January 14th, 2010.  Eagle River Community Council Meeting; the meeting was held at the new Eagle River Town Center, just down the hall from the new Eagle River Library.  The Eagle River Community Council meets on the second Thursday of each month. 

Last night’s meeting was lightly attended, with a majority of the participants being from the local High Schools.  There were several persons visiting from other community councils; they were there to hear the gust spear from Land Design North, more about this later.

 Assembly women Debbie Ossiander was in attendance and gave a recap of recent developments.  Funding was restored for the Eagle River Library; they will open one more day during the week; although one full time position will be cut.  There maybe other budget concerns as the year progresses; they will be doing a quarterly review in April. 

Local roads are being plowed on a frequent basis; one concerned citizen spoke up asking that the plow trucks be a little more responsible about how much snow they dropped in his driveway (gating).  Michael Melielo is the council representative to the Road Board; he addresses this concern and provides the contact information to the homeowner so that the proper people we notified.  The discussion at this point was how our road board worked differently from Anchorages.  The end result was that Eagle River/Chugiak was more efficient and home owner’s property taxes were lower as a result; less mill rate for road maintenance.  

The next topic was the Master Plan for Beach Lake Park; guest speaker Mrs. S Doyle of Land Design North.  This discussion was very lively; there are many different uses for the park.  In the summer you have bikers as well as hikers, and there are several different areas within the park that are in use.  Beach Lake Park does see more traffic in the winter as there are miles of cross country ski trails; as well as several dog sledding trails.  For the most part these trails do not cross.  There have been several meetings to layout the master plan, and the next meeting is February 9th 2010, 6:00 - 8:30 pm at the Eagle River Town Center.  Click here for PDF Flyer of Event.

The meeting was concluded shortly after this lively discussion. The Eagle River Community Council meetings typically last between 1-2 hours.  There is always good information about the community.