Redistricting Board Meeting - Calista and AFFER and McKinnon Discuss Their Maps

[I'm listening to the Board online from LA, this is long.  I tried to summarize briefly after this note, then my very rough notes as I listened.]

Overview: 

• Board attorney White went over definitions of Socio-Economic Integration (SEI).  Seemed to be addressing last week's testimony from Cooper Landing (that North Kenai was not connected to South Anchorage) and Gazewood & Weiner testimony (that rural Alaska may be connected to Fairbanks, but had no connection to Ester).  Citing Court rulings that if Kenai is connected to Anchorage in general, then N Kenai could be connected to S Anchorage. 

There was a request to winnow down the many plans, though Board member Brodie said there were good parts of maps that otherwise were not good that might be useful.  They surmised that the latest maps of Calista and AFFER would be all they needed.  Then had them come to the table to explain where they were. 

• Calista had two maps.  Final Best plan is Calista Option 4 but if the Board was going to split Matsu two ways, then Calista Option 2 Revised.
• AFFER - New map submitted this morning at 9am, Board didn't have it.  Ruedrich went through the whole state.  Said mostly similar to Calista but different with Matsu double split and some Fairbanks, but mostly like Calista. 
• McKinnon - private citizen - deviation 9.6, but keeps all ANCSA Regional Corps intact and all Boroughs except Fairbanks and Anchorage intact.  

 Also some discussion of "Brave New World" after Shelby County v Holder decision that low deviation is now much more important than before.



Here are the very rough notes.  Don't quote, but use to get a sense of what happened.  Lots missing or paraphrased. 

ALASKA REDISTRICTING BOARD MEETING
411 W 4th Avenue, Suite 302
Anchorage, AK 99501
Phone:
907-269 -7402

JULY 5, 2013 FRIDAY
11:00 AM
Anchorage office
AGENDA
11:00 AM

11:00am - I can hear the Board, but clearly the meeting hasn't begun.
Brodie - summer weather in here
noises

1. Call to Order
Torgerson:  Call to order.  Five after 11.

  
2. Roll Call of Members
Roll call - all members present
3.Approval of Agenda  - approved
4.Discussion of Social-Economic Integration
White:  Compact and contiguity clear.  Go over SEI - Constitution
where people work together, ?? together, earn their living together.  Can't be defined with math precision.  Can be figured.  Economic unit inhabited by people.
Courts have said - proof of actual interaction and interconnectedness more than mere homogeneity.  Other things;  common interests in ??;  transportation, ferry, Native characteristics, geographical proximity, ferry.  services hub.  Court has said 'relative' not minimal, but some flexibility, given the sheer size geographically.
One of the issues raised in ???, idea of how to measure SEI, when have to combine two different areas - like Kenai and Anchorage.  Court has said they are.  In Kenai case in late 80s.  combined N Kenai with Anchorage - challenged.  No connectedness with N Kenai and South Anchorage - maybe with Anchorage, but not S Anchorage.  Court clear, don't look at specific areas, but can look - let me get exact wording:  will be upheld if reasonable not arbitrary.  Previously upheld comparison.  .  . Issue here whether interaction with hd7 and not just n Kenai, and surrounding areas as well.  Kenai as a whole and Anchorage as a whole.  Since then no dispute, Kenai and Anchorage a clearly SEI.  Not just N K and SA, but surrounding area.
Questions?
Torgerson:  No questions for Mr. White?  Anything else?
PeggyAnn McConnochi:  If people in N Kenai go to Dr. in S Anchorage?  Some indication.  But if go to Dr. in N Anchorage or Airport not in S Anchorage, still there.
Sufficient of N Kenai and S Anchorage results from interaction with Anchorage.  . . .Actual is minimal, but nexus between Kenai and Anchorage.  That nexus is what's important, not the two areas of N. Kenai and S. Anchorage.
Same argument was raised last in 2001 - Valdez challenged S anchorage SEI, trial level upheld.  SEI not tied just to S Anchorage area, but Anchorage-Valdez nexus.
Torgerson:  Other Questions.  Alright.  Brings us to 4 Discussion of draft plans.
5.Discussion of draft plans
McConnochie:  Is there  a way to reduce the number of plans?
Brodie:  difficult in that one plan treats one part of the state better, but we don't like another part.  Looks like it will be a mix and match.
Green:  Thank you for raising that.  It would be helpful to focus ?? limited time we have, throughout our hearing this has been mentioned - why we have so many maps.
 Holm:  Maybe we should just go thru the options, like Calista 1-4, if offering all four maybe we should assume 4 is the latest and look at that and remove the others.  Same with Board.  We have ABCDEF and I don't know which we think 2 or 3 most appropriate.  Way to eliminate some of those.  Then Gazewood & Weiner and AFFER and Gateway and that gets us down to 5 or 6 and work from there.
Brodie, Hard.  Some have attractive small portions tho the rest we don't want.  So take a look at start with A and see if there is a portion of that, or knock out the whole plan.  If we want to do that, I'm willing to knock out C the one I drew.  Things I would change, particularly N. Slope drawn to get numbers even.  Not knocking out SE portion or city portions. . . .
McConnochie.  Since four from Calista.  Not clear, hard to pull map off the computer.

 Torgerson :  Would you like to hear from Calista to see what they intend.  Not planning to open hearings again, but . .  One filed 21st which was our deadline for filing maps.  AFFER also because they have 3 or 4 plans.  Let me take a small break and we can pull up table and let people talk.

11:25am Rustling of papers, some talking, waiting for Brodie to return from bathroom
11:27am  Back to order, invite Marcia Davis and Tom Begich
??:  We got another this morning?
Davis:  Just Southeast . . .
Torgerson :  We need another mike, bring that table to center.  Teleconference mics.
My name is Marcia Davis - Calista general counsel
My name is Tom Begich - consultant to Calista
Davis:  to avoid confusion start with punchline.  Where we stand today, we've been listening to testimony, evolving like the Board, based on testimony and concerns and knowledge we acquired, Our final best plan is Calista Option 4, there is another SE that we sent over today.  Meets our ANCSA corporation need, political boundaries to max extent possible.  Considered that AFFER was pushing double split of Matsu, not sure, we wanted to have  double split that allowed the Native interests.  That's our option - changes to Native areas - Shish to Bering Strait and Arcti Village to 39, needed ot move Koyukuk??  If Board goes to dobule shift in Matsu want to be prepared. 
Either Calista option 4 with whatever SE  or Calista 2 Revised
Begich:  ???  Opiton 2 one worked with AFFER group  - disagreement in FB and some Senate pairings.  essentially the same of 36 of 40 house district. 
Marcia:Just to respect to house districts, but not senate pairings.
PAM repeat
Tom Begich:  If Board does double Matsu split - our 2 revised matches AFFER close, they have Juneau to Hobard Bay, assume B wants to keep hold, we honor B there.  Same split with J.  Fairbanks - AFFER aligned more moves Eilson to rural, NP different, fundamental difference pairings

