Assembly hears presentation on boroughwide Safe Streets plan that would unlock federal funds

Robert Ruffner, Planning Director for the Kenai Peninsula Borough, asked the assembly to adopt the borough's 2025 Safe Streets and Roads for All comprehensive safety action plan as an element of the 2019 Kenai Peninsula Borough comprehensive plan.

The plan, Ruffner said, aims to reduce "killed or serious injuries" (KSIs) across the borough by identifying 20 priority locations and recommending proven countermeasures such as rumble strips, improved striping and targeted lighting. "We have finished the plan...this is the final step, and it is to fold it into our comprehensive plan," Ruffner said.

Folding the plan into the comprehensive plan would make the priority projects eligible for Federal Highway Administration grant funds, Ruffner told the assembly. He emphasized the plan is advisory: it "doesn't mandate anything" and is agnostic about who owns the affected roads. "The State can choose to take any of these or they can choose to not take any of them, but there will be a carrot there and that's that Federal Highways dollar," he said.

Nut graf: Adoption would not itself authorize construction or mandate local action, but it would formalize a set of priorities and make those priorities eligible for federal funding, potentially speeding safety work that local agencies alone could not fund.

Ruffner described the plan's scope and data sources: the technical team mapped KSIs from 2018 to 2022, worked with borough GIS staff, and held six in-person workshops plus virtual meetings and focus groups across the peninsula. He said new crash data recently released by the Alaska Department of Transportation bolsters the plan's findings.

The plan organizes countermeasures by cost and complexity. Low-cost measures identified include higher-durability reflective paint and targeted no-parking restrictions; medium-cost measures include lighting and signals; high-cost items include realigning roads and building frontage or "backage" roads to reduce high-speed access points. Ruffner pointed to the Sterling-to-Soldotna corridor as an example where frontage roads and medians are already being discussed and where the plan could help prioritize complementary work.

Assembly members asked how sites were selected and who would implement projects. "The primary driver was the data for accidents," Assembly member Johnson said; Ruffner confirmed KSI data was the most heavily weighted selection criterion, supplemented by local knowledge of growth or sight-line issues. Ruffner and other staff stressed that most KSIs occur on state-owned roads, so the Alaska DOT will be a principal implementer.

Members raised questions about specific countermeasures. Assembly member Morton cautioned that lighting can sometimes encourage higher speeds and reduces visibility of animals; Ruffner agreed that lighting is project-specific and can create a false sense of security without complementary enforcement. Assembly member Townsend urged staff to keep business impacts in mind, noting vehicles accounted for the vast majority of collisions in the data.

Ruffner also highlighted non-infrastructure components of the plan, including post-crash care coordination and targeted outreach campaigns (for example, messaging aimed at groups responsible for a disproportionate share of KSIs). The plan includes an online dashboard and a safety "report card" for ongoing tracking, Ruffner said.

Ending: Ruffner said the Planning Department will continue engagement with cities, DOT and community stakeholders and asked the assembly for its consideration in folding the plan into the comprehensive plan. No final vote on the ordinance was recorded in the committee transcript.