No, No, No - Bragaw Extension Won't Get People To Emergency Room Faster [UPDATED - 13 New Emergency Rooms For Prov]

[May 24, 2016 - See today's article on Providence getting 13 new emergency rooms after battle with Regional Hospital to see more reason why Providence is behind this money getting back into the budget.]

Here's the letter to the editor* that inspired this post:

"U-Med road would be a lifesaver
The U-Med road is the one thing that absolutely will save lives. Providence hospital sits right in the middle of this road. If you ever had to get there because of illness or heart attack like me, every second counts. Shortening the amount of time it takes to get to the hospital could save more lives. The money once was already appropriated for this road but the mayor wanted it for the black hole also known as the port. Now the money is there again for this much needed project but guess what? The mayor talks about the deficit and wants this project blocked again for his friends, but at the same time he is in the capital asking for over $200 million for the port. We have already spent hundreds of millions of dollars at the port and there is nothing to show for it. I know where it went, but shhhh — they don’t want you to know. — Richard Wooten Anchorage"

*[not sure people without an ADN subscription can use this link (let me know if it works for you), but you've got the whole letter above.]

I'm sorry to hear about Mr. Wooten's illness and hope he's better.  But his having been sick doesn't change the actual facts.  It just distorts his interpretation of them.  That's understandable, but policy decisions need look at the big picture.  There are lots of questions to raise about this letter, but let's just focus on the "Lifesaver" story.

First,  nowadays, we have ambulances with technology that allows the paramedics to start treatment before they get to the hospital.  Here's an Edmonton story about their $3.3 million (Canadian) stroke ambulances.  But then they have long rides bringing people in from rural areas.  That's not an issue that this road would fix.  But their ambulances might.  You could get five of them for the initial cost of the minimum sized road.  That doesn't account for later expansion beyond a two lane road or maintenance of the road - funding that wasn't provided for.

Second,  it's not the road that matters, but a host of other issues that get ambulances to people on time and then to the closest hospital.  This article discusses some of the turf battles and other administrative issues that cost lives.

Third, and most significant in this case, there's another hospital north of Providence, where patients would be coming from to use this road.   Why do ambulances coming from the north even have to go to Providence?  Alaska Regional is a short distance to the north of Providence and if time is of the essence, the ambulance should go there.

Let's look at the map.

Screen shot, with additions, from Google (click to focus)

To the north, circled in red, is Alaska Regional Hospital.  To the south, circled in blue, is Providence. Google says they are 2.9 miles apart via Lake Otis (blue route) and 3.1 miles apart via Bragaw (gray route.)  Nine minutes either way.

I've added in an extension to Bragaw in red to Providence from Bragaw and Northern Lights.  It wouldn't be significantly shorter than the gray existing route.

People on the Lake Otis route won't be affected because the new road would be longer for them.

Most of the area around there is wooded parkland.  There are some health agencies along Northern Lights and East High at the corner of Northern Lights and Bragaw.  East High is probably right in the middle between the two hospitals.  That would make it, by Google's time estimate, about 4 minutes and 30 seconds from either hospital.  Anyone north of East High is probably closer to Regional Hospital.

This road isn't about saving lives.  I suspect it's really about Providence's need to dominate the Alaska health care world.  Getting one more road close by is part of a much bigger strategy.  They've already gotten 40th Avenue pushed through and paid for by the State.  They've got lots of other roads wandering through their ever-expanding campus.

The letter writer doesn't mention that all the community councils in the area are strongly opposed to the road.  Nor does he mention all the reasons why they are opposed, not the least of which is the cutting through the last big tract of unbroken land that's used for recreation by people and for living by wildlife.

I'd bet that a road through there might cost more lives by adding traffic past East High than it would save by getting people to the hospital faster.   There's no proof this road would save lives.  The map plus the changes in ambulance technology, plus the existence of Regional to the north, all suggest that this road would not save any lives.  Unless Providence just wants the ambulances from the north to pass by Regional.  But even then, the new road would be marginally shorter than the existing road.  

And the port?  Mayor Berkowitz inherited that problem. Sheffield may have wasted tens of millions, maybe even hundreds of millions, but that doesn't mean the port should be abandoned. It still needs to be fixed.

