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The Alaska Redistricting Board and the East Anchorage plaintiffs have been again in Anchorage Superior Court docket Decide Thomas Matthews’ digital courtroom as we speak for oral arguments over the board’s newest iteration of the Anchorage-area state Senate pairings. It’s been an extended, litigious path with loads of late nights, tight turnarounds and Gold Medal-worthy authorized gymnastics that’s produced some really odd moments. So, I suppose, it is sensible that as we speak’s oral arguments boiled all the way down to the East Anchorage plaintiffs and the Alaska Redistricting Board arguing to Decide Matthews about what Decide Matthews actually meant when he despatched the Alaska Redistricting Board again to the drawing desk.
When Decide Matthews discovered the board’s creation of a state Senate seat from East Anchorage and Eagle River to be an unconstitutional gerrymander that gave Eagle River a political benefit on the expense of East Anchorage did he:
Intend for the board to create an all-East Anchorage seat and a separate all-Eagle River state Senate seat because the East Anchorage plaintiffs argue?
Intend to present the board free reign so long as East Anchorage and Eagle River didn’t find yourself in the identical state Senate district, which resulted within the board approving an all-East Anchorage seat and an Eagle River/South Anchorage seat whereas holding the Eagle River/JBER and Authorities Hill seat in tact?
The Alaska Redistricting Board argued that Decide Matthews and the Alaska Supreme Court docket weren’t prescriptive with how Eagle River ought to be dealt with and due to this fact this attraction ought to be rejected (conveniently falling again to a slower litigation schedule that pushes up in opposition to the June 1 candidate submitting deadline for this yr’s elections). The board’s case hinges on the truth that the order remanding the work to the board solely known as on the board to “right the Constitutional errors recognized by this Court docket and the Supreme court docket in Senate District Ok.” It doesn’t explicitly say what the board ought to do, the board argues, and positively doesn’t say there ought to be a unified Eagle River seat. Board counsel Matt Singer pulled a Invoice Clinton when he argued the entire thing comes all the way down to what the definition of “in” is. He argues that “in” means the solely errors that the board was required to deal with have been those inside Senate District Ok, which was the untenable connection between East Anchorage and Eagle River. Nothing, he argued, was required of the board past severing that connection.
East Anchorage’s lawyer Holly Wells argued the redrawing course of doesn’t erase the unconstitutional intent that invalidated the unique plan. The plan wasn’t simply discovered unconstitutional as a result of it related the disparate East Anchorage and Eagle River communities of curiosity, she stated, it was discovered unconstitutional as a result of it meant to spice up the illustration of Eagle River on the expense of one other neighborhood. Nothing, she stated, modifications as a result of the board went again to the drawing desk and was a bit extra cautious about what they stated on the file. The tip result’s Eagle River’s conservative voters are nonetheless answerable for two Senate districts, she stated, and the one factor that’s modified is who’s on the dropping finish of the deal.
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“The fact is the Alaska Redistricting Board break up up the Eagle River neighborhood of curiosity for political functions. These political functions have been discovered illegal, the board was required to right the unconstitutional conduct mirrored in Senate District Ok, the board corrected it with regard to at least one district and never the opposite,” she stated. “The board cleverly preserved the fruits of its illegal political gerrymander. This motion, this intent that continues to hold on doesn’t adjust to the order. That’s it.”
She argued that the rotten intent behind the final map should nonetheless be thought-about when the board approached the brand new mapping course of. They need to have, she argues, taken into consideration Decide Matthews’ order that discovered Eagle River and East Anchorage each constituted communities of curiosity and that there was little justification for breaking them up. From Decide Matthews’ order: “There’s ample public remark, in addition to testimony throughout trial, that Eagle River Muldoon are respective ‘communities of curiosity,’ with little convincing data on the contrary. The Court docket sees that the Senate Districts ignore the Muldoon and Eagle River communities of curiosity with little or no justification.” After all, we’ve since had a pitched, partisan battle of public testimony in entrance of the board. How a lot that’ll matter because the Alaska Supreme Court docket reversed the load Decide Matthews gave to testimony is anybody’s guess.
For all of the forwards and backwards over what Decide Matthews meant together with his order, Decide Matthews didn’t have a lot to say about it throughout as we speak’s listening to. He did, nonetheless, level out that his order was not express about what ought to be achieved with Eagle River (one level for the Alaska Redistricting Board), but in addition identified that the Alaska Redistricting Board was ignoring the third bullet-point of his order that known as for the board to “make different revisions to the proclamation plan ensuing or associated to those modifications” with the errors round Senate Ok (one level, possibly, for East Anchorage).
Decide Matthews stated he may have a call on the East Anchorage attraction “quickly.”
