Unofficial results from Soldotna’s special election show residents voting down the home rule charter commission February 3.
Many city council members stated they did not expect a large turnout for the vote and just over 450 showing up; 298 voted no and 170 voted yes, reaching 63.68 percent to 36.32 percent.
Mayor Nels Anderson spoke with us previously about tax decisions before the city, something Soldotna could have worked on autonomously if home ruled.
Anderson: “We’ve looked at it and Soldotna for example has the lowest property taxes in the borough by a long way, we’re down to a half a mil. Could we have eliminated it completely and done ok the answer is yes. We chose not to, we chose to keep it at a very low level because we didn’t know what was going to happen in the future. Now our best estimates are if the food tax removal goes through we will have to quadruple property taxes in Soldotna to make back the revenue.”
Had the seven charter commission been formed they would have had two opportunities to present the home rule question to voters.
The city will still count absentee votes.
For the city’s election results site click here.
