City of Wasilla celebrates being debt-free

WASILLA — The city of Wasilla is now officially debt-free. Wasilla Mayor Glenda Ledford and other city officials gathered at Wasilla City Hall to celebrate the occasion with an official ceremony.

“There’s a lot of good things going on in Wasilla because we’re open for business, bring it,” Ledford said.

Now that the city is debt-free, future projects can be paid for without worrying about interest rates.

“Whenever the project is done, it’s paid for,” Ledford said. “As the needs arise, then we will go forward.”

Former Wasilla Mayor and Bert Cottle said this will help grow Wasilla’s already thriving business development sector.

“They’re going to be attractive for more businesses coming. You’ve already got more that are going to be open next summer. Maybe at some point down the road, people will come in for annexation for cheap future development because we’re the cheapest place in the Borough to live,” Cottle said. “Economic development, in doing what we said we would do when we went to the public on forwarding funding and all our capital projects is how we got here.”

Ledford said being debt-free is a major achievement for the city, and it took a lot of people working together to make it happen.

“It was definitely a team effort,” Wasilla Mayor Glenda Ledford said.

Mat-Su Borough District 4 assembly member Rob Yundt credited the past and current administrations’ financial discipline for getting the city of Wasilla to its debt-free status.

“Just friendly Mat-Su Borough residents trying to be fiscally responsible. Bert is amazing. Miss Glenda, she’s amazing. I hope she’s our mayor for the next five years here in the city. She’s awesome, very motivated. She doesn’t miss a meeting. She’s everywhere. You can’t put a price tag on that… Glenda and Bert are probably the two most involved local representatives,” Yundt said.

For more information about the city of Wasilla, visit cityofwasilla.com.

Contact Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman reporter Jacob Mann at jacob.mann@frontiersman.com