Vice Mayor Privett resigns from Assembly

With the stroke of a pen and a handwritten letter addressed to Mayor David Jack and members of the Borough Assembly, longtime member and Vice Mayor Bill Privett resigned his position with the quorum at their April 9 meeting.

“Please consider this my formal letter of resignation, effective immediately,” Vice Mayor Privett wrote. “My grandson has applied for employment with Castle Mountain Entertainment and cannot be hired because of my Assembly position. Maybe again in the future I will be able to serve the people of the City and Borough of Wrangell.”

After reading the resignation into the record, Assembly member James Stough commented on Privett’s years of service to the city.

“I want to thank Bill for his time and service to the community,” Stough said.

Privett served from 1982-89, and 1997-99 as mayor of the City of Wrangell, dating back to years before its incorporation as a Borough. He also served as a member of the former City Council at various times between 1978-2008.

Librarian Kay Jabusch also honored Cathy Schmidt, the president of the Friend of the Irene Ingle Library, during the meeting for her 32 years of service to the group.

Borough Manager Tim Rooney’s bi-weekly report to the Assembly informed them of a lateral transfer from within the Borough’s ranks to lead the parks and recreation department.

“Ms. Amber Al-Haddad has been selected to replace Mr. Kim Covalt as the City and Borough of Wrangell's Parks and Recreation Director,” Rooney wrote. “Ms. Al-Haddad has worked for the City and Borough of Wrangell for the last two years in a non-permanent position as the Borough's Project Manager and brings a significant skill set to this position.

According to Rooney, Al-Haddad’s grant writing abilities, and facility and project oversight, along with a “strong and sound decision making process, and unwillingness to accept the status quo will be an asset to both the parks and recreation department and the City and Borough of Wrangell.”

Covalt is officially set to retire on April 30.

Rooney also informed the Assembly of continuing work at Heritage Harbor – and a diversion of funds to be used for a planned Mariner’s Memorial.

“A contract in the amount of $14,900 was executed between the Borough and Ketchikan Ready Mix for the installation of signs for Heritage Harbor,” Rooney stated. “The work is expected to be completed by May 2013. The State of Alaska, DCCED, has granted the Borough a grant extension on the Heritage Harbor Uplands Phase III project. Under such grant provisions, the Borough will not pursue the design work with PND Engineers for the second boat ramp design and will instead redirect the balance of grant funds to the Mariner's Memorial, which is located at Heritage Harbor.”

The electric line extension to Ishiyama Drive, also known as Spur Road, is scheduled for completion this week and was also a topic mentioned in Rooney’s report.

“The Spur Road line extension is on schedule and should be completed by the target date of April 10, 2013,” Rooney added. “All of the poles have been installed, the anchors are secured, and the line crew is in the process of stringing the wire. There were some unique challenges presented through the pole setting process as several poles had to be put in solid bedrock but installation of the poles was completed at least two days ahead of the original estimate. Once the project is completed, arrangements can be made to provide secondary service to Ketchikan Ready Mix so they can begin the coming construction season with electric power.”

During persons to be heard, Randy Oliver of Oliver Construction challenged Rooney and city departments over what he termed as the Borough’s cancellation of a contract he has claimed is in effect regarding the cleanup of the landfill in the Borough.

“I think there needs to be a discussion about what has happened here with me and the company trying to clean up Wrangell,” Oliver said. “We could not get the (city) to admit that we have a contract but yet they terminated my contract as of April 22, so there have been some problems that have gone on there. We have spent the last four years trying to clean this town up and ridded it from junk cars, scrap iron and anything that anyone wanted to get rid of. In the process we have dumped hundreds of thousands of dollars back into the community in contractors wages, consumables, fuel, freight and everything else. But, every time I turn around I have the director of Public Works and Capital Projects slapping us down. We’ve done all of this at no cost to the city whatsoever; we have done it on our own to make this happen. It’s offensive the way we have been treated by the city manager and Director of Public Works … all I have wanted was for them to acknowledge we have a contract so that we can put an end to the theft going on at the landfill.”

According to Oliver, theft of materials from the landfill has been ongoing and cannot be investigated by the Wrangell Police Department without a valid contract between his company and the city. The Assembly took no immediate action on Oliver’s complaints.

The Assembly unanimously approved the interim membership of a newly formed energy committee to study the relationship between the City and Borough of Wrangell and Southeast Alaska Power Authority prior to a December 2014 review date. Mayor David Jack appointed member Pam McCloskey as the chair of the group, along with member Stough as representatives from the Assembly. Rooney recommended Borough staff members Clay Hammer and Ron Paul to be on the committee as well, with Thomas Bay Power Authority Commission member Dave Galla and SEAPA board member Brian Ashton rounding out the current membership. A seat open to a member of the public is still open.

In other energy issues the Assembly unanimously approved TBPA’s fiscal year 2014 budget in the amount of $1,803,093.

The next meeting of the Assembly is scheduled for April 23 at 7 p.m. at City Hall.