The Juneau Assembly has reluctantly agreed to move forward with plans to purchase two floors of the Michael J. Burns building, which houses the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation. If finalized, it would become Juneau’s “new” City Hall.
The plan comes after voters shot down the city’s request to fund a new City Hall via bonds — twice. Since then, the city has been trying to find a new space for all its staff.
“We are in a real bind with our city office space, and there are no other good solutions,” said Assembly member Ella Adkison during Monday’s Committee of the Whole meeting. “That being said, I have a lot of difficulty with this proposal. I just really see this as a detriment to both short-term and long-term Juneau’s future.
Adkison worries the purchase could contribute to capital creep – the slow trickle of state jobs moving away from Juneau to Anchorage. She works as a legislative aide to Juneau Sen. Jesse Kiehl.
Right now, City Hall fits less than half of city employees and needs roughly $14 million in maintenance work. Plus, the other buildings that city staff work out of have been riddled with issues and cost the city hundreds of thousands of dollars to rent each year.
According to City Manager Katie Koester, the two floors and parking spaces at the PFD building would cost roughly $12 million.
The city’s proposal is to form a condo association at the Michael J. Burns Building on 10th Street by the federal building. It would allow it to jointly own the building, instead of renting it. Assembly member Wade Bryson says that’s a big plus. But, he’s still disappointed that it’s not the new building the city wanted to construct.
“It would have been the best solution for the community,” Bryson said. “However, the community wished for us to take a different direction. So we are still left in a position where we can own a building and condo ownership is better than renting.”
The Assembly’s vote means Koester and the city attorney will start figuring out the logistics of forming a condo association with the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation. That will likely take a few months before the proposal returns to the Assembly again.