The beginning of one other
With the understanding that it’s all conditioned on the result of the East Anchorage attraction, the top of the listening to concluded with a good bit of dialogue concerning the timeline and course of forward for the brand new problem being introduced ahead by a bunch of Girdwood residents. They filed their lawsuit yesterday, arguing the board repeated its aim of imposing Eagle River’s political benefit this time on the expense of the South Anchorage and Girdwood voters in Home District 9. The case largely mirrors the case that was efficiently argued by East Anchorage however is bolstered by having residents who stay in new constitutionally questionable districts and are additionally not financially tapped out.
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The one agency deadline set by Decide Matthews is Could 15 for a remaining determination within the plan, which he stated ought to give simply sufficient time for “one additional last-ditch attraction” to the Alaska Supreme Court docket earlier than the maps should be locked in for this yr’s legislative races. It appears like one other expedited schedule with the primary spherical of briefings anticipated to be due someday subsequent week. Oral arguments, if wanted, might be held the next week. A minimum of the Girdwood plaintiffs are getting a working begin as a result of they’re being represented by the authorized workforce—Eva Gardner, Mike Schechter and firm—that was concerned within the first spherical (that different case has been resolved so it’s not a joint illustration scenario).
A snowmachine carrying two juveniles on the Kuskokwim River drove into an open hole Saturday, resulting in the death of a 15-year-old, Alaska State Troopers said Sunday.
Troopers said in an online update that they were notified of the incident, which happened about 8 miles upriver from Kalskag, just after 6 p.m. Saturday. One boy was able to get out of the river to safety but Cole Gilila, 15, “disappeared under the ice,” troopers said.
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Volunteers with search and rescue came from Kalskag and Aniak to help find Gilila, and searchers recovered his body from the river around 8 p.m., according to troopers.
A truck driving on the ice road took the other snowmachine rider to the clinic in Kalskag, and the boy was reportedly in cold but uninjured condition, troopers said.
Gilila’s remains were being taken to Aniak, then on to the State Medical Examiner for an autopsy, according to troopers, who also said Gilila’s next of kin had been notified.
Part of a continuing weekly series on Alaska history by local historian David Reamer. Have a question about Anchorage or Alaska history or an idea for a future article? Go to the form at the bottom of this story.
For more modern historians, newspapers are one of the best resources, the most thorough and accessible surviving accounts of what daily life was once like. Flaws and all. Looking back at any given newspaper, it is essential to remember that everything printed was then considered important in one way or another. Certainly, some topics were more serious, but every story was written for a reason: to educate, elucidate or entertain. Still, some stories have longer lifespans than others. Values and perspectives evolve. With that said, let’s see what was on the front page of the Daily News 20, 40 and 60 years ago.
Jan. 5, 2005. Most of the stories on this front page either remain relevant or are too serious to forget. The title of an article about AIDS, “Americans with AIDS survive longer, but lives remain a struggle,” could be reused today. The biggest story on the front page was ongoing relief efforts in Indonesia after the Dec. 26, 2004, 9.2-9.4M Sumatra-Andaman earthquake. An estimated 227,898 people died in the ensuing tsunami, which reached 100 feet high.
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Concerns about the nomination of Alberto Gonzales for attorney general, from the article on the lower left, proved prescient. The Texan lawyer’s tenure as attorney general was marked by controversy over his support for interrogation techniques previously and subsequently considered illegal torture, including waterboarding. He resigned two years later “in the best interests of the department.”
On the other hand, there is the article about Holland America parking unused McKinley Explorer railcars outside Anchorage, a ploy to avoid higher taxes within the municipality. With all due respect to property taxes and the prominent cruise line, few locals have likely thought of this intersection in the years since.
Perhaps the most interesting article here is about a proposed extension of the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail from Elderberry Park to Ship Creek. Twenty years later, there’s still no connection. Prolonged, heated battles mark the entire history of the Coastal Trail. In the 1980s, property owners along the water, notably including Anchorage Daily Times owner Bob Atwood, loudly protested the creation of the trail. Likewise, fevered opposition by South Anchorage homeowners in the 1990s and early 2000s scuttled attempts to extend the trail to Potter Marsh. Maybe one day.
There were also teases for interior articles: Ryne Sandberg and Wade Boggs were enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame. The University of Southern California football team, in its Pete Carroll-led golden years, beat Oklahoma. And down in the lower right corner, Sen. Lisa Murkowski was sworn in for her second term as U.S. senator, the first after being elected to the office. As every good Alaskan already knows, her father, Gov. Frank Murkowski, appointed her to his vacant seat in 2002.
Jan. 5, 1985. If you were alive then, you are at least 40 years old today. Consider what happened 40 years before that, including the last year of World War II, the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the creation of the United Nations. In other words, FDR’s death was as recent for people in 1985 as “Careless Whisper” by Wham! is to people today.
