One Assembly, two school board seats uncontested ahead of Monday’s filing deadline

Tourism activist Karla Hart and former candidate David Lee Morris join District 2 contest; Areawide Assembly has two candidates; other races have one candidate per seat

The Juneau City Clerk’s office on Monday, June 30, 2025. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Independent)

By Mark Sabbatini

Juneau Independent

A day before the 4:30 p.m. Monday filing deadline in Juneau’s Oct. 6 municipal election there are three people seeking an open Juneau Assembly District 2 seat and two people seeking an Areawide Assembly seat. Three other Assembly and school board seats are uncontested with one candidate for each.

The most crowded competition is for the District 2 seat representing the Mendenhall Valley, with tourism activist Karla Hart and retired swim coach David Lee Morris filing during the past week. Also seeking the seat is finance manager Joyce Niven, who filed when registrations began July 17. See also: Profiles of the six candidates who filed for Assembly and school board seats on opening day

Incumbent Areawide Assembly Member Paul Kelly is seeking a second three-year term. The lone challenger so far is Brad Sapp, office manager for the Federal Aviation Administration’s Flight Standards District Office in Juneau.

Former Deputy City Manager Mila Cosgrove is the lone person to file for the Assembly District 1 seat. Juneau Board of Education incumbents Britteny Cioni-Haywood and David Noon are the only candidates so far seeking the two seats available.

Below are brief profiles of the two candidates who have joined the field since the first day of filing. Profiles of all candidates, including those in the linked story above, will be featured in an article published after Monday’s filing deadline.

Assembly District 2: Karla Hart and David Lee Morris (challengers)

Hart has been active in Juneau politics for decades — primarily as an activist seeking to limit large-scale tourism — but rarely sought political office herself.

She unsuccessfully ran for Assembly in 1997 — which was also the first year a cruise ship head tax was on the ballot — and dropped out of another Assembly race in 2014. She’s also been involved in ballot proposition efforts, most notably as the leader of a "Ship-Free Saturday" measure in 2024 that attracted global media attention and was rejected with slightly more than 60% of voters opposing it.

"I have felt as if I was more effective as an activist in influencing things than in sitting on the Assembly for a long time," she said in an interview Sunday. But this year she is running because "I think that my voice could be more effective on the Assembly right now because the Assembly appears to be willing to not listen to the community who has concerns about the cruise industry."

In an email Hart sent last Tuesday announcing her candidacy, she stated she will not be just a single-issue candidate.

“Any candidate can call for addressing housing shortages, budget shortfalls, daycare and education, the pending need for a new solution for Juneau’s waste, vulnerable populations, supporting the infrastructure that makes Juneau a great place to live, and economic development," the email states. "Those issues, and more, will come before the candidates in the upcoming election, and before the next Assembly. I will work on those issues, in addition to taking a strong position on cruise ship tourism."

Morris also has previously run for Assembly, unsuccessfully seeking the District 2 seat in 2023. He’s been a Juneau resident for more than 45 years, and is a retired swim coach, former Alaska Marine Highway System employee and former board president of the homeless assistance nonprofit Family Promise of Juneau.

Attempts by the Juneau Independent to reach Morris on Sunday were not successful as of early afternoon.

In his 2023 candidate statement and media interviews, he cited high local taxes as a primary issue along with housing availability. He supported a proposal by Nano Brooks, elected to the Assembly last year, to establish a "land lottery" that would make city-owned parcels available to residents via a raffle.

Morris, in response to a KTOO questionnaire at the time about whether limits should be placed on cruise tourism levels, stated "I believe in tourism, but I believe there’s a point when that’s enough. And I think it ought to be put out in a vote to the people, because it’s their city, it’s their decision, and the Assembly works for the people."

He also called transparency by the Assembly a priority, stating too many decisions occur in closed-door executive sessions.

(Disclosure: Joyce Niven is the Juneau Independent’s business manager. She is a part-time contractor responsible for accounting and other financial responsibilities, with no involvement in newsroom operations.)

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.