And that funding the writer mentions, was snuck into the budget in the closing hours of the last session without any hearings or opportunity to remove it against the wishes of the legislators from the U-Med district.

Mom Leaves Her Stamp(s)

There are several drawers of stamps - cancelled stamps from all over, first day covers, loose stamps, unused US stamps in blocks.  And there are several stamp books.

Should I take them to a stamp store?  Give them to my grand children?  Put them on E-Bay?  The second option is my preference.  I think (ah the memory is such a malleable faculty) that stamp collecting was one of the ways I got interested in geography - learning the names of foreign countries and finding them on the map.

And looking at the cancelled stamps, many still on envelopes, I can't help thinking about the people or events or places or things depicted on the stamps.  And I wonder about how the letter writer chose the stamp - purposely or just because that's what the post office sold her?  And, of course, who were the people corresponding?  What was the nature of the correspondence?  In some cases my mom's collection affords the opportunity to find out more because the letter is still inside.  And I'm ever so distractible that I could spend a year just pursuing that.  Others have already written novels based on letters they found.

But we're just back home with lots to do and this wasn't supposed to be a long post, just some pictures of stamps. (Click on any of the images to enlarge and focus. They're really SO MUCH better if you do that.)  But, as I said, I'm infinitely distractible.

So looking through the box of stamps I brought home - these are unused US stamps that mean I won't have to buy stamps for a long time - I thought I'd just post some that I thought were visually strong.

Just imagine the challenge of creating an image that fits on a postage stamp.  There are a lot that are awfully busy and you have to look very closely to see what's in them.  Those that focus on one thing seem to come out best.

First, some portraits.  I think I like these because they're big and bold.  And I noticed that four of them are basically black and white drawings.

The Pulitzer stamp is the exception, but the quote is big and drew me in.  And the message - "OUR REPUBLIC AND ITS PRESS WILL RISE OR FALL TOGETHER" - is as important important today as when Pulitzer said it.  Here's more context from Pulitzer.org:

In May 1904, writing in The North American Review in support of his proposal for the founding of a school of journalism, Pulitzer summarized his credo: "Our Republic and its press will rise or fall together. An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it, can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery. A cynical, mercenary, demagogic press will produce in time a people as base as itself. The power to mould the future of the Republic will be in the hands of the journalists of future generations."

The media coverage of the current presidential race doesn't seem to me to be living up to Pulitzer's expectations for the press.

Here are a few stamps heralding events.  The Spirit of 76's power comes from our familiarity with the image and the post office's willingness to use three stamps to zoom in on the three characters.  The American Revolution tells us:

"Despite the near universality of this image as synonymous with Americanism and its instantaneous recognition in the iconography of the Revolution, the world of art has never considered it to be Art with a capital "A"."

And the picture on the stamp doesn't quite match up with the picture on their site.   But they add that painter (not artist according to the critics) Archibald McNeil Willard, made several different versions of this picture that was featured at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1876.

The First Man On The Moon stamp says it all in a relatively simple illustration, that, I think, is also aided by images we've all seen before.

Finally, I like the image on the Mayflower stamp.  The Pilgrims are a little small, but the boat stands out and you can work a bit to see the Pilgrims.  My assessment is of the image, not, by the way, of the event itself.


I love these images of plant life.  I like the cacti particularly.  Do I really have to say any more?

Getting the details of buildings and places onto a tiny stamp would seem to be a bit of a challenge.  Here are some of the more successful ones in the box.  I particularly like the architecture ones and the lighthouse on the lower right.  The historic preservation stamp had to, apparently, highlight the theme and identify what was being preserved in each stamp.  They did the latter in tiny letters, which, when I blew up the image, showed how out of focus it was.  But they're challenging to my old eyes in the original.  For those who need to know the images are a) The Decator House, b) The Charles W. Morgan,  c)  San Francisco Cable Car, and d) San Xavier del Bac Mission.   (The links are well worth following.  I figure most people already know about the cable car.)

