Assembly candidates discuss issues at forum

PALMER — Sales tax, economic development and natural resource extraction dominated the discussion at Wednesday’s forum of Matanuska-Susitna Borough Assembly candidates.

Six of the seven hopefuls for the three seats on the Oct. 6 ballot met to address the public at the joint meeting of the Valley chambers of commerce.

The candidates fielded questions from the crowd asked through a moderator about some of the Valley’s most controversial topics. What follows is a summary of their responses grouped by contest.

District 3

Michelle Church is running for re-election against Ron Arvin to represent District 3, the area between Trunk Road and Seward Meridian Parkway.

Church started by saying local government should encourage growth by providing necessary infrastructure and stable, predicable laws. She cited examples of success stories in the borough, like the port, railroad expansion and growing university.

For Arvin, economic development is the main issue of the election. The goal of the borough should be to create an environment where industry looks to the Valley as an ideal place to run a business.

The logic behind the sales tax is simply to provide the borough with another stream of revenue, Church said. She said the borough is reliant on property taxes, a single-revenue policy any business person would agree is unstable. But the most important thing, she said, is to let the voters decide.

“The assembly voted to put it on the ballot. That’s what (the people) asked us to do,” Church said.

The sales tax “will go down in flames,” Arvin said, but it will serve as a catalyst to get out the vote. He said it is just one more example of how out-of-touch the assembly is with the people.

This is the same disconnect, Arvin said, at work with the new gravel ordinance. What applies in the core area does not apply in Talkeetna, he said, and regulations in the borough put an undue burden on industry trying to start up in the Valley.

“It’s absolutely easy to develop in an environmentally sound manner,” Arvin said. But with the new regulations, “it’s becoming uneconomic. If it doesn’t pencil, it doesn’t happen.”

Church agreed natural resource development is essential to the borough, but it must be done correctly. The assembly has no power to enforce existing state and federal regulations, and the borough is actively looking into real situations where the regulations were abused.

“Regulation is not to restrict, but to give guidelines,” Church said.

District 6

Robert Wells is the incumbent in District 6 seat — representing Hatcher Pass, Wasilla Fishhook and Memory Lake — running against challengers Jim Turner and Jim Colver.

Wells has lived in the Valley since the 1970s and has 18 years of continuous experience on the assembly and school board. He said he tends to vote for less restrictions on businesses and is fairly conservative on spending, but he is more liberal with funding to education.

Colver is a small business owner and the current president of the school board. He wants to focus on a traffic solution for downtown Palmer that actually works, and he said the borough needs to do a better job of listening to the cities.

Turner is a 49-year resident of the borough. He is a small-business owner with experience at all levels of the borough government. He said he will serve true to his positions and act as the “people’s troubleshooter,” telling them where to go to get things done.

As far as a sales tax, all three agreed it is a bad idea.

Sales taxes are inherently regressive, Wells said. Lower income earners will have to spend a higher percentage of the income on the tax.

“People on fixed and lower incomes will be penalized,” Wells said.

Once started down the sales tax road, the rate will only go up, Colver said. He said large corporations will benefit much more than the average homeowner.

“It will be a transfer of wealth from consumers to businesses,” Colver said.

Turner said that while 30 percent of property owners live outside the borough, only 5 percent of the sales at his store come from out-of-towers.

“There will be an immediate increase in the taxes the residents of the borough will pay,” Turner said.

The key to the regulation of natural resource development is minimal and stable, Turner said. Regulating by way of conditional-use permits is arbitrary, he said, and he regrets supporting the tower ordinance.

“That ordinance has been used to put down every tower over 100 feet,” Turner said.

Colver said the borough should not impose a gravel ordinance on the cities without the approval of the cities. But, as far as zoning, some usage regulations are necessary, he said.

Wells said there is a natural place for things to occur, citing the Springer Loop farm system as a success of zoning. However, he feels Alaskans are suffering from an entitlement mentality. On the day the Permanent Fund Dividend was announced, “We need to remind ourselves that this is a pay-out from our natural resource development,” Wells said.

District 7

Doyle Holmes and Vern Halter are squaring off to win the seat from District 7, the area from Meadow Lakes north. Tom Kluberton, assemblyman for the district, chose not to run for his seat.

Halter did not attend the forum.

Holmes served on the assembly for 10 years and said he wants to return the borough government back to one of service instead of regulations. He said he likes the one-acre lot sizes and setbacks, “but when you can’t cut brush within 10 feet of the water, something is wrong.”

The sales tax is a bad idea, Holmes said, will only increase the size of government and lead to higher taxes.

“The assembly will say we need more. The property tax will go up,” Holmes said.

Contact Todd L. Disher at todd.disher@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.

Editor’s note: For more information about the candidates for the Mat-Su Borough assembly, please visit the Frontiersman Web site at http://www.frontiersman.com/articles/2009/08/13/local_news/doc4a84cd2842213551402895.txt.