Mayoral hopefuls square off

WASILLA — With less than three weeks remaining before the Oct. 4 municipal elections, the gloves came off Thursday at a candidate forum for Wasilla mayoral hopefuls.

Saying she’s “had enough of the Boss Hogg style of leadership” at city hall, councilwoman Taffina Katkus targeted Mayor Verne Rupright’s administration while responding to questions at Wasilla Area Seniors Inc. Both Katkus and councilwoman Dianne Woodruff got in a few political jabs while addressing the lunchtime crowd at the senior center. They were joined by perennial candidate Michael Carson.

Rupright, who is seeking a second term as the city’s chief administrator, declined to attend over concerns about whether the forum met Alaska Public Officials Commission (APOC) guidelines.

“I will not be participating in today’s forum for the following reasons,” Rupright says in a letter to Wasilla seniors. Those reasons include checking with APOC and feeling “this forum is a violation of APOC rules.”

He said he also was concerned that there were no rules or guidelines provided to him or his campaign about how the forum would be conducted, that a similar event scheduled at Primrose Retirement Community was stopped for the same reason and that there are four more forums he will be attending before the election.

Mike Chmielewski, a WASI board member who also served as forum moderator, responded that the organization checked with APOC and was confident everything was above board.

“I’m not going to engage in a discussion here whether the mayor’s view of this is correct or not,” he said. “I’m just saying that we were very careful to place a call to APOC and describe what we’re about. We were assured that was an OK thing to do.”

Over about an hour, Katkus, Woodruff and Carson answered a handful of questions, some of which came from WASI members and others from supporters of their various campaigns.

Support for WASI?

Darlene Langill, a WASI board member, wanted to know what the candidates would do to support WASI in the future in regards to funding its meals program.

“As many of you know, WASI came to the council for funding but was not willing to provide information that would support the need for funding for the meals program,” Woodruff said. “It’s a tough spot to be in, because nobody wants a senior in this community or any other to go hungry. What we found was the money wasn’t needed for the meals program, it was needed for another issue. The voters who live in the city have a right to know where their money is going and why.”

Katkus said she supports WASI and that there are other seniors in the community who aren’t WASI members who also deserve consideration.

“One way to respect our seniors is to be very consistent with the public,” she said. “I’ve been on the city council when that was brought before us and I was consistent. We do not have a process for grants. What’s important is respect for the people.”

What about

those grants?

A question following up those responses asked the councilwomen if they support setting up a system in the city to handle granting funds to local nonprofits.

For her part, Katkus didn’t address the question directly, saying she wants to know what the community thinks are priorities.

“A mayor sets the pace for the direction of the city, and one way they do that is getting the community involved in finding out what the needs are,” she said. “It should be a priority to know what those needs are.”

Woodruff said she doesn’t favor the city becoming a granting agency for a couple of reasons.

“I don’t anticipate setting up another bureaucracy in the city of Wasilla just to do grants administration,” she said. “I see two problems with that. One is we already have organizations in the Valley that are very good at that. We have the Mat-Su Health Foundation and the United Way.”

She also has heard from a number of people unhappy with Matanuska Electric Association’s new Round-Up program that rounds up utility bills unless a customer asks it not be done.

“They are not excited about giving their money just to have it passed on to a charity that may not be of their choice,” she said. “I don’t want to do that with taxpayer funds.”

What’s up with

utility rates?

One gentleman referenced the city raising its water and sewer rates by 50 percent. “How’d you let that slide by and you didn’t catch it?” he asked, then drew laughs by quipping, “Y’all have fallen and bumped your heads or something.”

Carson fielded that one first.

“I haven’t been following that,” he said. “Years ago (when he was on the council previously) we started the sewer system and sewer service, and that was a money-loser and still is a money-loser.”

Katkus said the increase is to pay for deferred maintenance on the city’s water and sewer infrastructure, and placed the blame for that at Rupright’s feet.

“We have a lot of deferred maintenance and, in my opinion, it’s sloppy leadership to have not taken care of issues, and now those people are paying for it,” she said. “That’s under our current administration. I see a lot of this happening. One way to take care of that issue is to do economic development so we don’t have to raise taxes to pay for that deferred maintenance. I apologize, and I think it’s sloppy management.”

Woodruff said it’s an ongoing problem that’s coming to a head.

“This may help explain it,” she said. “The water and sewer system is an enterprise fund, like many others we have in the city. What that means is it needs to run like a private business, except that we want to have a zero on the bottom line. In fact, we’ve been losing money on the water and sewer system for a number of years and were down to a two-month reserve in the fund.”

She said the money to upgrade the system has to come from somewhere, and the city can’t expect a random happening to help it out like the city of Palmer did a couple of summers ago.

“Palmer got very lucky a couple years ago when there was stimulus money available when their water lines were geysering in the middle of their main street,” Woodruff said. “I don’t think Wasilla is going to be that lucky.”

How about expanding bus service and

handicapped access?

A pair of WASI members asked the candidates what they thought about supporting expansion of the MASCOT bus service and encouraging more handicapped access at local businesses.

“I hadn’t really thought too much about it, but if we’re going to expand the bus system, I think I’d get somebody who knows how to write grants onto the payroll and concentrate on getting grants,” Carson said.

Woodruff passed on an idea a resident gave her about encouraging Valley Mover, which provides bus service to and from Anchorage, to add a route to coincide with plane flights bringing North Slope workers back to Southcentral. She also said she encourages residents to contact her and point out problems.

“It’s a big deal when you’re a person with limited sight to find an 8-inch pothole … and you find it by stepping in it,” she said.

Katkus said her platform “has been helping families equals helping communities, and you have to have a way to get around.”

She also said the city could benefit from community councils that can identify and give suggestions about problem areas in the city.

“We’re at a time where we need to have community councils and add some organization to our town,” she said. “That way you have a voice.”

What about city employee turnover?

Referencing the city has had five police chiefs over the past three years, one campaign supporter asked what the candidates would do to stabilize city government and make it more accountable. Both Katkus and Woodruff zeroed in on Rupright in their responses.

“My experience in management is the first thing you do is look for qualified people,” Woodruff said. “They don’t have to be your friends, they don’t have to be your buddies. They have to be the best-qualified people. Then you hire those good people and you retain them. That means you treat them reasonably well, you give them the tools they need to do their jobs and you expect them to get those jobs done. That, really, I think has been lacking for some time. We’ve had some good people who have left, and that’s really a shame.”

Katkus said it is “inexcusable to have four, five police chiefs in three years. How are we going to fix that? It’s a process that’s called government that’s open, respectable and is run efficiently. The mayor sets the tone, direction and character of the city. … You need good leadership. That’s the biggest thing. No more good-old-boys policies.”

Carson approached the question methodically, saying he’s never been in a position to hire or fire a police chief. But he supports the one the city has now, Gene Belden.

“I can see the mayor would want to have somebody in there who would support him,” he said. “Apparently, the people in there did not do that. I would say, the police chief they have in there now has a long record of good service to the state troopers, and I think he’s probably exactly what we would want in police chief.”

Wasilla mayoral candidates will participate in more forums before the election, including the last Valley political forum prior to Oct. 4 at 5 p.m., which is Sept. 29 at the Alaska Club.

Contact Greg Johnson at greg.johnson@frontiersman.com or 352-2269.