Palmer council okays new wheeled loader, golf carts, Zamboni for ice rink, repairs to water reservoir

Palmer’s city council ran through a routine business agenda at its Tuesday, May 23 meeting, approving a $341,369 expenditure for a new wheeled loader from Yukon Equipment, Inc. to replace an aged loader acquired in 1999.

The urgency of replacing the loader was amply demonstrated last winter in bad weather when the loader experienced problems and supply chain and other issues hampered getting it back into operation, city manager John Moosey told the council.

The city council also approved advancing $583,482 from the city’s water and sewer fund for repairs to a city water reservoir heavily damaged in last January’s windstorm. The repairs would replace insulation at the reservoir.

In a separate approval the council okayed $32,545 with HDL Engineering Consultants for construction administration on the reservoir insulation project.

HDL was also separately awarded $32,510 for construction management for the 2023 Evergreen Avenue and Airport Way pathway project.

Other expenditures approved included $25,000 for a down payment on a $25,000 down payment for an ice resurfacer from Zamboni Co., USA; $46,000 in a change order for Alaska Sure Seal Co. for yellow curb painting on city streets and $125,000 for the purchase of 50 used golf carts for Palmer’s golf course.

Moosey, the city manager, also said the city is working on an extension of water service to 40 new homes on Scott Road that are being developed by AMG Associates. The development is outside the city limits but Palmer has developed several water projects outside the city including Mat-Su College.

On an upbeat note, the council listened to a group of Palmer High School students on an education-related trip to Japan give a report by telephone on their experiences so far. The students spoke in halting Japanese followed by an English translation. The group is visiting Palmer’s sister city in northern Japan.

One other upbeat note was Mayor Steve Carrington’s report on the official opening and ribbon-cutting Tuesday of the community’s temporary public library in downtown Palmer.

“It was a pleasure to see children and young people reading and checking out books,” said Susan Paugher, a Palmer resident.

However, that seemed to prompt another round of comments critical of the library during the audience participation part of the meeting. Local residents Jackie Goforth and Cindy Hudgins appear regularly at council meetings to complain about age-inappropriate and explicit material in books in the library.

Goforth had made copies of sections of texts for the council. “Read these, and you’ll be disgusted. We have such a beautiful little city here in Palmer, and it’s a shame to have such filth in our library. You’ve got to do something about it,” she said.

Goforth wanted to hand the copies of the texts to council members but Mayor Carrington told her to give them to the city clerk instead.

But Susan Paugher, who considers herself a friend of the library, stepped up at that point to defend the library. She said she had looked for the books Goforth was talking about but couldn’t find them. Others said the books were there but the section for adults, not children.

“The library is a big part of our community and people support it. I knew of a $500 donation given to the library at the recent Friday Fling (a weekly community event), she told the council.

“I really enjoy my First Amendment (freedom of speech) rights and I don’t like the idea of other people telling us what I shouldn’t read,” Paugher said.