Skagway’s assembly meets on Thursday night about budgets, taxes, and rockslides. KHNS’ Mike Swasey spoke with Mayor Andrew Cremata for this preview of the meeting.
Swasey – Let’s jump in immediately to the budget. This is going to be the third and final reading of the budget, most likely. One of the major discussion points has been about a (sales) tax increase. It would have to get approved by the Assembly and then sent to voters. If they approve it, what could this tax increase be used for?
Cremata – Well, that’s one of the potential issues with this particular ordinance, it’s not very clear. Sales tax revenue goes into the General Fund. So, there’s a lot of ways that the money could be used, an increase in the school budget, to help pay for the considerable expenses of the clinic, (or) a number of other things. It’s a 1% increase, that could represent up to maybe $1 million to $1.5 million in additional revenue into the General Fund.
Swasey – And this, to be clear, is a sales tax increase for the second and third quarters, basically, during the summer months, that would not be applicable during the winter months.
Cremata – It’s very similar to what Ketchikan just did with their sales tax increase.
Swasey – Moving on to the mountainside and the continual rock fall, there’s a Memorandum of Agreement with White Pass (and Yukon Route) on the agenda. I assume that’s a little bit more formal than a Memorandum of Understanding?
Cremata – Yes. So we wanted to have early access to the docks, there’s a lot of work that’s gone into this scaling project. We want to make sure it continues (and) we want to make sure that everybody’s safe. Most importantly, we want to meet Federal Highway Standards in regard to rockfall so that we can shuttle passengers from the railroad aft position on buses, and know that it’s going to be, you know, as close to 100% safe as possible.
Swasey – Does this mean if the dock gets damaged that the municipality is going to be on the hook for a percentage of repairs?
Cremata – That’s a complicated answer because while the municipality may be on the hook for helping to pay for damage to the dock, the payment would come out of a fund, where it could potentially be paid for through the CPV money or through passenger head fees that could increase on the dock. So it’s not going to be money that’s going to come out of taxpayers’ pockets.
Swasey – Okay. And let’s stay on the rockslide (topic), the municipality is looking for what’s called a BRIC grant to help pay for some of the mitigation. Is this for the project that’s underway now? Or is this for the major project that has to be done here in the next few years regarding what was formerly called the Deathrock of Doom now being called Ship Rock?
Cremata – Yes, so the BRIC grant would free up a lot of money from the government in the form of a grant that could be used for the larger project to completely mitigate the larger rock that is being called Ship Rock. That is a more expensive project. It’s a more detailed project, and whether or not the grant comes through, it’s something that the municipality is going to have to address.
Swasey – With this resolution, it’s calling for 30% matching funds from the municipality. 30% of what?
Cremata – Well, so, of the overall cost of the project. When there are certain amounts of matching funds it makes it more likely that you’re going to get the grant. If the municipality is going to pay 30%, it’s going to be the users that are going to pay for that. So I could see an increase in passenger head fees paying for it, perhaps CPV funds, whatever it might be.
Swasey – Skagway Mayor Andrew Cremata, thanks for joining us today.
Cremata – Hey, my pleasure. I’m gonna get out there and enjoy this beautiful weather.
The Skagway Borough Assembly meeting can be streamed live on khns.org at 7 pm Thursday night.