There have to be over a hundred different images in the box I found.  Some pretty dramatic and others almost looking like advertising.  I could do weeks of posts on these stamps.  And who knows, maybe I'll come back to them for future posts, but for now one more set - animals.

I really do like the top set - the 125th anniversary of the Berlin Zoo.  It's the only block of non-American stamps I've come across in the box.  And it's interesting that the German stamps in the set are different denominations.  I haven't noticed that among the US stamps.

The role of stamps

The little stamp has a role much bigger than one originally thinks about.  This should be obvious by the popularity of stamp collecting over the years.  The Art of the Stamp conveys a little of this, better than I can, in a description of the an exhibit at the Smithsonian's National Postal Museum in 2003-4:

"Few works of art enjoy as vast an audience as American stamps. At their most basic, stamps are simple proofs of postage, but with the addition of graphic designs that honor national heroes and commemorate historical events, they become something much greater: compelling works of art that serve, in the words of W.B. Yeats, as “the silent ambassadors on national taste.” Each year, award-winning graphic artists bring their talents to a broad range of U.S. stamps. Working on unusually small canvases, these artists surmount truly unique design challenges to create superb miniature encapsulations of American culture and history."

State Overreach And Elmore Road Extension

I've written about how disingenuously I think the term "federal overreach" is often used.

Those who decry federal overreach tend to mean "we want to do what we want and damn the feds" (or often our corporate funders want to do what they want without pesky regulations to preserve the environment, workers' health, or equity).  The idea that they are defending the democratic rights of citizens of the state against an overbearing federal government is proven a joke, when these state officials turn around and forbid local governments from doing what they want.

North Carolina's new and controversial law about bathrooms was specifically aimed at prohibiting Charlotte from recognizing the needs of transgender folks to choose an appropriate restroom.  (And, apparently, it covers a lot of other issues that aren't getting the same attention, like limiting rights to sue over discrimination, and affects minimum wage.)

And in Anchorage, according to a story in this morning's ADN, Rep Saddler and Rep Pruitt have added $18 million to the University budget for "roads."  The University's budget has been drastically cut, but they found an extra $18 million for roads.  (If that link doesn't work, try this one.)

Not just any road mind you, but the extension of Elmore Road - a road that has been resoundingly rejected by all the community councils surrounding the area and in the area.  Over and over again.  A road that DOT has pushed through against what people want.  A road that new mayor Ethan Berkowitz rejected when he came into office.

The only question really out there is:  Who wants this road?   The obvious suspects are contractors.  I suspect the other major culprit here is Providence Hospital which has gotten the state to build a number of other roads in the area that the community did not want, but which makes their property much more accessible.  But there may be others.  But government transparency isn't one of their favorite ideas either.

I call this state overreach, when the state tells local people they have no say in how their communities develop and how that development affects the livability of their neighborhoods.  Well, they have a say, but the power that be just don't listen.  And that's why I think the term 'federal overreach' is just a catchy marketing tool to mask the real intent - we want to do whatever we want and all consequences be damned.  Just like states' rights was used to mask racism during the 1950's and 60's.

No more time today, got lots of work to do on my mom's house before we head home.

This Is Hopeless

Or so I think.  Then I plow on.

Back cleaning out my mom's house.  We're trying to get it rentable by Thursday.  The bar is pretty low, but I think we'll have to come back and do more.  But I'm getting more ruthless about throwing things away.  But what do you do with things like this?

Actually, that's fairly easy.  It will go into one of the boxes headed to the thrift shop.  But old letter and photos, jewelry, watches, and stuff.  Pictures on the wall.  The realtor helping to rent the place thinks we shouldn't leave any pictures up we wouldn't want to lose.  And there are a few.

So blogging is a low priority at the moment.

At least we can put things we can't decide on into the garage.

But I'm guessing we'll be back in a month to do more.

Not complaining, just thinking out loud.  My mom cleaned up my messes often enough, so turnabout is only fair.  She has given us a lot, and throwing things away was painful for her.

Nordstrom's Great Marketing Department

My step-father died about thirty years ago.  My mom just last summer.

Today I opened a letter addressed to my step father that included two new Nordstrom credit cards.