Bethel 37 up into Doyon - Coastal Native and Interior - prime objection, we paired Native Interior to Interior rural/FB district.  Taken with comment that Natalie Landreth made about Coastal Natives have such strong focus on fisheries and Coastal delivery and we feel really strongly that Western Coast Natives need to stay linked in Senate pairings too.  Does real injustice, have no issues in common, tail wagging dog.  Common issues fuel delivery, transportation, shopping.  We realize that if they're contiguous good enough, but 37 doesn't touch 3?  - not contiguous.  Don't have native preclearing issue but doesn't mean we can ignore it.  They came up highway with Valdez - we linked to seven, we linked to 5.
Begich:  Ruedrich - all three of Senate seat five that FB is entitled to should be paired together. 
Davis:  Only if Board feels comfortable breaking Matsu twice,
Begich:  Very low deviations.
Brodie:  N and W Alaska same as four.
Begich:  Six is virtually identical, Delta?? together.  Don't break Matsu 2x  - then 10E has to be paired either to Matsu or Anchorage.  Easier to pair to Anchorage break - there's the break right there, incorporates 500 Matsu residents.  Maintains Chugiak district Anchroage has had and pairs it to the road district with Matsu to Valdez.  Only way to have only one Matsu break.  You can link Valdez to Anchorage - by law - and this seems to be the best way.  If break Matsu just once, this is the only way.  Tried to match lines Mayor proposed as Colligan said to follow Mayor's.  Couldn't match exactly.
Torg:  Kenai still divided twice.
Begich:  All maps take ?? out of B.  Know we have to break twice.  Tried to take Native pop in Nanwalek and to lower coastal district - Halibut Cove and Far eastern part of Homer, but not Homer.  Three fully populated borough districts (H Kena Soldotna)  Three Boroughs in Kenai . . .
Brodie:  Took Nanwalek for Native population?
Begich:  Yes.  Neither community likes to be connected to Kenai.  Driven by deviation.
Brodie:  ??? 32 along the Coast  . . .
Begich:  Blocks red and green, huge blocks make the water connection.
White:  Only contiguous by water 32 - connect across the bottom.
Begich: Could, but creates crazy angles - by Seward - no population.  Board's ability to draw straight line. 
White:  what happens to deviation if pick part of Matsu and put . .
Begich:  About 550 people - about 3%.  If you did that a wholly enclosed Matsu.  But we were shooting for low deviation.  Case law political boundaries can be reason for higher deviation.  Overall, minus to plus is 1.37%  40 goes down to -.88, still under one percent.  to .48 positive. 
Torg:  Homer group? 
Begich:  Still dealing with about 3%, but because underpopulation one and overpopulating another comes to 6%, but Board can do this.
White:  are there villages you moved into 40 where population was a factor?
Begich:  You could take Koyukuk and take back in 6 is a coherent group of village.  As long as keeping groupings together, they are comfortable.  Villages around ruby and Galena, McGrath villages together,  Relationship between Ahtna and upper Tanana, Matt Ganley also testified on that.  Short answer is, all Athabascan.  Always bring more Athabascan in, but changes deviation.  this puts all villages together but pops the deviation a bit.
Brodie: ???? North Slope hard to hear him.
Begich:  More than 3 now.  Can't speak for TCC or Doyon.  As long as groupings together they were satisfied.  Would put more Ath villages together but throw deviations out
Brodie:  Well worry about that.
Begich:  Sure, but upper Koyukuk about 700 people . .
Brodie:
Begich:  Shishmareff represented about 550 people.  Bering Straits didn't want Shish out.  The others were taken to balance Shish to Bering Straits.  Bettles addition keeps upper part together.  Start drawing the map very differently if you do that.  Letter from NWAB at this point, may speak to that. 
Holm:  I'm curious, Mr. White, how we defend SEI compatibility between Fairbanks and Barrow, Metlakatla and Barrow if that is challenged?  Concerned with SEI and with the different groups wanting to be grouped.
White:  Public testimony with what they would like to see, not always compatible with law.  Comes down to if we can move these villages here and meet their needs, but raises deviation above allowable.  1990 case called Athabascan and ?? possible combination.  30 years ago.  Might be an issue there about SEI, Marie, Marcia.
PAM;  Would like to hear from Marcia.  Marie and I did a lot of work in that area, got a lot of testimony.  Why do you feel comfortable with that.
Davis:  Working villages a long time, listened to folks, Lawyer in me plus the person having all this discussion answers:  1st US and Alaska Constitution dictates maximum deviation.  If you move off it, need to justify.  Excuse to move off deviation needed.  Presumption established.  Not unique we have Athabascan cultures intermixed in other cultures.  It exists in multiple place.  Because region so huge but sparsely populated, so necessary.  Doyon's testimony so huge that they have operated in clusters, ability to travel and communicate across every cluster impossible.  If clusters are intact, they're ok.  With that objective met here.  Then how comfortable in context of larger district.  Pipeline corridor, economic, similar lifestyle - subsistence, caribou, moose managed for subsistence.  Positive thin, when we went back, Lime Village, Calista, but they go to McGrath for shopping.  Even those Calista, has Athabascan connection.  Same with Middle Yukon villages.  Highest order - Athabascan with other Athabascan - not possible, but can honor it at cluster area. 
Holm:  I bring this up because I spent a lot of time in ?? pass and ??? river.  All their relatives are in Ft. Yukon, not North Slope.  They have the connections with the eastern Athabascan families.  Just seems as if they really don't have any connection to N Slope at all.  Hard for me to believe they can do it for SEI connections.  Just for deviations, that's my concern at this juncture. 
Davis:  One thing Board has to face.  it's a new world for you.  In past battle around VRA,  VRA said other things have to yield to VRA.  With that missing, battle more around deviations.  You definitely got hammered hard on SEI because deviations weren't the weak points.  But now those are gone and now pure hand of equal protection.
White:  Holm has good memory, Trial court from last Feb.  While the B think deviations necessary, simply said, the Board must meet low deviations. 
If that deviation caused by making more compact or SEI that will be acceptable.  Now more safe harbor at 10%.  Before only applied to Anchorage, now to most urban areas with large districts that can be shifted.  If now applied to rural areas - Davis says, this is a brave new world.  Does that mean you should have lower deviations?  If put villages there - if you feel not SEI with other part, if go from 1 to 6% probably be acceptable if making it more compact. 
Brodie:  We could carry deviation in extreme we could divide Ft. Yukon in half.  Same in urban area, go down highway and grab 3 houses across the street to get low deviations.
White:  Deviation a laudable goal, but US and Alaska SC recognize - urban and rural different standards.  In the States, given 10% leeway, even our court has allowed above 10%, but I don't think that's allowable any more.  Playing between 10 and 1, if have rational reasonable justification.  Wish we could be 1.4, but want this SEI.
Begich:  reason for grouping, don't take one or two of the villages, move them as a group.  Your comment about splitting Ft. Yukon is reason why we did this.  Maintained all the city boundaries.  North Pole for example.  Don't want to split neighborhoods.  Sadly struck down by Court ten years ago, didn't care about neighborhoods in larger area. 
????: 
Begich:  Toatal, from my head, about including Eilson, about 8500, Salcha and about 4000 to the north. . .
White:  If Board feels SEI needs, deviation in FB pretty close too.
Begich:  Yes, in urban core the better off for rural FB.  Two Rivers Road below 6c, ????
3b anywhere there, a population more closely integrated with NP,  You have options.  Begins to become rural quickly if go to Hot spring road.
Torgerson:  Thanks, Randy, you be ready  We want to eliminate some plans, you have four I believe, Calista had 5 and now down to 2.
Ruedrich:  Morning Mr. Torgerson, guess it's afternoon.  to assure you world is dynamic, we have filed another plan this morning which eliminates all the rest.  Adopts slight variations between Calista and ours, They will now be identical except for some zero blocks.  Emailed this morning about 9 o'clock.  Current version of option 2 modified slightly.  Let's talk about SE initially.

