KENAI — Though legal challenges still remain, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly has defeated a proposal to drop its controversial invocation policy.
The assembly voted down an ordinance sponsored by assembly member Willy Dunne of Homer that would have repealed the section of code allowing for an invocation before meetings, the Peninsula Clarion reported Wednesday.
Policy currently allows invocations from members of religious organizations that have established local presences and regular meetings. Chaplains serving organizations such as fire departments and hospitals can also give invocations.
There is an ongoing lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union of Alaska calling the policy unconstitutional.
Dunne has repeatedly introduced proposals to walk back the invocation policy, saying it’s discriminatory.
“We cannot decide that a religious belief that a U.S. citizen has is legitimate or not,” he said at the assembly’s Tuesday meeting.
Before this week’s meeting, public comment stretched on for nearly two hours. Many members of the public said they supported the prayer, though no one spoke in favor of the current policy specifically.
Assembly member Jill Schaefer tried to amend Dunne’s ordinance to convert the invocation to a moment of silence, which she said would be a compromise.
“I’m not doing away with it,” she said. “God is still here — he’s inside every one of us. I don’t think it’s bad for us to look inside us and say our own invocation. If there’s people in the audience or assembly members that don’t agree, they can ask for guidance on their decisions or go over their grocery lists or whatever is right for them.”
That amendment failed.
This is not the first time the assembly has attempted to amend or abolish the invocation. The controversial issue began nearly a year ago when then-Assembly President Blaine Gilman sponsored an ordinance to remove the invocation, which failed before introduction.
The trouble really got started after members of the Satanic Temple offered an invocation in August. The assembly then adopted stricter rules about who could offer the prayer.
Dunne said Tuesday that he intended to introduce a resolution amending the invocation policy at the next meeting.
