Sitting Ketchikan City Council member Riley Gass has filed to run for reelection. Gass has served two terms on the council.
There are three three-year seats available in the upcoming municipal election. KRBD’s Hunter Morrison sat down with Gass to ask about what he plans to focus on if reelected.
Hunter Morrison: First things first, why are you running?
Riley Gass: I’m running because I love Ketchikan. I was born and raised here, lived here all my life, and I’ve currently got two little kids, and I’m very concerned about the future of our town. I don’t have all the answers. I don’t claim that I can fix everything, but I have some ideas. I have some things that we’ve been making slow progress on, and I’d like to see through, and I’ll probably get to some of those things here shortly.
Morrison: Yeah, could you kind of spell out your priorities?
Gass: Sure. So the main thing for me right now is coming up with practical ways to get this big industry that we have here, the tourism industry, to pay a little more of our infrastructure and of our town needs. I don’t think it’s too much to ask. I think everyone would agree that they benefit tremendously from our roads, our water, wastewater, landfill, all the things that we keep paying more and more for. And just to elaborate on that a little bit, in the last six or eight months, somewhere in there, I’ve brought forward — I am on the council now — and I’ve brought forward a few things to address that. I got council support to have the management address these and bring back some solutions. We’re still in the stage of waiting for those things to be brought back to us, but a few ideas I had are: one would be for the museum to be fully funded out of some sort of tourism dollars, so that our general fund taxpayer dollars are no longer supporting the bulk of the museum. I got council support to bring that back to management to have at least 95% of the museum covered by door fees and some other sort of CPV [commercial passenger vessel] revenue or tourism money, and other ways. Another big one that I’ve recently brought forward and got council support on was to increase the PILT, or Payment in Lieu of Taxes, on our port, which actually has not gone up in many, many years. It’s the only property that I’m personally aware of in town that the property tax or PILT money has not gone up on, and to me that should be increased, because that’s essentially a legal way of getting tourism CPV dollars directly into the general fund, which would alleviate the need for increased taxes on the citizens. So those are kind of my top priorities right now, and as I said, they’re in the works. So I’m hoping we can get to a solution on that.
Morrison: Gotcha. And could you elaborate a little bit more, you know, on your tenure on the council, what is something that you’ve done that you’re proud of?
Gass: Well, those subjects are the main focus, the ones I just mentioned, but aside from that, I really believe that our community is maxed out on the cost of living, and that would include taxes and rates. We’ve seen drastic tax and rate increases. More on the rate side, I will say we’ve successfully voted down three tax increases since I’ve been on the council, which I guess I would say I’m happy about, but we’re seeing a lot of rate increases, and I have been consistent on that. Not only have I voted down almost every rate increase, I’ve voted no, even if the majority hasn’t. That’s been my position, and I also would say that I’ve taken the harder position on the other end, which is when items get brought to us for increased spending, increased money for equipment, things of that nature. I’ve been consistent in saying no to that, which is a lot harder because some of these things we really want, we really could use, but in the end I know that the taxpayer and the ratepayer are going to pay for it. So I’ve been consistent on spending and increases on spending, and I believe that our citizens are kind of maxed out on that right now.
Another thing I’ve been working towards with some progress, although I think I’d like to see a lot more, is trying to consolidate. And what I mean by that is, rather than giving out pink slips or firing massive amounts of employees, which I am not in favor of, having a focus on looking at where we can consolidate positions as people retire or leave, and with technology increases, we’ve made a little bit of progress there. But I think there’d be room for more. And I guess the other thing — this one’s maybe a little more lighthearted, but one thing I was pretty pumped about was I sponsored the thing to allow four wheelers in Ketchikan. When the state changed that rule, it went to the municipalities, and we were recommended to not allow them here. And it ended up being kind of a back and forth dragged out debate, but we ended up getting that. So I think that was pretty cool. And then more recently, I always feel like anything we can do to make people’s lives easier, to get out of the way and to not impede the citizens, the business people, is always a plus. One thing we did recently was one of the cab companies in town came to us and basically said, “Hey, there’s way too much red tape here. It takes me too long to get these people approved through the process when we need drivers in town because we all know we need a lot more transportation during the summer months.” So he basically proposed that we eliminate some of that red tape. We had some concerns, and in the end, we did end up eliminating some of that red tape and making the process a little easier. So, whenever I see an opportunity to get government out of the way, as long as it’s not at a detriment to the citizens, I think that’s a good way to go.
Morrison: Gotcha. And you know, outside of your time on the council, what other community engagement roles, leadership roles, makes you equipped for this role?
Gass: Well, most recently, I’d say being a dad. I’ve been involved for many years with refereeing basketball here in town, youth basketball, Kayhi basketball. I did a little bit of coaching. I’m no longer doing that just because of time. I also, in recent years, have a real passion for housing and trying to create housing in town that provides year-round housing for regular folks, because I know so many people that struggle to find it. So I have been fortunate enough to start building some residential housing recently. I’ve had a lot of success with that. There were some major challenges. I’ve learned a lot, but I’d say that’s something that I’m proud of, and I want to do more of.
Morrison: And, you know, aside from what you’ve mentioned, what is something that you’d like listeners to know about you?
Gass: I would just say I’m kind of a regular guy. Probably a lot of people say this, but I don’t consider myself a politician. I have been very fortunate and blessed enough to have been elected to the council twice now. I’ve run twice, got elected both times, and I’m very grateful to the community members for putting their faith and their trust in me. It’s something I take very seriously, and I’m proud of that. I mean, I’m an electrician. I’ve lived here my whole life. I plan to live here the rest of my life, and that’s kind of what drives me to do this politics is that I want to try to make sure that Ketchikan is safe and affordable and a good place to grow up like it was when I grew up. The people here are incredible, with the youth sports that they support and all the things, the activities, the church groups, the businesses that donate everything in this town, and I just want to keep it a good place to, to raise my family and for hopefully future generations to come.