This map, we filed this am, district 33 as Calista has we have not modified in any way shape or form.  then left - Juneau north D31, intact over these many maps.  Reduced its deviation, put those people back into 32, south of the airport.  Main change is Hobart Bay area, and island ???? on in 34.  34 larger bulk visually, but doesn't change population, puts entire Petersburg in 34.  Green area bigger, southern portion of rust color go way, makes S district more compact.  Think of those 33 people west of Hydaburg - they would be better served in D33.  No people on island west of Hydaburg.  Makes a better map, but worse deviation.  If want more compact, that's the place.
Torg:  Can you back up and tell me diffs between Calista and your new one.
Ruedrich:  in SE no differences.  All I've spoken to so far.
Now lets go to Western Arctic, High Arctic.  Our map is again, virtually identical when we talked about N Inupiat district. Western Nome District, D37 and D36 identical.  Only dealing with House.  Pairings meaningless now.
Agree with Calista concept.  Had to increase size in all because no longer reason to maximize Native districts.  ?? on perimeter.  I've worked with Doyon and TCC more than other groups and I understand reason.  When they recruited for roustabouts, they recruited in those villages.  Had direct tie to their areas.  I was hesitant to take Huslia and rest of Koyukuk valley, Realized that Arctic Village didn't fit.  Matt Ganley convinced me what we did was back idea.  Koyukuk, ??, Upper Kuskokwim, all TCC sub regions, in different district.  They still work together, as we try to populate Coastal region where we run out of people if we don't take them.
PeggyAnn McConnochie:  In your talks with them . . .
Ruedrich:  I haven't talked to them but I lived there years ago, it's valid what Davis says.
White?  Senate pairings?
Ruedrich:  Tried to scrub letters but didn't work
White:  Not defending non-contiguous.
Ruedrich:  Please disregard the letters.
Back to South Kenai and other portion of the world.  Breaking boundaries is something we pay close attention to Constitution recognizing political entities.  Kenai B has been split - Hope has been taken out in past, Seldovia, often not part.  In this case, with view to bring deviations down and bring SEI into play, we have again split the Kenai B significantly.  West side in 36, historically attached to some district on West side.  took significant # of people out , sorry put in a sig number in to 35 and allowed us to drop Yakutat.  Beluga and Tyonek and Port Graham and Nanwalek, breaks the boundary in two places, is proper....  took from S kenai, Katchemak Bay, Fox River and ??? Creek to replace the surplus population and put into 35, smaller than before and put Yakutat back in.  Almost identical to Calista and I think serves Kenai well.  Single southern of Homer, Anchor River, and ??
Brodie:  Upper Katch Bay - east end road?
Ruedrich:  Some of the last ones on east are attached to road system.  Don't believe people on West . .
Brodie:  For deviation - if some can't drive to Homer, to their voting place???
Ruedrich:  I think we've done that, not sure.
Brodie:  Whittier?
Ruederich:  Surplus pop problem,  detail could be revisited.  Whittier is kind of a unique small population, definitely PWS, not Anchorage, though once were.
Holm:  36, Port Graham?
Ruedrich:  ????
?  How many people?
??: Native villages, not connected by road at all?
Ruedrich:  Seldovia not attached by road, there is a small area that is more native, but larger non-native pop in general area. 
Moving into Anchorage.  No changes, except editorial in beginning.  There were some map in 25 boundary, but eliminated we found a better way.  Some tiny tweaks unless questions.  Deviation under 1% for city.  Probably about .9.  Some toward Matsu, we reduced populations from original.  In city from 13 to 27, no net change.  Moved small population on perimeter of 27 to ???13??
Ruedrich:  Let's look at valley.  matsu.  used 2002, 2012, most rapidly growing part of state of Alaska, paired on S side surplus with Anchorage and also with highway corridor to Valdez.  Highway communities have sued i the past wanting to stay together.  Delta, etc. Valdez is not paired with Anchorage in any way shape or form.  Valdez has asked not to be paired with Anchorage.  Picks up surplus population with eastern portion of Matsu B.  From SEI those villages are like eastern villages of Matsu B.  Maybe they'll draw a better Borough i the future.
White:  Help us understand split with anchorage and Valdez.  Splits Matsu twice.  Rational? 
Ruedrich:  Find no way to put Anchorage surplus population elsewhere.  Solid boundary on Anchorage Kenai front.  Courts have looked before said this is ok.  Only think Matsu did is grow one more full district.  Did in 1990, 2000 cycle and will again in 2020 probably.  More people more SEI than the highway commuters driving from chugiak, Palmer, or Wasilla to Anchorage caught i the snow.
Brodie:  ??? Calista plan eastern border of Alaska with Anchorage and N. Kenai - treated different way of moving around the population. 
Ruedrich:  Begich reminded me their double split Matsu is identical to ours (not totally clear.)
building map starts north of Yakutat, putting Y into 35, no population north of that.  So gttig to Ahtna, combined with Indian pops of upper Tanana fit together with traditional Athabascan groups of upper and middle Yukon.  Keeping Doyon and Ahtna people to south, those four groups in D38.  You'll find we built the urban population for 38, go back to other one and expand, zoom in please, easier to see.  38 wraps around FB, villages on the West, Upper Tanana villages to the east, middle Tanana is right there in front of you.  Rural areas to the east to S. boundaries of NPole to Chatanika precinct.  Rough equal urban NSB resident and non- NSB resident.  9000 something and 9000 something.  Bringing other FB districts to truly minimum deviataion,  .4% .3% 3 people under if look at FB map. 
Takes Wainright bombing range and north.  Come up into FB, have the City of FB only in D4, eastern NSB of fB added and gives us a compact city district, which probably would share a senator - one of the litigation issues earlier,  No FB district S FB district surrounding FB.  Broken once along purple red interface.  closed to Denali on south and district 38 on this map???
White:  Help us understand, on right hand side bottom border with 38, split some population there.  Why there instead of elsewhere.
Ruedrich:  Tried to keep people live on that road system, there, together.  That's there way back to civilization.  Corridor of interest.  River.  Chatanika, more rural, and needed significant population to do this.  Respected NPole and north of there to gain population.
White:  Maps you offered i past.  No dispute, all courts said, have to go with rural-urban. In past you did from west side.  What's your change on that?
R:  Not a big difference.  People on east equally rural to people on west side.  Maybe more a matter of how you try to create d 1 and 2 that makes sense.  Northwest borough makes sense this way.  If shift further wind up with undesirable 1&2 Boundary, gives clear division for ?? Borough
White:  You made some choices but other reasonable choices?
R:  Absolutely,  I kind of like the one we had before.
PAM:  Zoom in on 3 and 4? 
R:  All thee people by def are SEI within a Borough.  Makes no difference where you draw the lines.  People have some reason to be together.  Who works and plays together.
White:  Only changes from this map in SE? 
R:  yes, I have to look, we've drawn enough maps.
White:  Thank you.
We have a map given us Friday.  Mr. McKinnon ??? is here.  Worried about timeline?
MAP?  ????
John McKinnon - presenting this as private individual.  Has overall deviation of 9.6% in FB, Anchorage, Juneau less than 1%.  Principle feature it adheres to Borough boundaries. only Anchorage and FB are broken.
White:  Not broken at all, or not more than once?
McKinnon:  Not at all.  Either whole B in one district, or if multiple seats, all seats are within the B.  Also more than others, it adheres to ANCSA boundaries.  People ask what Doyon wants, I think this is what Doyon wants.  All but few Doyon villages there.  Bering Straits from Calista.  Bristol Bay, Aleutian district.  Kenai Borough, Matsu has population for five seats, Kenai for three.  This gives them their 3 and 5.  Doesn't carve out Nanwalke and Seldovia.  Does create one aspect Board might want to look at.  Kenai is self contained, leaf from Kodiak to Cordova - about 145 miles running from east of tule island to Johnstone Bay on Montague, but same magnitude with interim plan, District 9 from Nunavak Island to ??? also about 139 miles,  Same order of magnitude.  If Board is uncomfortable, I've identified three unoccupied islands, that would violate geography of Kenai Borough would still keep population of Kenai in three boroughs.  Takes Valdez ??? becomes part of the highway district.  Begich in earlier testimony last week explained justification.  Includes most of Ahtna district.  SE forms district out of Ketchikan and Wrangle.  Sitka and Petersburg. . .. . [missed this.]
Fairbanks - wither district that , based primarily, two city districts combine for senate district, takes West population Ester and U and forms district there, and then north of city, then another based on North Pole.  Maintains a Doyon district out Chena Hot Springs Road, more rural areas of Borough.  Eilson.  Rational - Tom argued in his presentation - less connected with FB area, potential, that population could be moved to Anchorage if fighter right developed and would strengthen Doyon villages. 
I think that covers it.  It is 9.6% deviation.  Based on existing law.  Talk about more mathematical precision.  Now the standard is 10% outside of urban Boroughs.  Once inside Borough boundaries no longer dealing with SEI.  In rest of the state, SC acknowledged a lot of SEI factors need to be adjusted for. 
White:  You said 5.6
McKinnon -5.6 is Bethel, +4 is Homer based.
White:  How many people out of FB put in . . .
McKinnon:   half the people, about 8500.  Valdez about ???
White:  All the rural districts underpopulated?
McKinnon:  yes.  Bush districts -4.6 about -5  - allows you to maintain regional corporations
White:  Thank you very much.

Lets take a ten minute break before we go to work session.  You can ask questions of presenters, then we'll be back about 1:10. 

Finished here before working session. 

