AFFR Presents Plan They Say Meets All Requirements

Carl Marrs and Joe McKinnon

As mentioned in my compass piece in the ADN today, the Redistricting Board's plan has problems with contiguity and is questionable in other areas.  This plan is purported to keep nine Native districts and meet the other state and federal requirements.  

AFFR - Alaskans for Fair Redistricting is presenting their plan.
4 Native Majority House Districts
2 Native Minority House
2Narive Minority Senate
Pairs H35 - Kodiak with Aleutians

Included everyone identified as Native and part Native as DOJ will.
Preserves much of the Board's proposals for rural Alaska but eliminates non-contiguous pairings.
Interior highway and Bethel is also like Boards.
YK Delta to Denali Borough - has vulnerability in ours and the board's draft plan.  But some commonalities.  SE integration not as strong as other districts, but should be ok for VRA.
H35 includes Kodiak, and several others - SEldovia
H36 Aleutians, loses in Chiknik and picks up ...
Parts connected with S Anchorage are now back in Kenai.
AFFR plan for Fairbanks similar to previous, but excess is placed in Interior, not Nome.
Anchorage - similar to previous and s. Anchorage no longer connected to Kenai.
Military bases split.  Plan for Anchorage has better neighborhood cohesion than any other we've seen.
Adjusted plan avoids placing incumbents in same districts, except in SE and except for 7, no incumbents are paired.  Our maps show homes of incumbents, existing districts shown in black lines.
Concerned that board's plan unnecessarily pairs incumbents.  Has the appearance of gerrymandering not legally defensible and could make the plan vulnerable and hurt public confidence.
Concerned Lisa Handley's analysis is incomplete or unreleased - so we are all shooting in the dark.  Without this, we hired our own consultant, Engstrom's analysis is included in the plan.

Prof. Ingstrom Richard Engstrom examined races between Native and non-Native - he concluded the voting record was similar in the prior decade and similar to what Handley reported ten years ago, so that the 35% would be ok.  Engstrom's analysis also used voting age, also similar to Handley.

Given the lack of a plan so far, we suggest extending the time for public comment one week.
We're presenting a plan that meets all the federal and state criteria.

Torgerson:  Thank you.  Appreciate the work.

White:  Thank you guys for all the hard work.  VRA expert you had.  Ms. Handley in her last report 2001, which wasn't issued until May ?? - she indicated last time in district you have as 38, you needed 49% to be effective.

Not Marrs:  I believe he reviewed the existing District??  - We can ask about that and get a response for the board.

White:  Yes, that would be helpful.  Ms. Handley did say 38 needed more to make that district effective.

McKinnon:  He looked at the 2006 and 2008 elections.

White:  provided us with ??? everything but SE.  Is that right?  Any of those native incumbents being paired?

McKinnon::  Representative Thomas.

White:  You have Saxman in 1 or ?

McKinnon::  Saxman in 1.  We pulled Haines and Skagway out because they have low Native populations.

White:  Alaska plus Native or Alaska plus all?

McKinnon::  Plus All.  His analysis based on total Native plus all.

White:  I think AI+AN is total population.  Page 9 of your report.  What is AI/AN?

McKinnon::  American Indian/Alaska Native

White:  Page 13, table - number your VRA expert used?


McKinnon::  Difficult to make analysis if population below 35%.  Based on voting age population, but didn't feel significant difference.  % lower than that might result in Native ???

White:  District 2 35.7 is total population, then based it on that, a little lower.  A % or two below that didn't matter.

McKinnon::  There were no results between 17 and 35%.  Reluctant to draw conclusions because of lack of data.

White:  2 maps you provided have diffeent numbers.  30 and 34 are the same districts but have different numbers.  Kenai = 30, then Kenai = 34    Tenana Chiefs part of AFFR?  They were not happy about being reduced from majority to effective.  Did they endorse this.

McKinnon::  They have not. 

9:26 Break