Council approves election officials, tennis court funding

PALMER — The Palmer City Council approved two resolutions and an action memorandum with the consent agenda at their regular meeting on Aug. 10. Action Memorandum 21-047 calls for the council to budget $25,000 in support the resurfacing of the Bill Hermann tennis courts complex on the corner of East Elmwood Street and South Gulkana Avenue in Palmer.

The project for resurfacing the tennis courts is being undertaken by both the Palmer Rotary and the Wasilla Sunrise Rotary clubs with an estimated pricetag of approximately $200,000. The Rotary clubs have already raised $22,000 with future donations from Matanuska Electric Association, the Mat-Su Health Foundation, the Mat-Su Borough and U.S. Tennis Association forecasted.

The consent agenda was passed with a unanimous vote. The council also approved Resolution 21-028 appointing election officials for the October 5 city of Palmer election. With no active city clerk, the ordinance called for council approval of election officials, rather than clerk approval. Both council members Steve Carrington and Julie Berberich are up for reelection and are joined by Pamela Melin and Lee Henrikson in running for the seats.

Community Development Director Brad Hanson has served as clerk in the interim while the city has yet to fill the position. City Manager John Moosey discussed holding interviews with the council of the qualified candidates in the coming weeks. Moosey also said in his manager’s report that asphalt pavement repairs had come in over the expected budget and would be pushed until next year.

“It’s not ideal but we think we can scamper through to get us to 2022. Maybe the markets a little better and prices go down. I know a lot of us are facing in business different materials being extremely expensive right now and there doesn’t’ seem to be a lot of hunger, so work is being accomplished, we’ll try to do this a little bit sooner next year and hopefully get a better deal,” said Moosey.

Moosey, Deputy Mayor Sabrena Combs and Councilman Brian Daniels all attended the Alaska Municipal League Conference in Fairbanks last weekend and reported briefly to the council.

“This was my first time going to the conference and meeting everybody in person. I was amazed at the scope of AMLl’s work and it was really fascinating to meet everybody from around the state and to see the similarities and some of the differences of Palmer versus different places around the state,” said Daniels.

Moosey met with the Manager’s Association while in Fairbanks and Combs was a featured presenter to the Conference of Young Alaskans, occurring in conjunction with the AML conference. Deputy Mayor Combs said that she would present resolutions crafted by COYA to the council for discussion at the next meeting.

“It was a lot of preparing for the November legislative meeting. I did attend the conference of mayors as well. We had an update from Senator Micciche. It was dismal,” said Deputy Mayor Combs. “Just a lot of things up in the air with the legislature as we all know so that was a little bit of gloom and doom that was held throughout the week to be honest because there’s just a lot of things up in the air on the state level.”