6.Board work session
7.Executive Session on litigation strategies (if Necessary)
8.Adjourn

Trying to Understand Problems I See At The Alaska Redistricting Board

This post is going to look at problems I see with the Alaska Redistricting Board.  This is meant to be descriptive more than judgmental, though some would point out that the word 'problem' itself is judgmental.    I’m reasonably certain about the actions I am reporting on, but I’m much less certain about the reasons.   This was going to be a series of posts so I wouldn’t overwhelm readers.  Or myself.  But while separating them makes it easier to talk about them, they really are all tangled together. 

Key problems I see:

1. Public Access problems
1. The Board doesn't say much about what it's doing and why
2. The website - I’ll cover that in its own section, but basically things get moved, disappear, return, show up in different places, critical things don’t get posted,
3. The state public notice website - the Board's official public notice, the only one that make sure they keep up to date, is the state's public notice website.  This is site that most people have never heard of, unless they are regularly looking to get contracts with the state.  It's not a place that most people check out regularly, or even know exists. It's much more user friendly now than when the Board started, but if you google "Alaska Redistricting Board"  it doesn't show up in the first ten pages of results (I stopped there.)
4. One way on-the-record communication with public - The Board does not answer questions from the public on the record.  Board meetings have no public participation.  At public hearings the public has three minutes to say something.  The Board can ask questions,  Other than that,  it’s all one-way communication and no conversation.  People can ask the Board members questions during breaks, but anything that challenges what the Board is doing tends to be met with resistance.  Thus we don't know much about what the board is doing or why.
1. It's hard keeping track of what the board is doing
2. It's harder to understanding the motivation of the Board
3. It's hard understanding what the differences are between all the plans
5. When I asked a Board member about the disappearance of the court documents from the website, I was told that people should be able to go to the court websites and get them on their own.  The Board didn't need to do all that for the public.
   I know the Board likes to say they are by far the most accessible redistricting board in Alaska history.  And I've said before, that's not a high standard.  Besides, technology has changed radically in the last ten years so they should be the most accessible.  But I do appreciate the access I've been able to have via the Legislative Information Office and via telephone when the either the Board or I am not in Anchorage.
   
   
2. Changing rules about when plans are due, and lack of rules for approving them, etc.
1. The Board created seven plans.  Why?  Why not three or ten?  There was no public discussion of the purpose of the options or criteria for deciding which ones to keep or not keep.  They simply approved them all.     
2. The Board had a deadline of noon, June 21 for third-party plans.  They then voted to approve all three state plans plus one Southeast plan.  There was no discussion of criteria for approving plans. 
3. The Board then accepted more third party plans and posted them the day before the first public hearing.  There was no explanation of why they accepted plans after the deadline.  There hadn't been another meeting for them to change the rules or to accept more plans after the deadline.  It just happened. 
4. When the Board added new and amended third-party plans after the deadline, it was problematic because others might not have submitted a plan or made changes because they thought that a deadline was a deadline.  At the very least the other group to submit a plan should have been notified that adjustments could still be made.  So I contacted Gazewood & Weiner, who had also submitted a third-party plan but not an amended one.  I talked to Michael Wallerie.  I wanted to know:
1. If the Board had notified them that the deadline had been extended  [he said no]
2. If the Board had sent the amended and new plans to them [he said no, but Calista had sent them their plans, but AFFER did not]
   
3. The sheer number of different plans plus the Board's lack of information about each of their plans means the public has lots of data, but very little information.  The public hearing had seventeen plans for the public to read.  But there was no information about how the Board plans differed from each other or why. (This overlaps a lot with number 5 below.)
   
4. Problems with the Board’s websiteLet me preface by saying I've gotten a lot of important information from the Board's website. 
1. Keeping the website current has always been something of a problem.  But toward the end of the first round of creating plans, the website had begun to have useful information and much of it was fairly timely.  
1. New maps got put up quickly.  
2. There was a link with all the documents filed with the Courts.  
3. But it took a little longer than forever for meeting transcripts to get posted. When the last executive director left, the website went to sleep.
2. Information has disappeared, been moved, reappeared, and otherwise been hard to find
1. The list of court documents - a very useful feature - disappeared.  I think.  I recently found it again.  But I had complained about it to three different Board people and none told me it was still there.  There's now even a litigation document link on the main page, but it says 'updated 6/28/12'.
2. Old maps from the prior round disappeared - though links I had to them from this blog continued to work.  And recently I found the Amended Proclamation Plan in a new location.  
3. Board meetings, when they were announced on the website, were usually on the main page.  Recently I looked for a meeting announcement and couldn't find it.  Later I found they were on the calendar - not a bad place, except the calendar hadn't ever been used before. 
4. The best way to keep track of what's happening with the Board is through their subscription email.  That link is almost on the bottom of the right column on the main page. 
5. The website problems were mentioned in one of the recent Court orders and I was told that the Board had contracted with a website managing company to keep the site up-to-date.  This is positive, but they really need someone who understands the Board's process and what the public needs to direct how the website is used.  Making a user friendly website isn't easy.  The Board has different information scattered all over the place in different formats.  There is no one person any more who knows the process who is also managing the site.
    
5. Lack of discussion at Board meetings about their different maps, how they were different, why they had those differences, etc.
1. Third parties were asked to present their plans at the public hearings.  They were given 30 minutes to do this.  They tended to explain the factors that were important in creating their maps - such as keeping  the deviations low or respecting ANCSA boundaries - then they talked about why they made decisions to things the way they did.  They’d say, for example, we looked at splitting Matsu to connect with Anchorage here,  or we used the east side of Fairbanks for the rural district because the military are much more transient than the people on the east side and they don’t vote nearly as much.  
2. The Board has been doing this work for two years now and they need the Third party map makers to explain their maps to them. 
3. The Board had seven plans but they did not explain any of their plans to the public.  One person, Lois Epstein, an engineer who works with GIS, asked a couple of the Board members, during a break in the testimony, to explain the logic of their plan.  PeggyAnn McConnochie, one of the more technically savvy members of the board said they followed the Constitutional criteria.  Asked if she could be more specific, she told her it was too complicated.  The tone of McConnochie’s answer said, “Why are you asking me this?  This is an unreasonable request.”  I talked to Epstein right after that and tried to find out more of what she was after.  Basically, she wanted to know what criteria they programmed into the computer - was keeping boroughs intact the key one?  Or low deviation?  Or what?  I told her the ones I understood - equal population in each district, yes, trying to keep boroughs intact, compactness, contiguity, etc.  But as we discussed this I realized that covering this process so long had lowered my expectations.  That yes, the public was just as entitled, probably more so, to an explanation of each of the Board’s plans as the Board was to explanations of the third party plans.  I say lowered expectations because two years ago, I suggested on this blog that the Board needed to give the public more information about each plan so that the public would understand them enough to actually make comments that mattered.
4. This is not to say that a few organizations with the interest and resources to pay experts to follow this process closely, haven't been studying these things closely.
   
   In fact, the first time we all went through this process, the Board, at their meetings, did talk about each of the plans and why they were done the way they were done.  But that didn’t happen this time.  There was no public discussion of the plans.  They only voted to accept them all.
    
6. No discussion at Board meetings about what Section 2 of the VRA requires of them.  The Board has been holding off action in hopes that the Supreme Court would rule that Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act would no longer be in force, on the grounds that they would then only need to meet the Alaska Constitutional requirements.  
   Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act was invalidated by the Supreme Court recently.  Section 4 was the formula for determining which states and localities needed pre-clearance as required in Section 5 of the VRA.  Since the criteria are no longer in effect, Alaska and the other states that had been required by Section 5 to get pre-clearance no longer need to.
   However, Section 2 is still in force.  The Board doesn't need pre-clearance, but it does need to comply with Section 2.  If they don't, they can be challenged by the Department of Justice or by Alaskans in court.  Such a challenge could cause long delays.
   The differences between the standards for Section 5 and Section 2 are not completely clear.  I recently wrote in a post on this that it appeared that Section 2 required proving intent while Section 5 only required proving a discriminatory effect.  In the public testimony, Natalie Landreth of the Native American Rights Fund "pointed out to the Board that though Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is not in force now, Section 2 is.  And contrary to some media reports Section 2 does not require intent.  It too is evaluated on impact on protected groups."  Board attorney Michael White agreed with her.
   But there's been no public discussion of this by the Board.  They've simply concluded they just need to meet the state Constitutional requirements and all will be well.  Something seems to be missing.
    
