Candidates running for mayor or a seat on the Sitka Assembly joined Raven Radio and the Daily Sitka Sentinel Tuesday night (9-15-26) to answer community members’ questions ahead of the municipal election this October.
In back-to-back, hour-long forums, assembly and mayoral candidates laid out their stances on everything from diversifying Sitka’s economy to cell towers and tourism growth.
Outmigration in the region is a rising concern. Sitka has lost nearly a thousand people in the past decade — mostly children and working age residents.
Thor Christianson, a long-time assembly member making his second bid for the mayor’s chair, said to address the demographic shift, the city needs to work to develop land for affordable housing, continue to look for ways to fund childcare facilities, and support economic development. He said there are also some “big ticket items” he’s been looking into recently.
“The [U.S.] Coast Guard’s going to have to put those 11 new icebreakers they just are getting someplace, and they’re going to need to be on the West Coast up north,” Christianson said. “So there’s a decent chance if we work at it, we might be able to get one of them. Also, the [U.S.] Navy is looking at a large repair facility they want to have in Alaska at a deep water port. That’s something that maybe we could work on here. I don’t know if that would come to fruition, but we’ve got to work on everything and anything.”
Lisa Lane, a first-time candidate for public office, said she’d bring a “new and different voice” to the table. When asked what she would do as Sitka’s mayor to streamline government processes to make decisions faster, she said sometimes decisions take time.
“Sometimes you can’t make fast decisions,” she said. “You have to look at the long game. It’s like playing chess. If [you’re] rash or make a decision too quickly, you might be making something that’s gonna make a ripple that turns into a tsunami. I think everything needs to be researched and planned, even though sometimes that’s painful. Most people aren’t very patient. But a long, deep breath through your nose and a glass of water helps.”
Mayoral candidates were also asked what role the city government should play in preparing for upcoming changes to the federal food assistance program (SNAP), access to health insurance and Medicaid, and rising heating fuel costs that could impact Sitkans. Longtime assembly member and mayoral candidate Kevin Mosher said that he’s no stranger to financial struggles, and while the city can’t directly influence many of those state and federal programs, it can point people towards resources.
“We can make sure our utility subsidization fund is fully funded, and people know about it. We can direct people to outside help,” he said. “And I know it seems counterintuitive to work on childcare with the tax, but the housing and childcare go hand-in-hand, and it’s a long-term solution that can, in the end, help with the cost of living. And those are the kind of things we need to work on. So we need to really dig our heads in and really work hard on these things to try to help people.”
Local business owner Sherri Blankenship narrowly lost her bid for a seat on the assembly last year, and has thrown her hat in the ring a second time. When asked whether she supports a seasonal sales tax increase to fund childcare solutions, she said as a parent to four children, the issue is dear to her heart. She said while she doesn’t yet know where she stands on a tax increase, the issue is “multi-faceted” and the business community should be part of the solution.
“Childcare is workforce development, and it is essential to retaining employees and in retaining our population,” Blankenship said. “I think that we should aggressively pursue a private funding model, and also take our largest employers in town, such as SEARHC, bring them to the table and ask them to participate in these talks, and help the community out, and then aggressively go after federal and state funding as well, and see where our shortfall falls.”
Candidates were also asked if a Memorandum of Understanding between the city and cruise dock company that establishes guidelines for cruise ships is working. Incumbent assembly candidate JJ Carlson said the agreement should be reviewed and more stakeholders need to be brought into the fold.
“The MOU is an MOU. It’s a Memorandum of Understanding. It’s not binding. It’s not a contract. It’s a handshake,” she said. “But to really have it be more impactful, we need to get more people at the table. Currently, the MOU is between the City and Borough of Sitka and the Sitka Dock Company. Adding in the schedulers and the larger international organization for the cruise industry will make it even stronger. We’ve learned from it, and we’re seeing that it’s a bigger picture that we need to move towards.”
Darrell Windsor has served on Sitka’s Planning Commission for 15 years and this is his first bid for an assembly seat. He said 100% of any future housing developed on city land should be affordable.
“Affordable for me is not affordable for you, or affordable for the CEO of SEARHC,” he said. “We were looking at these properties [at] our last Planning Commission meeting, and the big question was high density or low density? I mean, can we cram as many houses in these places as we can, or spread it out? I think in the [area behind the] high school, it should be about a 50-50 on that. Affordable housing? Yeah, [it] should all be affordable.”
The fourth candidate running for a seat on the assembly, Mary Ann Hall, did not attend the forum.
