The Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly passed an amended version of Ordinance 2021-40, which would amend borough code regarding planning commission membership and apportionment. A previous ordinance substitute reduced the planning commission membership from 13 members to 11 members, but didn’t specify how city seats would be distributed. State statute requires that the planning commission membership be apportioned so that the number of the members from home rule and first-class cities reflects the proportion of borough population residing in home rule and first-class cities located in the borough.
The first amendment from Assembly Member Jesse Bjorkman unanimously passed. It would change the proposed amount of commissioners from 13 to 14 and preserve the city seats as proposed – 5 city seats for Kenai, Soldotna, Seward, Homer and Seldovia and assign seats for assembly district and for those people living outside of city limits within the 9 assembly districts.
Bjorkman said:
“What this amendment does is it provides for a better balance that more closely matches the state ordinance and how they seek to balance representation in state statute on the planning commission. Currently as proposed, a 13-member planning commission with 5 city seats would only result in 61 and ½% representation for people living outside of the city limits. When the state statute prescribes a goal of 4% more than that per people living outside of the city limits. My proposal, here, moves the representation much closer to what the prescribed level is in the state law to 64 and 1⁄3% and it designates seats on the planning commission for all areas of the borough.”
Additionally, an amendment from Assembly Member Tyson Cox unanimously passed, which would clarify the wording that says only a city resident may serve on a city seat and shall be selected by the mayor from a list of recommendations submitted by the council. Also, an amendment from Assembly Member Bill Elam barely passed, which added a new section addressing a vacancy or expiring term on the planning commission that will be put on notice for at least 30 days by the borough clerk’s office.
Another proposed amendment would have allowed for a person that sat on the city planning and zoning commission to apply, but a city council member or a city mayor would not be eligible. The proposed amendment by Elam did not pass.
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