7. Disruption of the Voting Process
   
   Redistricting is necessary, because maintaining the one-person one-vote principle requires some adjustment as population changes.  The US Constitution recognized this and requires states to adjust every ten years.
   But this adjustment is disruptive.  New districts require citizens to learn new borders, often new representatives, and new polling places.  Generally redistricting boards should minimize these disruptions while they balance the other criteria such as one-person one-vote, compact and contiguous districts, etc. 
   
   Another disruption when districts are changed too much is that Alaska state senators, normally elected to a four year term, can be truncated.  That means their term is shortened and they must go up for election at the next election after redistricting.  19 of the 20 Alaska Senators had to run for election in 2012.  That was the end of four years for some.  But for others, it meant they had to run for reelection after only two years.  And then the Board determined which new Senate districts would have two year terms and which four year (so that terms stayed staggered.)  So some Senators could have been required to run for office three times in  in six years (2008, 2010, and 2012.)  I haven't looked to see if there are actually any senators who came out this way.  But if there are, with new redistricting, it's conceivable that a senator would now have to run again in 2014 AND 2016 if the Board doesn't pay attention to this. 
   For most states, this happens only once every ten years.  But because the Board failed to create an acceptable plan for 2012, they are making another plan now.  For the second election in a row, Alaskans will be confronted with new districts, and in some cases new representatives.  And State Senators again face truncation and having their terms set for only two years. 
   This has not been discussed by the Board, but it seems to me that when the Board creates the new plan, they should be working hard to minimize such disruptions by keeping the new maps, when possible, as similar to the old ones as possible to avoid these disruptions for voters that degrade the quality of their representation in Juneau.  And that degrade the intent that Senators have a longer term view because they get elected every four years instead of two. 
   It's important for voters to know who their representatives are, to establish relationships with them, and to know their district and polling place.  The quality of representation is better this way. As I recall this issue was discussed by the Supreme Court when the Board's case was before them.
   This hasn't been mentioned at all as the Board reviews plans this time round. 

Why are these things happening? 

I can’t tell you exactly because I don’t have access to enough information about what the Board members are thinking and what they say to one to another when others aren’t listening. [I'm not charging any hidden conspiracy here.  Board members - if only two are present - can talk to each other about these things.  If I were on the Board, I'm sure I would.]  So I don’t know for sure how decisions got made or didn’t get made.   But I can speculate and here are some possibilities:

1. It’s lack of resources
2. It’s incompetence
3. It’s the inherent conflicts in the task 
4. It’s intentional
5. It’s Group Think
6. It’s that Board members’ models of their job and their obligations are totally different from mine

I think that there are different reasons for different problems and that in each case it isn’t simply one or the other, but some combination of them.  And some problems exacerbate others.  For instance, not hiring an executive director means they don’t have the human resources necessary to keep the website up to date.  I think the board’s views of what public participation means also makes the website a lower priority for them than for me.

I'll go through these issues in another post. There is already way too much for people to chew on,

Board Meets In Fairbanks, I'm At Airport Headed South

I was able to listen to about an hour or so of the public hearing in Fairbanks this afternoon, but I was gathering stuff for a last minute trip to visit my mom.  She had some issues over the weekend and I just felt I needed to go down and check up on things.  The caregiver is there and as things change, I need to be flexible. 

Michael Wallerie presented the Gazewood & Weiner plan.  He acknowledged some issues in his plan, but said it was more "This is a demonstration that it is possible" to meet the Hickel plan. 

It seemed to me the people testifying had a better grasp of the plans and gave more details than a lot of the people who testified in Anchorage.  There weren't any people who sounded like they were sent in to make sure the numbers supporting a particular plan were good. 

These are the rough notes I took as I was making sure I had everything packed.  Like always, BEWARE, these are very rough, just to give you a sense of what was talked about.  They have a transcriber and at some point the transcription should be on the Board's website.

Rough Notes: 

12:35:
[It took me a while to figure out how to connect.  It said there was a number if I wanted to testify, but not just listen.  They turned out to be the same numbers. So I got in midstream and assumed it was Michael Wallerie, the attorney who represents the Riley Plaintiffs and who I heard via telephone in the Fairbanks court and saw when he appeared before the Supreme Court.]

Wallerie:  Using Borough lines
Boroughs designed to,…
Factor under state constitution
Integrity of Borough lines gets high integrity factor in Constitution
Every borough less than a district is in a single district.
Eery borough that has surplus population - is only split once.
Some discussions about that in the courts and we think the court made it clear, that the courts made it clear that preserving that representation is important. 

Biggest problem is treatment with Lake and Pen - if you look at our D38, the Aleutians are kept intact, but are pared with Dillingham area and Bristol Bay which raises issues of contiguity.  To maintain integrity of design of plan, it is possible to slip the Lake and Pen district in. . .

One of the problems is logistics of Kodiak B.  Surrounded by other boroughs, Lake and Pen, Kenai.  Trying to maintain the integrity and representation and rights of Kodiak and L&P.  This is a demonstration that it is possible to come up with a Hickel values.

Second part is to demonstrate the treatment of Fairbanks.
A&B - originally decided to ‘shed Democrats” out of Goldstream area.  That is no longer an issue any more.  Historically, never any ???  in litigation, putting Ester and Goldstream is probably not consistent with Constitution.  Justification for the Board was VRA and that is no longer a factor. 
Socio-Economic integration is an issue.
Way to deal with Fairbanks problem - ½ district surplus population.  We believe that board does not have discretion to assign parts of the borough willy-nilly.  A&B Ester and Goldstream placed with ??? region.  Problem with SE integration.  Our understanding of SE I - Math formula - A+B=C???
No question, rarely examine the issues in depth, because dominated over litigation.  Fairbanks is a hub and SE connections with surrounding areas.  True and not true.  Not about commonalities, but the economic interplay between areas.  Not about commonality, but about interplay. 
When we look at it - historically - transportation, health care, shopping, common media, educational services - lead to problems with A and B.  While Fairbanks is a transportation hub, people in Kaltag go to Fairbanks airport, but not ???
When go to Fairbanks for health go to Fairbanks hospital, not to Ester clinic.  Shopping in Fred Meyer and Sam’s Club.  People in Ester don’t go to Kaltag to go shopping and vice versa.  Family and ethnic connections.  Majority of people Ester and Goldstream are non-native and vote on urban lines.  They elected Rep Guttenberg.
In rural area, no question that Dick was the preferred candidate - shows these two groups in opposition.
Calista has problems with including Native groups that are not integrated with Ester.
Common media - Fairbanks most tv and radio systems.  Some outreach, but not Ester and Goldstream.  shared with Ester, but not a direct relationship between Ester and Kaltag. 

Ester and Goldstream have ,,,,, [break another phone call]

Borough ?? and your plan B
Prior 2010 in effect plan.  Configuration in Anchorage.  Where do we need to change the lines to reflect changes in population.
Our understanding that Sullivan and Ruedrich want to scramble the district.
Purpose to adjust the population and not to politically change the districts.
Posible to do whole plan D all basically, when you gt to Anchorage and adjust it for population, not to scramble a district to create new political situations, which has profound partisan implications.

If Board has questions. . .

Torgerson:  D39 - Yakutat to Nome? 
Wallerie:  Areas do follow regional boundary, but what we’ve done there is preserve the line that hsa been in effect since 1990 redistricting.  Line that divides the Ahtna region.  In your plan D? you don’t do that and may be a better option.  Ours is about demonstration.  The line was to accomplish VRA goals and not the Hickel process to say. 

Torgerson: Questions?
thank you very much for your presentaion

Wallerie:  And we look forward to working with you.

Torgerson:  We go into public testimony until 4pm, please limit yourselves to 3 minutes.  Please spell your name for transcriber.

John David Ragen?:  Going to read article in Fairbanks paper yesterday  From Ester.

Lance Roberts: 

Bolen?  Attorney From Fairbanks North Star Borough - goal oriented - interested in contiguity and SE Integration. 
Excess needs to be in non-road system should be in SE Integrated
B and Gazewood and Wiener plan work - put NSFB Borough into five districts and surplus into ok district.  Assembly will support any other plan that meets the same overall goals

Sorry, that's all I have for you. 

Alaska Redistricting Board - What Happened Friday at Anchorage Public Hearing?

