The Petersburg Borough’s boundaries will stand as they are, now that Juneau has lost its last legal challenge on the matter.
The Alaska Supreme Court issued a decision Friday, upholding a lower court’s decision and the state Local Boundary Commission’s 2012 decision to grant Petersburg a huge boundary expansion.
It puts to bed a dispute over about 1,500 square miles of Southeast both boroughs laid claim to.
The previously contested land is almost completely uninhabited national forest – an old estimate puts the population at one – but with the land goes potential federal receipts, some property and sales tax revenue, and local authority.
“I don’t necessarily consider it a loss,” Amy Mead, the City & Borough of Juneau’s attorney, said. “We thought the law stood for something that needed clarification, and the court has now clarified.”
The Supreme Court heard the case in June.
Jeremy Hsieh is the deputy managing editor of the KTOO newsroom in Juneau. He’s a podcast fiend who’s worked in journalism since high school as a reporter, editor and television producer. He ran Gavel Alaska for 360 North from 2011 to 2016, and is big on experimenting with novel tools and mediums (including the occasional animated gif) to tell stories and demystify the news. Jeremy’s an East Coast transplant who moved to Juneau in 2008.
