Democrats Ready to Present

Chair Torgerson relented after Valdez and said the Democrats could present after the public testimony when there was some downtime if Jake Metcalf didn't get here on time.

They were ready at 2:30, but he wasn't here and they were ready to go to public testimony, but then he walked in.  While Torgerson was clearly not pleased, he deferred to Board Member Greene's request to let the Democrats present their "Rights Plan."

Metcalfe is now testifying.  He's going over the criteria which sound like the mandated criteria from the Fed and State.  The room is considerably emptier now than it was. 

Respected Borough and city borders.
Respected Alaska Native representation.
Two Plan alternatives doing our best effort to meet all the principles.

1.  Fair and Balanced.  Our preferred.
2.  Four - Two Plan.  Four Alaska Native majority districts, Two influential districts. 

There are a bunch of maps on poster board on easels and I'm not sure where things are going.  It's much easier to move around now because the Valdez and others folks have emptied the front rows.  But they are pointing the maps to the board and I'm behind them. 

Let me move around.  I did a lot of their tour of the plan on video.  I'll try to get some maps and the video up later.

Now they are working on the Four-Two Plan.  Metcalfe is using the 'socio-economic integration' mantra (it's one of the criteria for justifying why a district is put together as it is) a lot.  In the first plan what caught my eye was that Kenai Peninsula was altogether except for Seward.  Which turns out to be in a district that goes across Prince William Sound to Cordova.  I'll try to get a map. 

They're closing up now. It's 3:05pm.  

In questioning from Attorney White about retrogression, Metcalfe's response is that we're down one district, but these districts are going to stand for ten years.  These are honest numbers and these majorities aren't going to dissipate after a year. 
Four-Two plan you add another influence district.