A trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline, the war in Iran and personal connections are among the things central Kenai Peninsula voters said were important to them at the ballot box.
In some ways, it’s business as usual at the Soldotna Field House: walkers peer over the edge of the building’s elevated track and the rhythmic pop of a pickle ball match echoes off the walls.
But the south side of the building is busy in a different way – voters are queued up at two different precincts to cast city, borough and state ballots. It’s the first time state and local elections have been held on the same day on the Kenai Peninsula. Voters aligned the dates with the goal of boosting voter turnout.
Lin Kennedy says it’s so far, so good. She’s helping run the Mackey Lake precinct, where more than 200 people had already voted around lunchtime.
“People seem more than willing to sign both registers to get the borough ballot as well as the state ballot, which is great,” she said. “That's what we want them to do.”
One precinct over, Soldotna City Clerk Johni Blankenship is helping run the Soldotna precinct. That’s where voters are filling out three separate ballots. There’s a bit of a wait time for voters just arriving. But Blankenship says that wait is more comfortable in the field house. It’s also the first year Soldotna voters are casting ballots from the field house.
“The voters have been super gracious,” she said. “They've been super patient. We're very appreciative of that. You know, we are still trying to figure out the logistics of all this happening on one day. So we're very appreciative of everybody working with us.”
John Edwards reported smooth sailing. He voted a city, borough and state ballot and says poll workers are doing the best they can. That’s how he feels about candidates for local office, too.
Depending on where they live, Kenai Peninsula voters are voting for borough assembly members and a borough mayor, school board and city council members and state lawmakers, on top of the other state and federal races.
“We put a lot of pressure on these politicians to make sweeping changes, and it's just not a reality that we're going to see. We have to come together as a community and just kind of support the people who do get elected,” he said.
Edwards predicts the winners in local races will come down to who made the most personal connections with voters. He says that’s something Soldotna school board candidate Laura Rhyner did for him.
“I've got a kid in high school right now, and he's getting towards the end of it, and it's this whole thing of like I want him to be able to finish strong, and so the school board election is a big one for me, and that's where I paid a lot more attention to most that race than more than most of the other ones,” he said.
All borough voters are also considering whether to put term limits on school board members. If that ballot proposition passes, the nine-member school board would be subject to the same term limits as the borough assembly and mayor.
Alex Douthit voted against that proposal. He’s a current Kenai City Council candidate whose wife currently sits on the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District school board.
“We have such a hard time getting candidates just to show up for a lot of these seats,” he said. “That when these smaller boards and stuff come around and you start putting term limits on it, getting quality candidates that are willing to step up is going to be hard if you're kicking people off every few years.”
As a Kenai resident, Douthit also voted on a proposed $75,000 residential property tax exemption the council opted to put before voters. If that ballot proposition passes, eligible property owners could save up to $326.26 per year in taxes by exempting the first $75,000 of their property from city taxes. Douthit says he’d like the city to spend more time looking at exemptions.
“As long as the city can afford to give back some of the taxes we're taking in, I think it's great,” he said.
Like the rest of Alaska, Kenai Peninsula residents are also weighing in on state and federal races with their votes.
Michael Horton is a registered Republican who says he has a love-hate relationship with the national party. He says Republicans have let down millennials like him, and he’s been proactive about contacting his federal representatives about the issues he cares about. He ultimately voted for the Republican incumbents.
“Growing up with the Iraq War and Afghanistan war,” he said. “I am a huge proponent of not foreign wars, especially overseas. You know, I think we need to focus more on the United States and Alaska. Just each representative focusing on their state.”
Donald Hopkins says the Alaska LNG Project weighed heavily on his mind when voting. He’s a U.S. Coast Guard veteran with an industrial background and says oil and gas has long taken care of the Kenai Peninsula.
“Hopefully we can get that project started for Alaska, so that way we can start fixing some of the financial problems that we have up here, schools, mental health issues, and stuff like that,” he said. “So those are the biggest concerns I have. So hopefully the candidates I voted for will do what they say they’re going to do.”
Although polls close at 8 p.m., state election officials expect it will be weeks until we have final results for state and federal races. The first batch of preliminary results are expected around 9 p.m., with more coming in waves after that. The Kenai Peninsula Borough and individual cities will publish local elections results independently. Those won’t be official until certification.
Anyone in line to vote when polls close will still be allowed to cast their ballot. The state will publish preliminary statewide election results on the Alaska Division of Elections website.
