Palmer City Council to weigh sanctions against member cited for driving with revoked license

What you need to know: 

• The Palmer City Council will consider official sanctions against Council Member Richard Best after he was issued a summons by Palmer police on Jan. 20 for driving with a revoked license.
• Best pleaded guilty in May 2024 to refusing a field sobriety test, resulting in a sentence that included a 90-day license revocation and two years of probation. He also has an ongoing case in Anchorage stemming from a 2022 arrest on a charge of operating under the influence.
• The proposed sanctions would bar Best from representing the city at public events and from voting on public safety matters. The council will vote on the sanctions at a Feb. 11 meeting.

PALMER – The Palmer City Council will consider official sanctions against Council member Richard Best after Palmer Police early last week issued him a summons for driving with a revoked license.

Palmer Police issued the citation to Best on Jan. 20, according to a department press release.

A case file regarding the summons, including any charging documents or court appearance date details, had not been filed with the Alaska Court System as of Wednesday afternoon. Palmer police officials said the documents were delayed due to a technical glitch between their case information and the state's online filing system.

Council members Victoria Hudson and John Alcantra requested a draft ordinance containing the sanctions during a council meeting Tuesday. It will go before the council for a vote during a meeting scheduled for Feb. 11.

Best pleaded guilty in May to refusing a field sobriety test during a traffic stop in downtown Palmer early last year, according to court documents. A charge of driving under the influence was dismissed as part of the plea, the documents state. His license was revoked for 90 days as part of a plea, they state.

Best was also ordered to serve five days in a residential treatment facility and pay a $1,500 fine, the documents state. He is also serving two years of probation, which requires him to "obey all state, federal and local laws and ordinances," they state.

A 2022 Anchorage case in which police arrested Best on charges of operating under the influence and reckless driving is still pending.

Best was pulled over and arrested by Anchorage police in October 2022 after officers observed him driving north on the Glenn Highway at 97 mph, according to a probable cause statement filed in that case. He was taken to the Anchorage jail after failing a field sobriety test, the statement said. A breath test at the jail measured his blood alcohol content at 0.128, according to the statement. The state's legal blood alcohol limit for driving is .08.

Best told the council during Tuesday's meeting that those test results were affected by medication prescribed by his doctor. A court order signed Jan. 15 by Anchorage District Court Judge Kari McCrea allows testimony from that doctor to be included at an upcoming trial on the charges.

“We are all U.S. citizens, allowed to have our day in court. I happen to have a situation where my doctor has testified that I had medication on board that compromised the situation,” he said. “Now that is a proceeding in court – that is happening right now. You guys are wanting to hang me on something that you have no idea what’s going on.”

A trial date for the Anchorage case has not yet been set.

Best declined a request to comment for this story.

The proposed sanctions will block Best from officially representing the city at public events and from voting on matters related to public safety, Hudson said during the meeting.

“This behavior is not just a legal issue, it is a matter of public safety. We as elected officials are held to a high standard, and our actions should reflect the values of the people we serve,” she said. “We cannot as a council stand by and let this behavior go unchecked.”

Elected officials in Palmer are required to "avoid the appearance of impropriety," among other standards, according to a city Code of Ethics and Conduct for Elected Officials approved in 2020. The council may "formally censure" or reprimand members who "willfully and repeatedly fail to follow proper conduct," the code states.

City Attorney Sarah Heath will prepare the proposed ordinance containing the sanctions.

Heath said she will also present information on sanction guidelines and options during the Feb. 11 meeting. Palmer’s city ethics policy does not currently define what sanctions or censure can or cannot include.

The proposed sanctions join a separate City Council-ordered ethics investigation into Best's conduct requested by Hudson and Alcantra early this month.

That investigation, also conducted by Heath, is to examine whether Best violated city ethics rules by making negative comments about the city during a political party meeting earlier this month and through the pending Anchorage charge of operating under the influence.

Best was elected to the Palmer City Council in 2006 and was last re-elected in 2023. His current term expires in 2026. 

-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com

The "what you need to know" section of this story has been updated to reflect the correct date of the Palmer pleading.