Meanwhile, I'm still battling with Feedburner problems. (I know, I need to find a new RSS feed.  I will, I will.) I posted yesterday about why I thought Rep. Johnson had filed to appeal the decision of the Superior Court to allow Gov. Walker's Medicaid expansion even though though the legal counsel told Sen. Gary Stevens that such a move required a vote of both houses.  It didn't make it to other blogrolls.  So if any one is interested you can get to it here.  I tried to put the issue into context.  It also includes the complete contract between the Alaska Legislative Council and the DC law firm Bancroft PLLC.

And for people who do come here when they see the new post links at other blogs, if you don't see anything for more than a day, you might just want to check anyway.  Or you can subscribe and get your own reminder - those seem to be working.

You can subscribe in the upper right - as you can see in the image to your right.

Legislature's Contract With Bancroft DC Law Firm To Sue Governor Walker Over Medicaid Expansion

This post began with me wanting to just post the contract between the Alaska Legislative Council and the Bancroft law firm.  But as I tried to explain the context it got more and more complicated.   I was trying to figure out what the push was all of a sudden to get approval and to skip the Senate's approval.   Eventually it became clear.  And while I don't think I have anything here that hasn't already been published by someone somewhere, I think maybe I've put the pieces together in an easier way to follow it all.  Or maybe it just makes sense to me because I've now spent so much time doing this.

There was a fair amount of sturm und drang over Rep. Craig Johnson ignoring the legal opinion that both the House and the Senate had to vote to approve the appeal.  It makes sense to me now.  I'll say it here, and then the rest puts it all into context with some commentary on how I found my way through this maze.   So here's the skinny as I see it:

There's a 30 day window in which to appeal to the Alaska Supreme Court.  Although the judge's decision is dated March 1, 2016, which would appear to make the deadline March 31, there is something else in the court record called the "Final Judgment" which is dated April 5, 2015.  Thus the magic drop dead date was May 5, 2015 - 30 days later.  

So no matter what the legislature did or did not do, if the appeal wasn't filed in the court by May 5, 2016, there wasn't going to be an appeal.  So, apparently Johnson went and filed the appeal by the deadline in the hopes that the attorneys will be able to win any challenges to his authority to file the appeal without the House and Senate voting to move to Phase 2 of the contract with the DC law firm, Bancroft PLLC.  


Now, here's the post I was working on that led to the conclusion above.

I've posted the full contract below.  You can just scroll down and read it all.  But for those who are a little fuzzy on all this, here is some background.

As briefly as I can:

1. Congress passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010 and President Obama signed it
2. Republicans around the country did everything they could think of to kill the Affordable Care Act, including filing lawsuits saying it was unconstitutional.
3. The first challenge to make it to the Supreme Court was decided in 2012 and it upheld the Affordable Care Act.  An attorney - Paul Clement - for the law firm of Bancroft PLLC represented The National Federation of Independent Business, et al
4. The second challenge to make it to the Supreme Court was decided in 2015.  Again the Affordable Care Act was upheld.
5. About this time expansion of Medicaid in Alaska as called for by the Affordable Care Act was not making its way to the governor's office in Juneau.  So the governor expanded Medicaid administratively.
6. When the legislature is out of session, the Legislative Council does necessary business  on behalf of the whole legislature.  The Council voted to sue the governor over his decision to expand Medicaid.  And they asked the court to block the expansion until after the case was heard.
7. The court rejected blocking it and the Alaska Supreme Court did too.
8. The Legislative Council's suit  lost in the Alaska Superior Court in March 2016.
9. The Alaska Legislature is currently in overtime, having been unable to complete their work in the 90 day session.  The Legislative Council has some specific duties, but most importantly, acts in lieu of the State Legislature when it is out of session. But not when it is in session.
10. The House of Representatives has approved extending the contract and told Bancroft to file an appeal.  (Well, I thought this was true when I wrote this, but it appears that neither body voted to approve going to the contracts Phase 2 (which will be explained below))
11. The Democrats are pointing to a letter from the Legislature's legal counsel to Senator Gary Stevens, saying that when the Legislature is in session, decisions to take legal action require approval of both houses of the Legislature.  The decision to move ahead was only approved by the House.  (And apparently not even that, though I admit I'm confused on this.) An attorney I talked to about this speculated there was a deadline for the appeal and so they wanted to go ahead and file it before that deadline passed.  If they didn't they couldn't keep harassing the governor on the state level and the ACA on the federal level, and the Bancroft PLLC would forego the Phase 2 $150,000 and the continuing guerrilla warfare against ACA.  But I checked.  The Alaska Courts website says you have 15-30 days to file an appeal (depending on the type of case.).  The case was decided on March 1.  So even if it were working days and not calendar days, it's been over 60 days now, surely that's more than 30 working days.  But as we all know, reading the law with just a little bit of knowledge can be dangerous.  Obviously they're still planning to appeal.  So either there are provisions that allow extensions of that time, I've misread it, or they've already filed the appeal.  But if that were the case, it would be on the record.  You can see why so few reporters really dig in to get all the details of the story.  One thing just leads to another.  I'm tired and I'm not going to try to figure out how to look up if there has been an appeal filed already.  Someone else can do that.  [I'm leaving this all in so you can see all the false paths I explored before finding the right one.]

