Affordability. That was one of the priorities discussed between Sitka’s municipal and tribal governments when they met Wednesday night (4-29-26) for their semi-annual government to government dinner.
Yeidikook’áa Dionne Brady-Howard, chair of the Sitka Tribe of Alaska Tribal Council, said Sitka needs to prepare for the impact the increased cost of fuel, flights, and barges will have on Sitkans.
“We have so many things here in Sitka that really exacerbate the high cost of living,” she said. “Being situated where we are on the outside of the Inside Passage and previously not having a chain like Walmart or Costco that the other large Southeast communities have. So many things really just lead us to such a high cost of living.”
Brady-Howard said the Council wants to press legislators on federal poverty guidelines. She said the income guidelines — which impact an individual’s ability to qualify for many social service programs — don’t take into account the high cost of living for Sitkans.
Council Secretary Martha Moses said there are about 1,500 tribal citizens living in Sitka. One of the concerns they’re trying to address is outmigration due to affordability.
“We are trying to look at what we can do to bring the tribal families home, because they all want culture and language,” she said. “How can we bring them back? Mostly, they want to subsist. They want to get back into their cultures.”
Moses said they’re also working to address food sovereignty in Sitka. She said the tribe has increased donations to the Blessings in a Backpack program, which provides food on the weekends for school-aged children who might otherwise go hungry. They’re also working to increase their fish distribution program, and are in the process of building a garden at the end of Andrew Hope Street.
Another measure to help with food sovereignty, according to Council Member Lillian Feldpausch, is to see ownership of the old city float plane dock near the tribe’s resource protection department be transferred to the tribe.
“It’ll make it a lot easier to haul the volume of the herring eggs and the salmon,” she said. “It would make it so much easier to be helping with our food sovereignty to have that dock.”
Mayor Steven Eisenbeisz said he’s still in favor of that update.
“That’s been floated around for a while,” he said. “It’s always been my intent to make that happen, and nothing has changed on my position with that.”
The tribal council and assembly also discussed bringing electric buses to Sitka, housing, and funding education to the cap at their dinner. The next meeting will take place this fall.
