Are we affordable yet?

The Juneau-Douglas City Museum on May 21, 2026. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Independent)

By Stuart Cohen

It has been 11 months since Juneau voted to lower the property tax cap and eliminate sales tax on food, also blowing a large hole in the budget. I do not know if many people find Juneau significantly more “affordable,” but it’s worth looking at the likely consequences if we do not pass Propositions A, B and C offered on our upcoming October ballot. If you are just tuning into this issue, please pay attention, or the next time you hear about it might be when the closure of the city museum, Eaglecrest or other facilities is announced.

Let’s look at some numbers: The CBJ responded to the deficit by cutting grants and operating costs, raising fees and reducing some tax exemptions, saving a total of about $6.4 million. We were also fortunate to collect more sales tax due to inflation, but those gains will be offset to a great degree by the increased operating costs that inflation creates. In the end, we are expecting a deficit of $6.85 million for 2027. (The $3.2 million shortfall mentioned in previous articles refers only to 2026 sales tax, not total deficit.)

Some might be thinking: “Hey, I didn’t notice any budget cuts. Eaglecrest and the city museum are still open, so those cuts don’t really matter.” This assumption is mistaken: the city used $7.5 million of our savings to soften further cuts in the current year. That leaves only $3.3 million left in our savings for budget protection or any other emergency that comes up. In the quest to make Juneau “affordable,” its proponents have drained our city’s savings account.  We are not going to skate by with minimal cuts if we “wait and see.”

A fantasy is being promoted that nebulous prospects of growth will solve the problem. This is a distraction. The promise of increased revenues in some hazy future does nothing to help us with millions of dollars of bills that must be paid right now. This same philosophy and its resultant tax cuts implemented by George W. Bush took our country from a path of budget surpluses to our current $40 trillion national debt. The difference is that Juneau cannot print its own money, and deficits will need to be balanced with significant cuts. There is no slush fund available to solve our problems, as has been implied.

There are a number of other faulty and contradictory ideas being floated. The CBJ is criticized for underestimating income and overestimating expenses, in what most of us who have run businesses would call conservative financial planning. The city is told to encourage unspecified economic development projects, while at same time ruthlessly attacked for any projects they have encouraged in the past. While “growth” is touted, its advocates never specify what that growth is, how much revenue it would generate and when that tax revenue would actually be realized. In essence, we are being told to ignore the present deficits and instead base our decisions on promises of a rosy future or “public-private partnerships” in which private businesses somehow take on money-losing public recreational facilities.

All of Juneau’s recreational venues, including swimming pools, trails, ballfields, playgrounds, the skating rink and Eaglecrest are subsidized to the tune of just over $6 million per year. In other words, we could close all of them and still not balance the budget without new taxes. It’s simple: if people want to keep the city as a vibrant community that appeals to young people and families, we are going to have to invest in it.

There are three Propositions on the next ballot, and I urge everyone to vote yes on all of them.

Proposition A will maintain the 3% “temporary” sales tax that we have had for decades. This is the entry fee for having a full-service city. A no vote will be catastrophic. Proposition B will restore the property tax cap mill rate to 12 mills. Although the current rate is only nine mills (excluding pre-existing bonds) raising the cap gives the city the flexibility, if needed, to respond to emergencies and unexpected funding shortfalls. Mendenhall Valley residents hoping to have the city pay for flood mitigation might want to lend particular attention to this measure.   Proposition C would impose a summer sales tax. This tax, similar to others in Skagway, Haines, Sitka and Ketchikan, is designed to target the summer tourist activity, and would raise an estimated $6.8 million, which the city is directed to spend on recreation. It would not replace the current cuts to Eaglecrest or the city museum, but it would stave off further destruction.

I have my own criticisms of the city, as we all do. But those can be addressed by running for office or serving on a board, not by crippling our community and our future. Tax cuts don’t punish some indistinct entity known as “the city,” they punish our children and ourselves. I hope Juneauites will vote yes in October.

• Stuart Cohen founded and operated Invisible World, an e-commerce company. He serves on Juneau’s Utility Advisory Board.