Alaska News

Mayor of quirky Whittier faces recall from his neighbors

In the city of Whittier, 75 miles outside but a world away from Alaska's largest city, controversy is in the air for its 220 residents. Whittier's longtime mayor, Lester Lunceford, faces a recall vote July 23 over accusations of misconduct.

That's prompted the city ethics committee -- yes, even Whittier has such a thing -- to work on a response to the claims. Those findings are expected to be made public at the city council's meeting at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

Residents of this town along Prince William Sound can't really escape the political dust-up. For starters, with the city's small population, only 31 signatures were required for a citizen petition to force a recall vote for Lunceford. Organizers quickly gathered 56, not too difficult since the vast majority of Whittier residents live in a 1950s-era apartment building, the Begich Towers.

The brouhaha seems to have originated with the replacement earlier this year of Whittier's city manager, Robert Prunella, and the appointment of his successor, Tom Bolen. Criticism has centered on Lunceford's alleged illegal use of special executive meetings, held at his discretion in addition to Whittier's monthly council meetings, to make the personnel changes.

Peter Denmark, one of the organizers of the recall petition and a kayaking business operator, said the "first hint of what we perceive to be stinky business" began in February.

After a motion to replace Prunella was defeated at a regular council meeting, no less than six special executive meetings were called between January and March. At one of these meetings, Prunella's dismissal was allegedly forced through. Alaska state law prohibits a municipal special meeting from discussing personnel matters.

This, Denmark argued, resulted in a meeting being held with "erroneous specificity," and essentially amounted to an "illegal meeting." Denmark believed that the closed meetings took place in order to work around the schedules of individuals who were out of town and would otherwise have continued to block Prunella's dismissal.

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An ethics complaint surrounding this process formed the basis for the recall petition.

Denmark thought the mayor's motivations for wanting to remove Prunella were unclear, but added that Lunceford had previously said "the city manager is not communicating well with me."

Bolen, who was in Washington D.C. when contacted Wednesday, was disparaging of the justification for recalling the mayor.

He said he was aware of "a group of citizens who are unhappy," but responded that "one of the complaints speaks to how the mayor allowed the council to enter into what is alleged to be an illegal executive session."

"It seems to me this happens multiple times every month across the state of Alaska," said Bolen, adding that Lunceford's alleged ethics' violations can hence hardly be seen as "particularly egregious."

The current city manager also said it would be inappropriate to comment on the findings of the ethics committee before they were presented at the public meeting next Tuesday, and added that he had "no idea" whether the recall vote would pass on July 23.

Lunceford is also in the nation's capital with Bolen. Former Alaska Dispatch reporter Amanda Coyne reported on her blog that about $8 million of untapped federal grants to Whittier could be on the verge of expiring. Asked whether working to safeguard Whittier's federal funding options was the reason for the pair's visit, an employee at the Whittier city office replied, "I believe so."

The July 23 recall vote is not the first time in recent past that Lunceford has become embroiled in controversy.

As the Turnagain Times reported in 2009, a Whittier council meeting clashed over construction plans by the Alaska railroad that potentially threatened Whittier Manor, the city's only residential complex of note besides Begich Towers.

Lunceford found himself accused of a conflict of interest because he was employed at the time by the Alaska Railroad Corp. as a dock manager, and still is according to ARC's website.

The Whittier mystique

With its small size, isolated location, and quirky living arrangement, Whittier has over time managed to gain an out-sized share of attention.

Besides the 14-story Begich Towers and its mix of residences, city offices, police department and even a post office, Whittier's also home to the Buckner Building -- a vast, abandoned, government building originally constructed as a military base during the Second World War. Aside from that, there are a few smaller structures, like the Anchor Inn, one of three accommodation options in a town that's cut off by mountains and sits isolated at the head of Passage Canal, part of Prince William Sound. The city is accessible by car through a two-mile-long tunnel that closes after 11 p.m.

Whittier's weather is also notoriously poor, experiencing extreme temperatures and snowfall that put nearby Anchorage's winter in the shade.

Contact Eli Martin at eli(at)alaskadispatch.com

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