A new version written by Allan Tesche and Ken Stout was apparently not satisfactory to Dan Coffey and backburnered. On Tuesday, members briefly discussed the ordinance and then voted to postpone it indefinitely, effectively killing the measure. Ken Stout promised to present a new ethics ordinance on March 29, 2006 where it will be discussed at a work session scheduled for April 7, 2006.

LARGE ANIMAL ORDINANCE PLODS AHEAD: Months in the making, several versions of an ordinance setting new land use standards for keeping of large domestic animals (horses) in outlying areas of Eagle River and the Hillside were heard Tuesday evening. The ordinances set standards for size of corrals, buffering, vegetation, and numbers of animals allowed. Despite complaints from several testifying before the Assembly over a last minute substitute offered by Debbie Ossiander just before the meting began, members went ahead and took testimony on the ordinance and its substitutes. The matter returns to the Assembly for further debate and action on amendments drafted by Ms. Ossiander on January 24, 2006.

NO ACTION ON NEIGHBORHOOD CYCLOTRONS: The Assembly’s crowded agenda prevented members from completing a public hearing on AO 2005-178, which would ban medical or industrial cyclotrons from residential areas or as home occupations. Members heard businessman Al Swank, Jr., tout the health benefits of a twenty ton medical cylotron he wants to install in his garage in the South Additon neighborhood in order to manufacture radioisotopes for sale to local hospitals. The matter remains before the Assembly at its next meeting on January 25, 2006 under unfinished business.

BACK TO THE FUTURE: ANOTHER VOTE ON MAYORAL RUN OFFS? If Ken Stout and Dan Sullivan convince six other members to go along with them, Anchorage voters will have yet another chance to change rules governing run off elections for the office of mayor. Introducing AO 2006-1, the new "rollback" would repeal a Charter Amendment voters approved three years ago which requires a run off election for the office of mayor where no candidate receives 45% of the vote. If approved by the Assembly and the voters this April, the measure would raise require a runoff if the leading candidate received less than 50% of the vote, thereby assuring Anchorage voters of additional mayoral elections in the future. A public hearing is scheduled for January 31, 2006.

2006 BOND PACKAGE UNVEILED: Mayor Begich introduced the administration’s bond package which will be submitted to voters in the April, 2006 election. The proposed bonds will be heard by the Assembly on January 31, 2006. Measures include: $45,390,000 for Roads, $12,880,000 for Homeland Security and Public Safety, $1,960,000 for the Fire Service Area, and $4,050,000 for a Parks bond.

ACTION ON SIGN ORDINANCE ROLLBACK POSTPONED: The public will have to wait until February 28, 2006 to speak out on changes Dan Sullivan wants to make to the municipality’s sign ordinance. City sign regulations were modernized in 2003 and call for the elimination of those large "pole signs" by October of this year and all other illegal signs by 2013. Sullivan’s ordinance, AO 2005-163(S), would undo many of the tighter restrictions on signs passed in 2003 by eliminating amortization or phase out periods for illegal signs, including pole signs. The ordinance would also relax rules governing the size of electronic signs in business areas, and bring back moving signs. Opposition to Sullivan’s proposal from the North East Community Council and an expected vote by the Planning and Zoning Commission may make this "rollback" as controversial as the original measure was three years ago.

COMING YOUR WAY: A convenient calendar of key legislation the Assembly will consider during the next two months is maintained by the Municipal Clerk on her website. For details and copies of the ordinances, go to: http://www.muni.org/Assembly2/pending_legislations.cfm