There's a 50 page analysis of what's happening with the Alaska Redistricting Board floating through my head.  Much too much for a post.  I'm hoping to find ways to reduce it to the most critical issues and explanation.  I'm thinking of a series of shortish posts, each covering a different point, though they all overlap to some extent.

Meanwhile here's my raw data from Friday's public hearings in Anchorage and two things that struck me Friday - the new emphasis on very low deviations and Randy Ruedrich's discussion of the source of AFFER's Anchorage map.   I'll talk about these at the end.

Other posts will look at what's not working right at the Board.



The Facts:

 Friday, June 21, 2013 at noon was the deadline the Board had set at their previous meeting for third parties to submit their redistricting plans.  It was also when the Board last met before the public hearings.  At that the Board meeting approved 11 plans:

• Seven Board plans (Options A - G)
• Three third party full statewide plans
• AFFER (Alaskans for Fair and Equitable Redistricting, essentially the Republicans) - presented by Randy Ruedrich, former Chair of the Republican Part of Alaska with a cameo role by Matsu mayor Larry DeVilbiss
• Calista (Bethel area Native Corporation) - presented by Calista attorney Marcia Davis along with the contracted GIS person, Steve Colligan, (who also did the Republican maps), and political consultant, generally Democratic, Tom Begich
• Gazewood and Weiner, representing the Riley plaintiffs (who successfully challenged the original plans in court) will be presented on Monday at the Fairbanks public hearing. 
• One partial plan
• Ketchikan's plan of Southeast that had Ketchikan in a district with the southern part of Prince of Wales Island

Thursday, June 27, 2013 the Board posted three more plans on their website

• AFFER revised
• Calista revised
• Calista 2

[NOTE:  All the plans, plus additional ones mentioned below, as I write this, are available on the Board's website here.  You can get the maps, the GIS files, and the population data.] 

Friday, June 28, 2013 - When the Board opened the public testimony, it was announced that there were still more plans. 

• Calista 3 (which I think they used in their presentation)
• Matsu Plan 
• South Lakes Community Council (Matsu) Plan

Each stack is a different plan

At the meeting there were piles of maps for each Plan - with Statewide maps and more
detailed maps of Anchorage, Fairbanks, Eagle River/Matsu, Kenai, Southeast, and Western Alaska.  Plus the deviation numbers for each plan. 

• Public testimony - began with three presentations by third parties
• AFFER - (Randy Ruedrich (former long time Republican Statewide chair) and David DeVilbiss (Mayor of Matsu)
• Calista - (Marcia Davis, attorney for Calista Native Corporation, Steve Colligan, GIS expert, and musician, (mostly) Democratic political consultant, Tom Begich)
• Ketchikan (I only caught "Dan," but the internet shows that Dan Bockhorst is the Ketchikan city manager, so that would be a good bet.)  They wanted the southern half of Prince of Wales Island.

• I took notes on testimony by 27 people, not in this order (links go to posts that gives a little fuller account of their testimony.) Some might quibble whether my gist of each person should be considered under 'facts.'  Maybe not:

• Roger Jenkins - neutral some good, some issues
• Peter Goldberg - Board doing great
• Kelly Walters - Board Incompetent need master
• Bruce Schulte - (phone)  Support AFFER
• Brian Blessington - questions about NE districts - Muldoon
• Lois Epstein -  Board needs to be professional, explain maps to public
• John O’Day (phone)- AFFER good
• Leila Weisz (phone) - Board should do its job, hire a director
• Jerry Ahwinona (phone) - Thank you Board for your service
• Pat Abney -  Comply with court orders, hire full staff, make maps more accessible
• Steve Strait - (phone?) Leave things like last election, AFFER great
• Hope Nelson (Phone?)  I like what we have
• Rebecca Kurtz (phone) Cuts my neighborhood - Airport Heights - in half, shouldn’t
• Deborah Williams - Include Rights Coalition.  No intact Matsu map.  No Analysis Hire a master to finish this.
• SJ Klein - (phone) Fairview Community Council - Fairview shouldn’t be split in half, a whole community needs single representative
• David Morgan (phone) AFFER map good for my neighborhood Rogers Park
• David Cobb - Valdez Mayor wanted Valdez connected to Richardson Highway
• Ernie Weiss - Aleutians East Borough
• Matt Ganley - Bering Straits 
• Natalie Landreth - Native American Rights Fund - Likes Calista map 
• Susan Olsen -? - Anchorage concerned Board process not good.
• David Nees -  ? -Cooper Landing shouldn't be with Anchorage (Senate)
• Sen Kevin Meyer - Likes AFFER
• Brian Hove - Likes AFFER
• Scott Hawkins - Likes AFFER
• Tom Klinkner - Attorney for Petersburg - Plan A good; Plan E not good
• Frances Bennet - Live in D19, like AFFER

[I posted more detail of their testimony as it was happening on Friday, June 28, 2013.  You can click on the links at their names.  Most posts include several presenters.]

The Third-Party presentations explained how they went about making their maps, which criteria had higher priority, and explained where they had problems and had to make decisions - like having to break up Fairbanks borough because it had excess population, but not enough for a whole new district, and where they took the population from and why.


For now, I'll limit my comments to two things that caught my attention Friday:

• Keeping Deviation Low
• Ruedrich's Comment on The Source of the AFFER Anchorage Map

Keeping Deviation Low -  Deviation refers to each district's number of voters more or less than the ideal sized district of 17,755 (The 2000 Census reported Alaska state population divided by 40 districts.)   AFFER and Calista emphasized the low deviation their maps had - below 1.5%.  The basic idea is that if one district is much bigger than another, then the people in the big (by population) district have more people per representative than the people in the smaller district. Calista's deviations show their smallest district with -142 people and their largest with plus 168 - a difference of about 300 people from the biggest to the smallest.

But low is a relative term here.  In the previous round, the deviations for the state were much higher and the absolute maximum - only to be approached if there was no other way to meet the other criteria - was 10%.

I just got concerned here about the sudden sanctity of extremely low deviations.  This is good, but only if other issues are NOT being sacrificed.  Like keeping cities and boroughs intact.  Like not splitting neighborhoods like Fairview and Airport Heights.  I kept wondering what I wasn't being told about the other criteria as they kept emphasizing low deviations.

Again, the lower the better, all other things being equal.  But a statewide 5% deviation was well within the acceptable limits the first time around, and there's room for a little more deviation if needed to keep communities together in districts.

One reason that the plans can have such low deviations is that the planners are no longer worrying about pre-clearance from the US Department of Justice.  However, although Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which calls for pre-clearance for Alaska,  is still in tact, Section 4 of the Act has been invalidated by the US Supreme Court (in a 5-4 decision) because they didn't think the formula for determining which states should get pre-clearance was any good today.   This despite the fact that it was renewed in 2006 by 98-0 in the US Senate and 390 - 33 in the House. Until there are new criteria for Section 4, there won't be any states required to get pre-clearance.

However, Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act still stands and still protects Alaska Natives from having their access to voting curtailed.  So, even though pre-clearance isn't required, the Board can be sued if there is retrogression that cannot be avoided because of loss of population or other such justifications.

That said, Calista is a Native Corporation and they say they consulted with other Native Corporations.  One would hope that means at least their maps will be consistent with the Voting Rights Act.  And their deviation is low too. 


The Source of the AFFER Anchorage Map - When Randy Ruedrich got to talking about Anchorage he said:  (from my rough notes)

Anchorage map product of mayor's office, Assembly work group, Clerk.
From Girdwood to north of Muldoon, no change. 

The point he was making was that they just took what Anchorage had made for themselves.  But I recall two years ago when it came out that the Anchorage map was one that AFFER gave to the mayor.  He approved it.  Debbie Ossiander, then the Assembly Chair, testified that the Assembly approved it.  But it turned out that other Assembly members had not seen the map, let alone approved it.    It's probably not a big deal, but to someone without the history, it would seem like the AFFER group had nothing to do with the Anchorage maps, they came from the Assembly and Mayor and Clerk.  But, the way I heard the story, AFFER gave Anchorage the map in the first place. 

Alaska Redistricting Board Adds Three New Third Party Maps - 6 Days After Last Week's Deadline

Today the Alaska Redistricting Board sent out an email to people who have subscribed to their email list with an amended Agenda for tomorrow's (Friday, June 28) public hearing in Anchorage.

