The Kenai City Council is set to meet Wednesday evening at 6:00 p.m., and among the topics they will vote on will be whether or not to extend the city’s Emergency Disaster Declaration, originally issued due to the COVID-19 public health emergency.
The first declaration was issued on March 18 of last year, and has been extended with a current expiation date of January 31. City Manager Paul Ostrander issued a memo to the council, requesting an extension to the declaration until February 28 of this year. He noted that the extension would extend:
- Temporary leave to employees to address COVID-19 related illness, emergency closures of facilities, and transmission reduction.
- City Moratorium on penalty and interest for water and sewer accounts.
- City Moratorium on water and sewer disconnect for non-payment.
Ostrander discussed a previous extension of the disaster declaration back in September, saying that his intent is not to utilizing expanded powers without taking issues to the City Council first: “This does extend the executive powers that were granted to me back in March. It is a component of this, but since I believe April, I haven’t utilized that power. I don’t anticipate doing it because most of the thing we’re doing, although they’re continuing to work through COVID-related emergency issues, consistently we’ve been able to generally take to the council.”
The meeting will be held in-person at the council chambers, but will also be held online via the Zoom online platform. For those seeking to participate virtually, click here to do so online, or call : (253) 215-8782 to do so via telephone. Use Meeting ID: 880 4357 9001 and Passcode: 372771.