Well, I couldn't just abandon it at that point.  I have looked up cases before so I poked around on the Alaska Court System webpages for searching cases.  It's much easier than it used to be, though I did come up with different things in different searches.  

It was, in fact, about deadlines.  The case was filed May 5.  It says the case was settled April 5.  But the judge's ruling is signed March 1, 2016. 

But on the appeal it says the final judgment date is April 5, 2016.  The red on the upper left marks the appeal filing date - May 5, 2015.  The red in the middle on the right shows the trial court judgment date as April 5, 2016.  This is really so as the court judgment document above shows.  

Click to enlarge and focus these images originally from Alaska Court System

\

But further poking around shows that even though the decision was made on March 1, 2016, there is another date - April 5, 2016, that's labeled "Order:  Final Judgment Case Motion #22."  The information below is from this court system page.  Just keep scrolling down when you get there.  But here I've distilled the key dates and put them into this table:

03/01/2016	Case Dismissed. Case Closed
03/10/2016	Motion for Entry of Final Judgment Attorney: Borghesan, Dario (1005015) Filing Party: Walker, Bill; Davidson, Valerie Case Motion #22
03/23/2016	Non-Opposition to Defendants' Motion for Entry of Final Judgment Attorney: McKeever, Timothy A. (7611146) Case Motion #22: Motion for Entry of Final Judgment
04/05/2016	Order: Final Judgment Case Motion #22: Motion for Entry of Final Judgment
05/05/2016	Appeal Filed in the Supreme Court Case No: S-16309

So there it is.  Johnson was going on the advice that it is better to ask forgiveness than ask permission.  There just wasn't time to get permission.

Below is the whole contract so people can see it for themselves.  My layperson's eye doesn't see anything too unusual.   It's really the whole idea of spending $400,000 to try this Hail Mary lawsuit, that's at issue, more than details of the contract.  But since it's been bandied about, we ought to be able to read the whole thing.   I've noted a few highlights.  There's some seemingly weird language like the clause on Human Trafficking, but I figure that's boiler plate that has to be in every state contract.

Maybe others with more legal experience or knowledge of the players will point out things I overlooked.

Highlight 1:  This is a two phase contract.  Each phase is a flat fee.  By starting the appeal, it looks like the second clause begins and the company gets the final $150,000 payment. From the contract (see whole contract at end of post):

1. "Phase 1 - the flat fee for consultation, advice, and handling the court action until a final judgment or other resolution of the court action in Superior Court will be $250,000; the Committee will pay the Contractor $100,000 when this Contract is entered into, and $150,000 when services in the Superior Court are completely rendered. If the Project Direction elects to not proceed to the Supeme Court, then Phase 2 does not apply and the services and payments re complete.
2. Phase 2 - the flat fee for handling any appeal to the alaska Supreme Court (and subsequent Superior Court action if sent back to Superior Court) will be $150,000; the Committee will pay the Contractor $75,000 when the Contractor files the first brief and $75,000 upon final resolution."

