The Haines Borough Administration building. (Emily Files)
For more than a year, the Haines Borough has been weighing the question of how to provide police service outside of the townsite. The assembly may include two possible solutions on the general election ballot for voters to consider this October.
Last year, the Alaska State Troopers withdrew its sole blue-shirt officer from the Chilkat Valley. That officer had patrolled outside of the Haines townsite.
Since then, the local government in Haines has been struggling to figure out how to provide police services outside the townsite.
At a meeting Tuesday, the Haines assembly introduced two ordinances that aim to help resolve this issue. The first ordinance would create a new service area providing on-call police assistance outside of the townsite for residents whose properties are on the road system.
The estimated $70,000 price tag for the expanded service would be funded through a mill rate of .72, for the properties included in the new service area.
Assemblyman Tom Morphet opposed the service area and putting more resources into policing in general.
“I think government can serve either as a lever to lift people up and give them a greater view of the world and their prospects in the world, or it can be used as a hammer to beat them down when they get out of line. And I think we’d show a lot more faith in the people of our town if we put a lot more effort towards programs that lift people up,” Morphet said.
A second ordinance introduced at the meeting would amend the town charter to make the Haines Borough Police Department an area-wide power. Assembly Member Stephanie Scott proposed the amendment.
As the charter is written now, police services are limited to the townsite. Scott believes that when the borough was created, the charter overlooked how law enforcement would operate outside the townsite.
At the meeting on Tuesday, Scott said many more people have moved to different areas around the borough since she first arrived in 1973, and police services need to adapt accordingly.
“The town has changed a lot since when we first came here. Mud Bay road was dirt. There was no electricity, there was no phone. And now Mud Bay is quite a tight community. There’s a lot of people out there. Same thing is happening out the highway. There are more people living out there. So I think that we have got to change our vision,” Scott said.
Borough Manager Debra Schnabel agreed with Scott and questioned what she sees as a tendency to divide the borough into separate collections of residents.
“As Stephanie has said, things change. When the world changes around you, it’s important to stop and examine and say, ‘Are we doing what’s best for us in the new situation?’ And that was why the staff put this forward as an opportunity for the assembly and the community to imagine another way of living,” Schnabel said.
Assembly member Brenda Josephson disagreed, saying the town charter’s language on police services reflect what was promised to residents when the borough and the city were consolidated in 2002.
“This was not overlooked. This was exactly what was promised to the people, and I certainly hope this is not put forward. I do not want this introduced,” Josepheson said.
A variety of opinions were expressed at the meeting during periods for public comment. Resident Paul Nelson believed that the government was forcing an issue without consulting its citizens.
“I believe if the people in those service areas want more police, they will address the borough and ask for more police,” Nelson said.
Resident Carol Tuynman also opposed more police services outside the townsite, saying that the borough should focus its efforts on social services rather than policing.
Other residents supported the ordinances. Margaret Friedenauer said that people outside the townsite need better access to police services.
“If I care for my fellow citizens inside the townsite, I care for them just as much outside the townsite. And you want public outcry. Public outcry are the 911 calls reporting child abuse or domestic violence or suicide. That’s your public outcry,” Friedenauer said.
Both ordinances have been proposed for the general election ballot. They will go through public hearings on August 7th and August 21st. If the ballot propositions are adopted, the ordinances will be considered by voters during the general election on October 2nd.
