Unalaska, AK – Yesterday evening, city council met to discuss a number of bond and taxation issues, and it held an extended discussion over a rock tax.

Mayor Shirley Marquardt opened the meeting with a remembrance of Senator Ted Stevens, who died on Monday in a plane crash.

"Of course everybody in Alaska knows by now that we lost Sen. Ted Stevens in that plane crash just outside Dillingham," says Marquardt. "In the truest sense of the word, Alaska lost a family member, and it's just a really sad thing personally to a lot of people."

The council then returned to the issue of authorizing the issuance and
sale of electric utility revenue bonds that would help finance improvements to the city's electrical infrastructure, and it also considered an ordinance that would amend PCR's new schedule of fees and charges. Both ordinances passed unanimously and without comment.

Council also adopted a resolution on its consent agenda that would request payment in lieu of taxes funding from the Alaska Department of Commerce without comment.

One ordinance was introduced during the new business portion of the meeting: the council is considering an amendment that would delete an exemption for out of town sales and modify definitions of certain types of sales. The amendment aims to make the city's taxation code clearer and to diminish a potential loophole for out-of-town construction outfits, explains City Manager Chris Hladick.

"In the past we've had some disputes by engineering firms or construction firms who say they have offices in another town therefore they shouldn't be taxed," says Hladick. "And this clears that up."

There was also extended debate on how this ordinance would treat taxation on the city's rock. Discussion centered around the point in the process the rock should be taxed. This ordinance might push the tax to the beginning of the process. City attorney Brooks Chandler described it as a "raw rock tax."

The meeting ended with an executive session regarding the Department of Justice and a preferential use agreement.