So, it seems that the House's move to appeal, automatically gets us to Phase 2 - $75,000 for the first brief - the appeal I assume - and then another $75,000 when it's all done.  Chump change for the Majority it seems.   $150,000 would pay for two starting teachers in the Anchorage School District, their benefits, and still leave something on the table.    This can only benefit the law firm.  It's hardly likely to win.  And if they win, then Alaskan general health will lose.   So I can only guess that key legislators were leaned on to help this law firm pick up another $150,000 on top of the $250,000 they got for Phase I.

Think this through.  $400,000. [I'd note here that the Independent/Democratic Coalition has put out a press release saying that $300,000 has already been spent with $150,000 left to go for a total of $450,000.  Maybe something changed since the contract, but the contract is pretty clearly for $400,000 total.]  If we pay the attorneys $400 per hour, that's 1000 hours.  If we assume attorneys work 50 hour weeks, that's 20 weeks, about five months, full time.  Much, if not most, of the work would be done by para legals who get paid way less that $400 per hour.  And most of the legal research Bancroft has already done in prep for their other Obamacare challenges.

Note:  I first posted about this law firm and its role in representing 26 states that fought Obamacare to the Supreme Court August 19, 2015 when the lawsuit was originally announced.  Then I posted again a couple of weeks later when the Legislature lost their lawsuit.  And I'd note that Paul Clement, the attorney who lost the 2012 case at the US Supreme Court is listed as one of the attorneys in the Alaska case that lost in Superior Court.

Sorry for getting sidetracked there, but those two old posts give a lot more relevant background on the firm.

Highlight 2:  Contract goes from August 18, 2015 until "completion of the legal services required by Clause 1, or August 1, 2017."


Highlight 3:  Interest rate for late payment (after 90 days) is 1.5% per MONTH which comes out to an annual interest rate of 18 - 19% depending on whether it's compounded or not.  Credit Union 1 offers 0.30% on a premium savings account with $100,000 or more in it.  They offer rates between 4 and 7% for boat and vessel loans up to $250,000.  Is that a fair comparison?  After all, this is for a late payment after 90 days, so the first three months are interest free.  And the state should be good for the money, right?  Well, that used to be true.


Highlight 4:  The Project Director and Vice Project Director

"The Project Director and Vice Project Director are the persons appointed by the Presiding Officers of the Alaska State Senate and the Alaska State House of Representatives  The Project Director under the Contract is Chad Hutchison, for the Alaska State Senate.  Mr Hutchison is is [sic] authorized to oversee and direct the activities of the Contractor under this contract and shall, unless otherwise stated in this paragraph, approve all billings from the Contractor.  The Vice Project Director under this Contract is Mark Higgins for the Alaska State House of Representatives. Mr. Higgins is authorized to oversee the activities of the Contractor under this contract. .  ."

A quick internet search doesn't tell us too much about these men.

Chad Hutchison, according to a brief description under an opinion piece in the Juneau Empire, is a Fairbanks attorney and staffer for Sen. Coghill.  The opinion piece argues passionately for this lawsuit and I found it, on the whole, using logic and reason to make his points.  We can argue about his assumptions and I didn't fact check it, but it's not the kind of empty explanations we've been hearing from Juneau's finest.  Apparently there's another Chad Hutchinson who's Director Fairbanks Pipeline Training Center Trust and a longtime member of the Operating Engineers Union.

Mark Higgins is a staffer for the House Majority.  He's served as a political consultant and as a lobbyist for the Kenai Peninsula Borough.  Higgins was the subject of concern back in 2009 when Rep. Craig Johnson wanted to hire him to finish a 'long overdue report' on fisheries for a task force with which Higgins' wife, Debra, was involved, if I can untangle the story, as an aide to Rep. Johnson.   Senators Stedman, Harris, and Coghill had problems with the appointment because of the apparent conflict.  Johnson said he couldn't find anyone else with Higgins unique qualifications - his ability to write, his background in fisheries, and his knowledge of the law.  Johnson is quoted,

"If I thought there was a better person out there I would have certainly tried to get that person," he said.

