Second recall application filed

MAT-SU -- At 8:30 Wednesday morning, the second in a promised string of recall applications was dropped off at the Mat-Su Borough Clerk's office.

The application was for the recall of assembly member Jim Colver, and the applicant for the recall petition is Cheryl Turner. Turner is the wife of Jim Turner, a former assembly member who lost the 2000 election to Colver by a margin of 329 votes.

Turner's recall application states identical justifications for Colver's recall as those listed in a petition for borough mayor Tim Anderson's recall. That earlier petition was recently issued by borough clerk Sandra Dillon after a review for legal sufficiency.

The reasons Turner set out in her application for a recall petition are misconduct in office, incompetence and failure to perform prescribed duties. Turner's application charges that Colver "violated the law when he, as a member of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough Assembly, went into executive session to consider matters that should have been made public and when the Assembly made decisions outside the public's view in violation of the Open Meetings Act."

It also stated Colver "withheld or allowed to be withheld from the public, an appraisal of Hatcher Pass Development, Inc.'s assets in violation of the Public Records Act."

But Colver said no decisions were made in the March 20 executive session to which the application refers, a claim he said is backed up by affidavits by Dillon and assembly member Kelly Lankford Ladere.

As for the charge that he withheld information, Colver said he never had it. "The first time I saw it was right at that meeting we had," Colver said, referring to the June 19 meeting at which the appraisal was released.

He added that he believes the action is politically motivated.

". . . to me, it appears to be very politically motivated, when it's my former opponent and his wife that are behind it," Colver said.

Turner said she filed the petition after being asked about it by area residents stopping by the Hatcher Pass Gateway Center.

"This is community-based, it's not from Citizens to Restore Open and Honest Government," Turner said. "Nobody who signed this petition are members of that organization, including myself. It's just Hatcher Pass residents. People are very upset -- they feel very disenfranchised with what's going on with Hatcher Pass."

Dillon said she plans to contact Birch, Horton, Bittner and Cherot attorney Tom Klinkner for a legal review of the application and hopes to release the petition within a week or more. Once the petition is released and picked up by the applicant, Dillon said, the 60-day deadline to collect signatures goes into effect.

The number of signatures required for Colver's recall to move forward to an election are based on the number of voters in the most recent election race in his district. Since 1,361 voters cast ballots in that race, petition collectors must collect just 340 signatures from registered District 6 voters within the 60-day period.

When the first application for recall came in, Dillon had hoped it would be ready to go to election in time to combine the election with the special election for borough redistricting -- if the 2,323 signatures for the mayoral recall petition are collected within the 60-day period.

Combining the two issues into one election would result in significant cost savings to the borough. Dillon said she generally estimates a cost of $30,000 to hold a special election. In fact, she said, she will be coming before the assembly at its next meeting to ask for $30,000 to hold a state law-mandated special election to ratify the borough-wide reapportionment plan.

Dillon said she doesn't have money budgeted for a second special election at this point.

"I don't have any monies that have been budgeted for something like this," Dillon said. "I would have to go back and ask the assembly for additional monies."

It all depends on timing, and it seems the timing won't allow for the two issues to be rolled into one election.

Dillon explained that the 60-day period for collecting signatures doesn't begin until the applicant picks up the petition.

Although the recall petition for Anderson's recall was released Oct. 10, the petition has yet to be picked up, Dillon said, since petition applicant Bill Moll was planning to leave on a 10-day vacation when he was given notice of its release and decided to wait until he returned to retrieve it.

Even if the ballots are returned 60 days from the time the petition is released, Dillon said the ballots will likely be printed by the time the petition signatures are returned.

Dillon guessed a special election for the two recalls could take place in February or March, but she said flexible time deadlines make it hard to pinpoint a date until petitions are returned.

"Because the variable is so wide there, I'm at a loss [to speculate]," Dillon said.

Turner said recall petitions for other assembly members will likely be coming in soon.