The basic agenda change is that Gazewood and Weiner will present their plan on Monday in Fairbanks instead of in Anchorage.  Gazewood and Weiner is the law firm that represents that Riley plaintiffs who challenged the Board in court.  Their office is in Fairbanks.


At the bottom of the email is a notice that there are three new plans:

AFFER - Revised
Calista  - Revised
Calista Option 2

The deadline for all plans was Friday, June 21 at noon.  That was six days ago - actually the time that the Board meeting opened last week.  At the meeting there was no vote to extend that deadline, nor any announcement that it would be extended.  There was a hint that the Board wasn't necessarily firm about the deadline when the Board chair asked Board member Marie Green about a plan from Sealaska and said that they could get it in even though the deadline was over.  But she checked and said there was no plan coming in from them.

Also, for the first 11 options, the Board voted to adopt them.  There hasn't been a meeting since then, at least not one that was announced to the public, so how did these three plans get on the list?

Although the plans were only posted on the Redistricting Board website "as of noon today" according to the 3:10pm email, the three (3) new plans, along with the original 11 adopted by the Board last Friday, were displayed at the Haines Assembly meeting last [Tues]night (Wednesday) and discussed. 

From  KHNS' radio's report on the meeting:

“The State Redistricting Board is now considering 14 different maps.  Mayor Scott created a chart with some of the different options on the table, showing what communities Haines would be grouped with.  Under most of the maps, Haines, Skagway and Klukwan are grouped together as they used to be.  Most options also include grouping the upper Lynn Canal Haines with other small like Gustavus, Hoonah, Kenakee Springs and others.  But each option also includes of either parts or all of Juneau.

Assemblyman Dave Barry said the best option for Haines is   is likely the option that includes the upper Lynn Canal communities, Gustavus, Hoonah, Elfin Cove, Pelican, Kenakee Springs, and north Juneau.

Barry:  “I think the one that would benefit us the best would be E, the mere fact that the more communities we have that are similar to ours, is the less amount of population that north Juneau could put in so we wouldn’t be drownded by their thoughts. 

It would be interesting to know how they got the maps and who else got them early.  Maybe it wasn't from the Board, but directly from the Republican Party, but then all 14 plans (including the three that weren't up on the Board's website until this afternoon) were presented as the options the Board was using.  

Usually, when public agencies have deadlines for submissions of any kind, late submissions are not accepted.  While you want as many good submissions as possible, accepting them after the deadline isn't fair to people who actually trust the Board to honor their deadlines, and thus don't turn in late proposals.  One might also consider some extenuating circumstances, such as a group that is not already represented or is a marginalized group that doesn't understand how the process works.  

But in this case, the new plans (two revisions and one new plan) come from the Alaska Republican Party (AFFER) which already has four representatives on the Board itself, and from Calista, a Native Corporation that uses the same GIS expert to do their maps that the Republican Party uses.  Steve Colligan's resume (on his Colligan for Assembly website) shows long experience with GIS going back to 1984 where he worked for the Municipality of Anchorage through now as president of  the firm E-Terra, LLC.  He's also served as Vice President of the Alaska Republican Party.

Ultimately, is this going to make any difference?  I suspect not.  The Board is probably feeling pretty good now that they don't have to worry about pre-clearnace from the Department of Justice due to the Supreme Court ruling on Shelby County Monday.  They will do what they want with the maps - as is legal - as long as they meet the Constitutional requirements. Political gerrymandering is illegal though, but it is be hard to prove.

Even if this won't significantly effect the final plan,  it does show how poorly the Board is being run now that it doesn't have an Executive Director.  Deadlines are sloppy.  Official notification seems to lag behind some other form of notification (that got the maps and data at least a [two] day[s] ahead to the Haines Assembly.)  Even if Haines got the extra three options from the Republican Party, why did they think the extra three ones were official ones approved by the Board since they weren't among the original 11 and the Board hasn't met to approve them since last Friday?



Below is the email from the Redistricting dated 3:10pm today, June 27. 

Alaska Redistricting Board June 27, 2013

The Agenda for the Alaska Redistricting Board June 28th public hearing has been amended.       A M E N D E D   A G E N D A 06-28-2013 Public Presentation and Public Testimony ANCHORAGE LIO 10:00am to 4:00pm 10:00am 1. Call to Order 2. Roll Call 3. Discussion of VRA mapping schedule 4. Presentation of third party plans Presentations limited to the times shown below A. Ketchikan Borough                                                                           5 minutes B. Alaska For Fair and Equitable Redistricting (AFFER)          30 minutes C. Calista                                                                                                     30 minutes 12:00 Public testimony on all plans Testimony is limited to three minutes each 4:00pm       Adjourn The Agenda for the Alaska Redistricting Board July 1st, 2013 public hearing has been amended. AMENDED AGENDA PUBLIC HEARING ON BOARD DRAFT REDISTRICTING PLANS AND THIRD PARTY PLANS 07-01-2013 MONDAY FAIRBANKS LIO 12:30PM TO 4:00PM          12:30pm 1. Call to Order 2. Roll Call of Members 3. Presentation of third party plan        A. Gazewood and Weiner                                                             30 minute 4. Public hearing Testimony will be limited to three (3) minutes per speaker. 4:00pm ADJOURN Adjourn

There are, as of noon 6/27/2013, additional proposed maps now available on the Alaska Redistricting Board website www.akredistricting.org     The additional maps are: AFFER amended Calista amended Calista Option 2

"We issue no holding on §5 itself, only on the coverage formula." Shelby County and Alaska Redistricting

If you eliminate all the argument and get to the nitty gritty of the this morning's Supreme Court decision on the Voting Rights Act (Shelby County v Holder) , it's this, from the end of the opinion:

"Our decision in no way affects the permanent, nation- wide ban on racial discrimination in voting found in §2. We issue no holding on §5 itself, only on the coverage formula. Congress may draft another formula based on current conditions. Such a formula is an initial prerequi- site to a determination that exceptional conditions still exist justifying such an “extraordinary departure from the traditional course of relations between the States and the Federal Government.” Presley, 502 U. S., at 500–501. Our country has changed, and while any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions.The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed."

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

Meaning of Section 2 - Section 2 prohibits discrimination in voting practices (from the Department of Justice (DOJ)):

Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 prohibits voting practices or procedures that discriminate on the basis of race, color, or membership in one of the language minority groups identified in Section 4(f)(2) of the Act. Most of the cases arising under Section 2 since its enactment involved challenges to at-large election schemes, but the section's prohibition against discrimination in voting applies nationwide to any voting standard, practice, or procedure that results in the denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group. Section 2 is permanent and has no expiration date as do certain other provisions of the Voting Rights Act. [emphasis added]

Meaning of Section 5 - Section 5 requires pre-clearance for election law and procedure changes in states that have a history of discrimination (from DOJ):

Section 5 freezes election practices or procedures in certain states until the new procedures have been subjected to review, either after an administrative review by the United States Attorney General, or after a lawsuit before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. This means that voting changes incovered jurisdictions may not be used until that review has been obtained.

The section of the Voting Rights Act the Court struck down was Section 4 - this section sets the criteria that determine which states are required to get pre-clearance.   Again from DOJ:

Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act

When Congress enacted the Voting Rights Act of 1965, it determined that racial discrimination in voting had been more prevalent in certain areas of the country. Section 4(a) of the Act established a formula to identify those areas and to provide for more stringent remedies where appropriate. The first of these targeted remedies was a five-year suspension of "a test or device," such as a literacy test as a prerequisite to register to vote. The second was the requirement for review, under Section 5, of any change affecting voting made by a covered area either by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia or by the Attorney General. The third was the ability of the Attorney General to certify that specified jurisdictions also required the appointment of federal examiners. These examiners would prepare and forward lists of persons qualified to vote. The final remedy under the special provisions is the authority of the Attorney General to send federal observers to those jurisdictions that have been certified for federal examiners.