That's about as clear as most politicians are going to get.  He didn't think there was anyone with better qualifications.  Which suggests he didn't look. Seems to me there are lots of Alaskans who know about fisheries, the law, and can write.   Reading between the lines of that article, I'd say Johnson  had this overdue report and they were getting some pressure to get it done and someone in the office said something like, Mark could do that.  But when you read between the lines even with some knowledge of how organizations work and a good imagination you can end up anywhere from close to way off.


Anyway.  Here's the contract.  I know, by now, anyone who didn't just skip everything and come directly here, is already asleep.  But if you're still awake and ready to tackle the contract, go get yourself a chocolate chip cookie as a reward.  Or a bowl of strawberries if you prefer.  Maybe with some vanilla ice cream.

Alaska - Bancroft Lawsuit Contract

Parting And Arriving Shots

It was just about midnight as we took off from Anchorage last night.  It's summer if you count the seasons by how much light we have.

I'd note there was one Alaska legislator on the plane who took a break from the session to go to his daughter's college graduation.










But LA was fogged in pretty solid as we approached.  Downtown is somewhere down there between the wing and the mountains.  At this point the clouds were broken enough that I could see occasional spots of light.  But as we circled back toward the airport and the ocean, the cover got thicker.  I

counted slowly to 45 from the point we went into the clouds until we came out to this view below.

And then we our flight path to the airport cross the San Diego Freeway.  (When I left LA long ago, the freeways had names, not numbers.)

We were able to get off the plane pretty quickly and to the luggage carousel in ten minutes - just in time to see the first suitcases coming out.  We had our two 13 minutes after the door in the plane opened.  I continue to be impressed at Alaska's ability to make and keep their pledge to get the luggage out in 20 minutes from getting to the gate or you get mileage or a coupon off your next flight.

And then when we got to my mom's house and I read the Dispatch online, I saw that Alaska Airlines was rated as having the best service of the major carriers.  But it also mentioned that people are getting used to all the extra fees (like luggage, food, change) that

"raised $3.8 billion for U.S. airlines last year."

They can charge all these because there are so few airlines left that they can all just copy each others' fees and the traveler has no choice.  And because they have the power to unilaterally say you have to pay $100 just to change your flight to another day.  I understand there was a time when people booked a bunch of flights and then cancelled, leaving the airline with empty seats.  You can handle that more strategically - like charges within a week of the flight, or after the third or fourth change a year.  But these kinds of arbitrary and lucrative charges by the airlines, by banks, and other large corporations are part of the reason we have a growing gap between the rich and the poor.  Especially when the added profit goes to shareholders instead of employees or customers.  But at least Alaska's 20 minute guarantee gives people a reason to check in bags instead of taking them onboard.  No more hour waits for your luggage.

Geese Fly By

This is a pretty thin post.  But I did spent a half hour just enjoying the peace (but not quiet, since the Seward Highway is adjacent) of the Helen Louise McDowell Preserve.  There wasn't much happening, but when nothing 'big' happens, you notice the little things.  The biggest things was the
goose fly-by.


 





But mostly it was the little stuff.  Like raindrops on the water. As the rain increased somewhat, so did the number of rings in the water.












                                                          But then things calmed down so the reflection looked almost real.
I was on my way back from Loussac library.  I posted some pictures last night about the progress of the renovation of the entrance.  But I was having Feedburner problems and that post hasn't gotten to other blogrolls.  You can see the Loussac post here.  





[More Feedburner trouble.  Obviously I need to find another way to get the RSS feed to other blogrolls, but in the meantime I'm trying to repost and see if I can get it to work.  This is the first time Feedburner hasn't picked up the feed for several new posts over a couple of days.]

[UPDATE 7:10am:  I went into Feedburner.  There's a way to manually ping the feed, but I'd been trying that and it didn't work.  This time I found a place to 'resynch' and so I tried that.  And soon the latest post had reached another blogroll.  We'll see how long this lasts and I still need to find another way to do the RSS feeds.]

Loussac Remodel Update - Atrium Is Gone (Repost*)

Here's Loussac Library (Anchorage's main libray) on May 10, 2016.  They've taken out the whole atrium area.  The geometric metallic grid is, I believe, what held up the ceiling/roof glass.  The whole glassed-in area is now gone.





