By Jake Dye

Special to the Homer Independent Press

After a pair of delays, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly on Tuesday finished action on an ordinance approving the sale of Nikolaevsk School to the private nonprofit that will operate a charter school in the facility this fall.

The ordinance was introduced on May 19, but assembly member Willy Dunne successfully moved to delay action on the move until the body’s June 16 meeting. Then, when the assembly voted 6-2 to approve the deal, Dunne motioned to reconsider the action and redo the vote at the July 7 meeting. The vote to reconsider failed 3–6.

Under terms of the deal, Alaskan Homestead Education Inc. will purchase Nikolaevsk School for the price of about $2 million, though the entire cost will be deferred and eventually forgiven by the borough if about $200,000 is spent annually by the nonprofit in each of the next 10 years to maintain and operate the facility.

Alaskan Homestead Education Inc. won approval of its charter school last year on a 5–3 vote from the school board, after being denied for several years and despite Kenai Peninsula Borough School District administration saying it had concerns about the group’s proposed budget, facility, enrollment and operating plan.

The school has been vacant since July 2025, after the school district last year closed the facility, citing low enrollment. At that time, 21 students were enrolled in the K-12 school, which was built in 1976 and has a capacity of 175 students. The new Nikolaevsk Charter School was approved only six months later.

Although the ordinance was not enacted last month because of Dunne’s motion to reconsider, Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Peter Micciche said Tuesday that he had given the nonprofit access to the facility anyways and that they’d spend the last month preparing the school for operations.

Dunne said Tuesday that he’d moved  for reconsideration and delayed action on the ordinance because he’d heard from constituents who asked for more time to explore the proposed deal.

The public has not had a genuine opportunity to weigh in,” he said. 

He described concerns raised about the nonprofit’s ability to handle capital projects, a loss of public accountability as the building goes to a private organization and the borough’s stewardship of a public facility.

Those concerns, Dunne said, included “some pretty compelling reasons to reconsider the decision to pass the ordinance.”

Dunne said after the vote that he’s always hoped to see Nikolaevsk’s new charter school succeed, but that his efforts against the ordinance represented “differences of opinion on how best to help that school succeed.”

“I wish the school and staff and the community all the best.”

A vacant seat

The Assembly’s Kalifornsky seat, representing a broad swath of area between Kenai and Soldotna, is vacant for the second time in as many years as member Scott Griebel resigned his position effective Tuesday night. Griebel won election to the seat in October 2025, to fill out the remainder of a term won in 2024 by James Baisden, who also resigned after less than a year on the assembly. 

Applicants for an appointee to the Kalifornsky seat began to be accepted Wednesday, for a period that will close at 4:30 p.m. on July 23. An appointee will be selected in August to serve until the November election, when someone will be elected to fill out the remaining year of Baisden’s original term ending in 2027.

A resignation letter by Griebel, included in meeting documents, says he’s resigning from the assembly to take a job with the borough — “still service, simply a different type.” The borough mayor’s office said Wednesday that Griebel will be the new Director of Solid Waste.

During his final assembly meeting, Griebel said he’d spent decades working with the borough before leaving for a private sector job. That job “for a variety of reasons both personal and professional, wasn’t a fit.”

“I’m not young, but I’m not old enough to retire, so I’m looking for opportunities,” he said. “The borough has a number of good opportunities for me now that help me bring my skillset in and help me serve this community.”

Griebel said he may soon find himself on the other side of the dais and called on his former fellow assembly members to “ask me those hard questions.”

“You’re a positive influence to this body and to the borough,” assembly president Ryan Tunseth told Griebel during the meeting. “Thank you for all your service.”