Author: kfskadmin

Petersburg has a new City Councilor. The Mayor and three Councilors Monday night appointed Nancy Strand to the vacant seat. Strand was born and raised in Petersburg. She previously served on the Council forty years ago. Since her retirement from construction work in 1995, Strand has volunteered for a variety of city and community posts. In recent years, she was on the local committee that drafted the charter for a proposed Petersburg borough. She also serves on the Clausen Memorial Museum board and is chair of the City’s Utility Board. She lost an election bid for council last fall.
Strand was one of two applicants for the seat formerly held by longtime councilor Ed Sarf, who passed away in March. The other applicant was Ben Johnson, the operations director for the Petersburg Indian Association and current chair of the City’s ad hoc, smoking ordinance committee .In a secret ballot, the council initially voted three to one in favor of Strand. However, with just a quorum of four members Monday night, the vote had to be unanimous to make the appointment. So they took a second vote and everyone voted for strand. Councilors Mark Jenson and John Havrilek were out of town. Strand will have to resign her seat on the utility board to take the council appointment. Her council term will expire this fall . Councilor Rick Braun also reminded the public that most of the council seats will be up for election this fall:

Representative Don Young has been encouraging Southeast Alaska towns to be more united on issues like energy development. That was one of the issues young raised during his visit to Petersburg Thursday afternoon.

The City of Petersburg’s general fund is again facing a deficit in the next fiscal year. That’s according to the administration’s preliminary budget, which was released late last week. It would be the fourth year in a row the general funds revenues would be short of expenditures.

Petersburg’s Smoking Ordinance Advisory Committee made some progress in its first meeting earlier this week the City Council tasked the committee with revising a proposed measure that would ban smoking in most indoor, public spaces. Despite their mixed opinions on the original ordinance, the new committee members were able to settle a number of issues in a friendly and productive discussion. The group still has more work to do, but as Matt Lichtenstein reports, they are well on-track to come up with a recommendation for the city council.

Plans for a new Petersburg library are shifting a little. The library board this month agreed to re-situate the proposed building on its Haugen drive site. That’s in response to concerns from neighboring property owners. Planners say the adjustment will have some affect on the view from the new library, but it could also provide more of a buffer for nearby residents and save a little money on construction costs.