Below is pretty much the same view on Loussac's opening back in 1986.

Image from 2012 What Do I Know? post

And here's the atrium back on March 23 of this year.  The stairway and the deck with the statue of William Seward are gone.

And today, all the glass is gone.  I think those X's in the top row of windows are the bracing that is sitting out in front now in the top picture (and a couple below.)  It's scary that I only 'think' this,

that I'm not sure.  For all the times I was in there, you'd think I'd be certain.  But I guess I never observed as carefully as I should have.  But it did make enough of an impression that I 'think' that's it.

The top picture was taken from the stairs in the Alaska room to the right of this picture.  But the library wasn't open when I was there tonight, so this is from on top of the grassy slope to where the entrance deck was.

This is looking directly to where the glassed atrium was against the wall there.

Here's a better view of the grid.  It'd make a great playground feature.  I'm wondering if it's going back in as part of the new library or if it's just sitting here until it's taken away.  Based on this picture of what the entrance will look like, it appears this grid is headed for the scrap pile.  I still think it should be a playground jungle gym..

Image from Anchorage Library Foundation

The Alaska Journal of Commerce had a different view of the entrance.  It looks different from the one above.  From what I can tell, the top one was later than the bottom one.

Image from Alaska Journal of Commerce

I wasn't the only one there checking this out and I knew I had to include this next picture, particularly for Michelle.

To put all this in context, here are some excerpts from the 2010 Anchorage Library Master Plan:

"Some upgrades to the Z. J. Loussac building have already been completed and others are underway; however, additional improvements, including the redesign of the Library entrance, are on hold because of the failure of an April ballot proposition that would have partially funded that project." (p. 19)

"Some upgrades to the Z. J. Loussac building have already been completed and others are underway; however, additional improvements, including the redesign of the Library entrance, are on hold because of the failure of an April ballot proposition that would have partially funded that project." (p. 44)

"A concept for redesigning the entrance area exists but has not been implemented due to a lack of funding. A library staff committee produced an excellent report that contained ideas for the revitalization of several of the Loussac Library’s interior spaces. Many components for moving the Loussac Library in the direction of becoming Anchorage’s community living room are available but have not yet been acted upon." (p. 44)

From a September 2015 memo on delays in construction, we do have this estimated opening date.

"Based upon the changed scope-of-work, which has added days and is subject to change again as the project proceeds, the new scheduled opening of the Entry and Upgrades is set for December 31, 2016."

The the Library Foundation website says:

"The Z.J. Loussac renewal began in May 2015 and is scheduled to be finished in early 2017." 

Maybe they can have the opening before every little detail is finished. 

[*Repost - that's a warning to those who subscribe and have already seen this.  Feedburner is being balky again.  As I mentioned in the last post, this seems to be due to Google neglect of this feature (See "Feedburner:  Google's Biggest Screwup") and I have to find a new way to get the RSS feeds to other blogrolls for more consistency and speed.]

What Happens When Your Parents Aren't Who You Think They Are? And Feedburner Doesn't Share Your Posts?

I linked to a very interesting piece in Saturday's Guardian about a family that wasn't quite [remember, I tend toward understatement] what it seemed to be and the dislocation this caused the teenage sons.

But Feedburner hasn't done its work to get this posted in other blogrolls, so people reading other blogs can't see this new post.  (Blogrolls, for those scratching their heads, are the lists of other blogs that many blogs carry on the right or left column.  Mine are on the right.)

This has been a recurring problem over the last year.   Blogrolls do bring enough folks to the blog that it's worth reposting.  So I'm posting this in hopes Feedburner picks this one up properly and I'm using this post direct you to

What Happens When Your Parents Aren't 

Who You Think They Are?

Generally, when this happens, I repost it, and for some reason the reposts, if I'm lucky, go up right away.  But there is already a comment on this post and if I repost and delete the original, the comment will disappear.  So please bear with me.  It's worth reading and the comment adds other dimensions I hadn't considered.  (This does give me a chance to correct a typo in the title.  Thanks J)