Council candidates discuss ethics, need for new library at forum

WASILLA — Open and honest government and the fates of the city owned Meta Rose shopping center and overburdened library took center stage at a forum for candidates running for Wasilla City Council conducted at the Wasilla Alaska Club Thursday.

Two council seats are on the October city of Wasilla ballot. Councilwoman Leone Harris, a real estate agent and wife of Mat-Su Borough Assemblyman Mark Ewing, was elected to Seat C in 2008 and is seeking a second term. David Nyberg, who owns All I Saw Cookware with his wife, is running against Harris.

Colleen Sullivan-Leonard is running to retain Seat D. Leonard runs a legal and legislative consulting company and has previously served on the council but stepped down to take a state job several years ago. She was elected to the council again last year when councilwoman Nancy Hall stepped down to pursue a new occupation.

Sullivan-Leonard filled out the remaining year of Hall’s three-year term and is now seeking re-election for a full three-year term. Pat Brown, a retiree and avid volunteer who works part-time at the Wasilla Senior Center, is aiming to unseat Sullivan-Leonard.

Moderator Stu Graham led off with a question about ethics. Sullivan-Leonard has crafted an ethics law that she says is needed to clarify conflicts of interest, acceptable conduct by city officials and to ensure the city is governed openly. Her proposal includes a request that a Code of Ethics task force be formed to create a simple, useful ethics code that city officials could sign when elected.

Asked to explain her proposal, Sullivan-Leonard said the city had previously considered adopting a code of ethics but the proposed code was 29 pages long and cumbersome. She said she would like to see something shorter and easier to navigate.

“I want it to be something useful,” she said.

Brown concurs there’s a need for a city code of ethics.

“I believe it’s a document … whose time has come and is perhaps long overdue,” he said. “You are held to a higher standard in the public life because you represent, both by financial and by those votes, the people who put you in office.”

Brown said whatever code of ethics the city council adopts should also contain consequences for those who violate the code.

Harris, who supports the measure, said city council members considered adopting an ethics code a few years ago but “it became so entangled, with many, many words, that we never actually finished it.”

Nyberg also supports having an ethics code, but said he’d like to see it short and sweet.

“I think had it been in place a lot sooner, things might have been a little different,” he said. “All you need to do is have the facts — you can do this and you can’t do that.”

Asked if the city should have purchased Meta Rose Square, a mall in downtown Wasilla that houses Nyberg’s store and a handful of others that the city bought with the intent of moving the cramped library there, most candidates said they didn’t support the purchase.

Brown said while he thinks it was a good idea to turn the building into the library, but “there should have been some due diligence done beforehand.” He said he’d prefer the city leave the landlord business to the private sector.

Sullivan-Leonard said the city should not have purchased the building. “It didn’t sound like it fit at the time and it certainly doesn’t now.”

Harris, the lone candidate who was on the council at the time the decision to purchase Meta Rose was made, said the city rents other buildings — a fire station is rented to the Mat-Su Borough, the former train depot rented to the Wasilla Chamber of Commerce. She said the decision might yet benefit the city library.

“We bought it for the library and that went over like a dead balloon — or a lead balloon — and the city council decided that we would hang onto it until the market turns around and then sell it, and the proceeds could go to the library,” she said.

Nyberg said he might have a conflict of interest relating to the city’s purchase of the mall but he said he believes the city should not be in the rental business. He said the city’s purchase of the property has been a major concern for mall tenants.

“It was quite disheartening because we were not sure what was going to happen,” he said. “Even if the building is sold here in the future, that presents a problem for the tenants.”

Graham asked the candidates a related question: how to pay for a city library large enough to meet the demand of users, many of whom live outside the city?

Sullivan-Leonard said the city could ask voters to approve a sales tax increase with the revenue dedicated to construction of a new library, similar to how it paid for the multi-use sports complex. Failing that, she said, the city could seek state grants and other revenue sources.

Brown said he sees libraries as integral to the economy and culture of a community, though libraries also must be nimble enough to change with the needs of patrons. He said he believes the city, the Mat-Su Borough and the state should all work together to pay for a new library.

Harris agreed with the joint venture idea and advocated for asking the state for funding and using the sale of Meta Rose Square to pay capital costs. She said she doesn’t favor asking voters to approve a sales tax increase.

Nyberg said he too thinks the state and borough should be asked to help pay for a new library or perhaps donate land that would be suitable as a site. If more money was needed, perhaps asking the voters would be best, he said.

“Yes, we do need a bigger library. Friends of the (Wasilla) Library are trying their best to find a way to make that happen,” Nyberg said.

Hear more

Podcasts of this forum for Wasilla City Council candidates and past forums are available online at Country Legends’ website at countrylegends1009.com.

Next up

The Greater Wasilla Chamber of Commerce’s final candidate forum, this one for Wasilla mayoral candidates, is in the theater at the Alaska Club Wasilla at 5:30 p.m., Thursday.