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The passing of longtime Alaska Teamsters boss Jesse Carr, once the most powerful political force in the state, dominated the front page. Carr moved to Anchorage in 1951 and, by 1956, was leading the Teamsters Local 959, which became a statewide union the next year. During their mid-1970s pipeline construction heyday, there were about 28,000 dues-paying members, and the union possessed implicit control over Alaska. With their control over transportation and communication centers, Carr and the Teamsters could effectively shut down the state with a strike or other maneuvers. For example, in February 1975, he ordered safety meetings that closed the Elliott Highway supply line to pipeline construction camps.
Carr decided election outcomes. He won higher wages and extensive “womb to tomb” medical coverage for union membership. Friends prospered, and enemies tended to disappear. Consider Prinz Brau, the beer brand brewed in Anchorage from 1976 to 1979. They made an enemy of Carr, hence their short run. Once and future Alaska Gov. Wally Hickel declared, “Jesse Carr believed that by taking care of Alaska’s working men and women, Alaska itself would be built and bettered. That’s what he fought for and won, and that’s his legacy.”
The late Howard Weaver wrote the cover article and knew Carr as well as any journalist. In December 1975, Weaver, Bob Porterfield and Jim Babb published several articles collectively titled “Empire: The Alaska Teamsters Story.” This series dissected the Alaska Teamsters empire, their political power, and their impact on Alaska society down to the grocery store receipts. The reporters were awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, the newspaper’s first.
After the pipeline was completed, the Local 959′s membership and influence began to wane. A lengthy strike against the Anchorage Cold Storage Co. in the early 1980s exposed the union’s dwindling power, including several lost decertification elections by units at Cold Storage. In 1986, just a year after Carr’s death, Local 959 filed for bankruptcy protection.
The other front-page articles are a wide-ranging assortment. A new state law went into effect raising the minimum automobile insurance, which naturally meant busy days for insurance agents. A research analyst revealed that special operations forces were being trained to carry lightweight nuclear bombs behind enemy lines. And a new World Health Organization statistical yearbook revealed varying death rates around the world. The featured bit of trivia was in the article title, that a French person was statistically safer in a car than on a ladder.
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Jan. 5, 1965. In 2025, we are as far from 1965 as the people in 1965 were from 1905, from President Joe Biden to President Lyndon B. Johnson to President Teddy Roosevelt. From Taylor Swift to the Beatles to Claude Debussy. Or perhaps readers are more familiar with other 1905 musical luminaries, like Billy Murray, Byron G. Harlan or the Haydn Quartet.
The lead story was a tragic fire at the Willow Park Apartments, what is now the eastern and southern strips of the downtown Anchorage Memorial Cemetery. Pearl Lockhart was forced to watch from outside as her three children — Leonard III, Barnetta and Lawrence — died in the blaze. Investigators later concluded the fire began while one or more of the children were playing with matches, which ignited a toy box and, from there, spread up the walls. Anchorage in the mid-1960s was rocked by a series of deadly fires partially attributable to aging building stock of questionable quality, generous grandfather clauses and inconsistent code policing within city limits. Other notable fires in this era include the Sept. 12, 1966 Lane Hotel arson with 14 deaths and a Dec. 26, 1966 fire on East 14th Avenue that killed Bennie Harrison, his fiancée Alanna Jeanine Shull and her four children.
Another article notes ongoing debate on a proposed downtown parking garage. Many modern urban planners, with cause, deride expansive parking lots and towering parking garages as a form of urban blight, choking more pleasant developments. However, Anchorage residents by the mid-1960s had been demanding increased downtown parking for two decades, as evidenced in polls, multiple studies, letters and newspaper comments. Still, the issue of this particular parking garage became heavily politicized, with extensive public campaigning by both advocates and naysayers before the proposal was defeated in an election later that year. Construction began on Anchorage’s first multistory parking garage next to JC Penney in 1966 and finished in 1967.
In other news, President Johnson invited Soviet leaders to visit the United States, another small moment in the lengthy back-and-forth of the Cold War. A Viet Cong attack at Binh Gia. A Greater Anchorage Area Borough Assembly meeting. And author T. S. Eliot died in London. His best-known works include the poems “The Wasteland,” “The Hollow Men” and “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” the latter a personal favorite.
How many of these events do you remember? How many of these events have you ever heard of? It is something to consider. What events of today will be remembered 20, 40 or 60 years from now?
ELLENSBURG, Wash. (Jan. 4) – Senior guard Jazzpher Evans delivered 13 points and six assists to power a balanced attack Saturday for the Alaska Anchorage women’s basketball team in a 68-61 victory over Central Washington at Nicholson Pavilion. The Seawolves (13-2, 4-0 Great Northwest Athletic Conference) also got 11 points, five rebounds and three steals from senior point guard Emilia Long as they outshot the hosts .518 (29-56) to .327 (18-55). The Wildcats (9-3, 2-1) were led by 22 points, five rebounds and four assists from guard Asher Cai in a battle of teams receiving votes in the NCAA Div.…