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FAIRBANKS — Almost half the Fairbanks North Star Borough’s nine elected assembly seats are up for grabs Oct. 7.

Whoever wins will join a political body that sets policy on issues ranging from public planning and zoning to how much money from Fairbanks taxpayers should go to public schools.

They also will direct an administration that has focused increasingly on energy issues, including the creation of what would be a massive coal-and-biomass-to-fuel energy project.

William Minerva and Doug Wilson are challenging incumbent Bill Stringer for the assembly’s Seat A, a one-year appointment to a seat Stringer took over following the resignation of former assemblyman Charlie Rex this spring.

Incumbent Tim Beck has drawn a challenge from businessman Wayne Swanson for Seat E, and Mark Ames, Joseph Blanchard and Joshua Lott are elbowing for Seat H, for which incumbent Torie Foote has chosen not to run. Both seats E and H hold three-year terms.

Tammie Wilson, a homemaker, is running unopposed for a three-year term on Seat D.

Seat A

Minerva, 55, is a semi-retired contractor who has lived in Alaska more than half his life. Among the highlights of a broad resume: Minerva briefly ran a four-person police department three decades ago in the village of Selawik, where he also started a Boy Scouts of America troop. In the early 1980s, he served on the Kotzebue City Council, worked as a commercial set-net fisherman and a tugboat engineer. Minerva has said he’d look to hold taxes low and suggested school district officials can help make up for any resulting budget cuts by trimming administrative costs.

Stringer, 68, joined the assembly in January to fill a vacancy created when another elected official, Charlie Rex, resigned. Stringer served as an assemblyman for two terms in the 1970s, and since his appointment this year, he has participated in a recycling task force and attended meetings from other advisory boards.

A retired geophysicist from the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Stringer said he also is a member of a community group that restored and operates the 1897 steam locomotive at Pioneer Park.

Wilson, 54, is a forklift and maintenance worker at a Fairbanks wholesale retail store and has sat on the North Pole City Council for two years. He previously ran for the Borough Assembly in 2001 and 2003 and said he now wants to contribute to setting policy across the community. Wilson said he wants to guard against the imposition of any new taxes, particularly a sales tax.

Seat H

Ames, 46, is a former bus driver and activist billing himself as an “Alaska Interior State Heritage Conservationist Volunteer.”

A former Alaska Army National Guardsman and perennial political candidate, Ames pushed for changing the name of Pioneer Park to celebrate and commemorate the purchase of Alaska from Russia. Ames also pushed municipalities to cash in on claims for shared resource revenue under a royalty provisions in the Alaska Statehood Act.

Blanchard, 23, is a commercial truck driver and supervisor. He also is a student at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where he previously led the student government as president and is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in political science.

Blanchard was one of a handful of residents who this summer applied for a vacancy on the assembly, a post that ultimately went to Stringer. He wrote in a response to a Daily News-Miner questionnaire that local governments should relieve the burden on taxpayers already facing high energy costs while staying committed to providing schools and emergency-response services with adequate funding.

Lott, 29, said he spent seven years working his way up from usher to general manager at Fairbanks’ major movie theater. He now is a manager at Sears and said he has volunteered for a number of efforts and helped organize the Alaskan Heroes Welcome Home ceremony at Pioneer Park two years ago.

Lott said he also owned a small consulting and marketing business and has volunteered for a number of organizations that gave him the chance to coordinate concerts and work with young people at the Fairbanks Youth Conference. He wrote in answers to a Daily News-Miner questionnaire that Fairbanks should look to become the go-to place for top-field education and research into alternative energy technology.

Seat E

Swanson, 38, has owned an advertising company since last fall and is making his second attempt at local office in as many years. Last year, he cited a lack of political experience as a strength, saying a “non-politician” approach would be a benefit for the nine-member assembly. This year, he said local governments should continue economic-development projects to prepare for the prospect of expanding and diversifying the commercial base.

Swanson, who actively served in the Army for a decade before entering the private sector, trumpets a close connection with many other businesses, a network he said he developed partly through his work in advertising. He said he hopes to tighten government spending while maintaining services.

Beck, 58, is a retired highway designer who has served on the assembly for more than a decade, save one year he sat on the sidelines due to term limits. He has in the past billed himself as either a conservative Democrat or moderate Republican, and two years ago ran as the former in an unsuccessful state Senate race.

Beck, who will step down as president of the Alaska Municipal League in November due to term limits, has proposed initiatives including — two years ago — a sales tax that the assembly voted against sending to the ballot. He has cited energy costs as a factor in some recent assembly votes and said residents are increasingly looking to local governments to educate the public on the short-term solutions and long-term options in the face of higher energy bills.

Seat D

Wilson, 47, saw her 2006 bid to oust a then-incumbent Charlie Rex fall a handful of votes short in what turned out to be the tightest Fairbanks municipal race in recent memory. The following year, the former teacher tried again to join the assembly, first through the fall election and later by way of appointment.

While those attempts were unsuccessful, Wilson is now all-but-assured of a three-year post after finding herself the sole candidate for assembly Seat D. A regular at public meetings, she is already an appointed member of the borough’s Air Pollution Control Committee and has also served on a so-called junkyard task force.