This part on minority language groups particularly applies to Alaska:

Section 4 also contains several other provisions, such as Section 4(e) and Section 4(f), that guarantee the right to register and vote to those with limited English proficiency. Section 4(e) provides that the right to register and vote may not be denied to those individuals who have completed the sixth grade in a public school, such as those in Puerto Rico, where the predominant classroom language is a language other than English. In Section 4(f), the Act addresses the ability of those persons who are members of language minority groups identified in Section 4(f)(2), to register and vote as well as to get information relating to the electoral process in a manner that will ensure their meaningful participation in the electoral process. The Department has embarked on a vigorous program to enforce the Act's language minority provisions.

HOW DOES IT CHANGE ALASKA REDISTRICTING RULES?

As the Alaska Redistricting Board gets close to wrapping up its second 2010 redistricting plan (the first was rejected by the Alaska Supreme Court), there are two key sets of standards (beyond the basic US Constitutional requirements of one person- one vote, etc.)  that have been required:

• The Alaska Constitution
• The US Voting Rights Act

The Alaska Supreme Court has required the Board to first develop a map that meets the requirements of the Alaska Constitution and then second adjust those maps to meet the Voting Rights Act.

The Board has adopted seven optional plans that they believe conform with the Alaska Constitution and will have public hearings in Anchorage (Friday June 28), Fairbanks (July 1), and Juneau (July 2).

The US Supreme Court decision today on the Shelby County case, as I understand it, does not invalidate Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act or Section 2.  But, by invalidating the formula used in Section 4 to determine which states would be required, in Section 5, to have their plan pre-cleared by the DOJ, it effectively makes Section 5 moot until there are new criteria in Section 4.  

Therefore, 

1.  The Board still needs to meet the standards of Section 2
2.  But they do not need to get pre-clearance

So, the Board's plan:
1.  Must comply with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act
2.  Does not need to be pre-cleared by the Department of Justice

What Does Comply With Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act Mean?

This is the tricky question I've been trying to figure out for the last couple of weeks.

What seems to be clear is that Section 2 requires proof of intent of discrimination while Section 5 only requires proof of discriminatory effect.  Exactly what that means for the Board is not clear to me.  Proving intent, obviously is much harder than proving effect.  And because Section 5's pre-clearance required scrutiny before a voting process change could go into effect, it means that violations will be dealt with after the fact.  Meaning after an election.  And the candidates who win because of later demonstrated voter repression will still be in office and making laws.  (I think.)

When I talked to Michael White (the Board's attorney) last week about what this would mean, he said (at least this is what I heard him say) that Section 2 requirements mean that the new plan must preserve the same number of  Native Districts with 50% or more Native population.  Section 5 required, additionally, those with lower Native districts to also be preserved.  He thought the Board  would be required to preserve three of four Native House districts (and two Senate districts). But I can't find language that does explains that.  And, in fact, the Board had to hire a Voting Rights Expert to help them understand exactly how many districts they needed to preserve and how to determine if they met the standards.  The actual rules tend to be pretty fluid and this ruling is going to cause me to mix metaphors here if I'm not careful.  DOJ does prosecute based on 

The Board had worked very hard to not have 'retrogression' in its plan.  Retrogression means that there are fewer Native districts than in the previous (2000 Census based) plan.  If I recall, that originally meant nine Native districts.  Because of changes in how DOJ determined Native Districts, the Southeast Native District was no longer viable.

Pulling up the the old maps and population statistics from the Alaska Redistricting Board's website is difficult to impossible because much of that is no longer there.  However, they are still somewhere and the links from my old posts do still get to some maps and stats.

This map (below) is I'm 90% sure,  the Amended Proclamation Plan adopted April 5, 2012 and used as the Interim Plan (with later changes to Southeast.)   I'm using this to show the Native District implications.

White believed - he wasn't certain - that Districts 36, 39, and 40 - were the three with over 50% Native population that would have to be preserved as Native Districts, that the three all had over 70% Native population.

As I pulled up the Population Statistics chart that was also from the April 5, 2012 meeting, I found that there were two more districts with over 50% Native population.  The chart below shows that districts 37 and 38 have 51% and 52% respectively.

One problem for the Board all along was that these districts are relatively isolated.  In a sense, one could argue that all the Alaska Natives are 'packed' into a few districts, leaving other districts with a lower percent of Natives in other districts, thus diluting their voting strength.  But these districts are geographically isolated and in areas with low population density making it more difficult to get contiguous, compact districts of 17,755 people (the state population divided by 40 districts).


IMMEDIATE EFFECT OF SHELBY COUNTY DECISION ON ALASKA REDISTRICTING

The Board will have its public hearings this week and next and then on July 12 they will meet and select a plan that meets the Alaska Constitutional requirements.  Because they are no longer required to get pre-clearance from the Department of Justice, they will proclaim that as the new plan.

However, they are still required to comply with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and if they diminish the voting power of Alaska Natives, there is sure to be a law suit filed.  At this point, I just don't understand exactly what standards the Court will use to determine if they comply with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act or not.


As I find out more, I'll let you know.

Meanwhile, if you want to look at the Options the Board is taking to the Public Hearings Friday, Monday, and Tuesday, go to the Board's website.    News and Updates has all the plans - maps and data.  On the right you can get the details for the meetings - Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau.

If you want to compare the new options to the existing Interim plan you can go to my post of April 5, 2012.  There I have links to the statewide map (the one posted above) and to each of the district maps and the population stats (also posted above in this post.)

HOWEVER - Southeast Alaska's districts were changed and you can see those changed districts here.

If you haven't notice, at the top of the blog (under the orange header) is a tab for the Alaska Redistricting Board.  It has a list - in chronological order - of all my posts on the redistricting board with a brief description of each post.  Or you can get to it here.

What Do Alaska, Kentucky, and Texas Have In Common?

Seem To Be The Only States Still Without Redistricting Plans.

I got to wondering how many states, like Alaska, still don't have redistricting plans.  That wondering got me to redistrictingonline.org.  They don't exactly say, but I thought they might know and emailed their comment line and got a quick email back.

"After Maine approved its legislative districts recently, only Alaska, Texas and Kentucky have redistricting business to finish. You can check Prof. Justin Levitt's site  http://redistricting.lls.edu for detailed info on all the states."

Levitt's site has a map that shows the status of litigation in all the states. It lists 15 states still in court. That's much more than the "Alaska, Texas, and Kentucky" answer I got above, but it doesn't appear to have been kept current. (The latest Alaska update was last November.)  Plus not all the litigation is about state redistricting plans. 

However, he did Tweet a few days ago:

Justin Levitt @_justinlevitt_

ME gov signs state #redistricting map. Would've been last in country, if not for AK, KY, TX redo. redistricting.lls.edu/index-state.php

3:26 PM Jun 14th

.Kentucky's legislature has been sued for not finishing and if they don't move on it a three judge panel may be appointed to finish it up.

On June 20, Kentucky's governor called a special session for five days beginning August 20 to get redistricting finished. 

Texas might be close to completion.  From a Texas Redistricting And Election Law blog:

The vote on the redistricting bills has been added formally to the Texas House’s calendar for Thursday morning.
The House will be voting on the Senate version of the three map bills (SB 2, SB 3, and SB 4).
Assuming there are no amendments - and no successful points of order - the bills then could go straight to Gov. Perry’s desk for signature.
Thursday morning could be big in another way as well. An hour before the House meets, the Supreme Court will be releasing more opinions. Those could include a decision in Shelby Co.   Jun 18, 2013 5:40 pm

The Texas situation is evolving quickly.  Here's the picture from Saturday June 22.

The adopted version of the state house map: Plan H358

Assuming no changes by the Senate (and none are expected), the version of the state house map that will go to Gov. Perry’s desk is Plan H358.
The changes made by the House on the floor were minor, but, in any event, here are the updated demographic stats for the map.

Plan H358 - CVAP
Plan H358 - Spanish surname 2012 voter turnout 

On Sunday it was updated again to say three redistricting bills are on the governor's desk.



Meanwhile, compared to Wisconsin, Alaska looks really good.  [UPDATE Nov 1, 2013: There was a bad link for Wisconsin so I've put a more current link in.]

I don't know how long people have, in other states, to challenge the new plans in court.  In Alaska it's 30 days.  


Meanwhile, today's Supreme Court decisions did not include Shelby County (the voting rights case) nor the same-sex marriage cases, but SCOTUS Blog predicts more decisions tomorrow.