Wasilla upset by borough's lack of communication

WASILLA -- The Wasilla City Council voiced concerns Monday about the manner in which the Mat-Su Borough Assembly's proposed 1-percent sales tax ordinance has been handled.

"We have some concerns that [the borough assembly] did not discuss this with us," said Wasilla mayor Dianne Keller. "I personally have some concerns with how fast they will implement this."

Keller and other council members were alarmed that Mat-Su Borough mayor Tim Anderson did not include the city in a discussion on the proposal before the introduction of the ordinance that would allow the tax to be voted on. The assembly recently decided to hold a public hearing on June 29 on whether or not the tax should be put forth to voters.

In a letter to Anderson and the assembly, the council questioned the lack of communication between the two bodies.

"Since sales tax revenue is the majority of revenue collected by the cities (for the City of Wasilla 70 percent), we would have expected to be informed of such a proposal before it was brought before you, for in year's past all cities within the Mat-Su Borough have been contacted in advance of such a proposal," read the letter.

The letter addressed concerns about the borough taking over the collection of sales tax on Jan. 1, 2005. If the sales tax is approved by voters during the October election, the borough would have three months to prepare a collection process.

"If they can't figure out how to catch our dogs and cats, and can't keep up with their records, I sure don't want them touching money that our residents and people who come here to shop pay," said Council Member Diane Straub, speaking to the issue of the borough not being able to tell Wasilla how many animals they captured within city property, before Houston took over Wasilla animal control. "Keeping track of dogs and cats is not that difficult, let's let Houston collect the sales tax," Straub said.

Council Member Noel Lowe had concerns about the exemptions, or lack thereof, in the proposal.

"There's issues in this that I'm not going to support in the ballot box, and I'm not going to support it from my position on the council," Lowe said.

Though the council agreed unanimously to send the letter to the borough, Wasilla resident Steve Stoll questioned whether the council's reaction was appropriate.

"It's not surprising that the borough didn't come to us to ask our opinion, we haven't exactly been supportive of a borough tax in the past," said Stoll at Monday's meeting. "Wasilla is bathing in the ride of the grocery tax and to not let the borough residents enjoy that seems rather selfish."

Lowe disagreed with Stoll's comments.

"I don't think that the fact the city has not supported the borough tax ordinances in the past removes any need to communicate with the cities in the borough that will be effected by this," Lowe said.

At Tuesday night's assembly meeting, Anderson said that he and borough manager John Duffy plan to meet with officials from Houston, Wasilla and Palmer to discuss the purposed sales tax.

Contact Jen Ransom at jen.ransom@frontiersman.com.