City of Kodiak

At last Friday’s meeting of the Historic Preservation Commission, the group took up one item: the Kodiak Agricultural Experiment Station Barn, or more popularly known as, the Barn. The Barn, first built in 1922 by the federal government as part of a plan to assess the agricultural potential in Alaska, sits next door to the city library. It was entered …

The Borough Assembly has approved $10.5 million for the Kodiak Island Borough School District for the next school year. This is about half a million less than what the school district had requested, but nearly $1 million more than they received last year. Some Assembly members, such as Duane Dvorak supported funding to the school district’s $11 million request due …

This week, the City of Kodiak and Kodiak Island Borough will be taking the final steps toward streamlining coordination and hopefully reducing costs for running the two largest municipal bodies on the island. It will be called the Cooperative Relations Committee, comprised of three members of the City Council and three members of the Borough Assembly. While the committee will …

City employees may not see a cost of living increase this coming year as the city considered that and other measures to create a balanced budget at last week’s City Council budget discussion work session. If the budget was maintained, the city of Kodiak would be looking at a budget deficit of $3 million. To bridge that budget gap, the …

The Baranof Park public recreation facility- known to locals as the hockey rink- has seen a lot of love in its 20-year history, playing host to sports of all kinds and notably host to Kodiak’s thriving youth hockey league. But as the facility shows its age, some members in the community see the opportunity to build on its foundation- enclosing …

The City of Kodiak is in talks with Kodiak Electric Association to add electric vehicle charging stations downtown for Kodiak electric vehicle owners. These charging stations are part of the city’s new focus on electric vehicles, including replacing its motor fleet with electric vehicles. At last weekend’s planning session, the City Council discussed purchasing up to three electric vehicles to …

The City of Kodiak took another step toward the possible annexation of neighboring service areas last week when the City Council authorized a contract with UAA’s Institute of Social and Economic Research, or ISER, to examine the impact of annexation. Will annexation have a positive, negative, or even a neutral fiscal effect on these areas and the city? What changes …

The City of Kodiak may have found a little more federal money to help fund its recreation programs and fire and EMT departments. But there are some strings attached. The DCIP was enacted to support communities with military installations, but the question remains: is Air Station Kodiak a military installation? The federal program is called The Defense Community Infrastructure Pilot …

In 2019, the City of Kodiak signed the Alaska Remote Sellers Sales Tax Commission agreement with 14 other local Alaska governments to help collect sales tax from online sales. One year later, more municipalities have signed on, and it looks like the work of the Commission is paying off for the state and the City of Kodiak. From March to …

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include a new case of COVID-19 reported on Monday, Oct. 26. Kodiak’s COVID-19 count blew past the 100-case milestone on Friday. Even so, compared to the rest of the state, the number of positive tests for the virus remains relatively low in the Kodiak region. The Kodiak Strong movement, with its homemade …