AK Redistricting Board GOP Members Use Allocation To Punish Moderate Republicans

I've been slogging through the Nov. 9 video of the Board's truncation discussion and the Senate seat cycle allocation battle.  I'll get up a discussion of what happened later.   In this post I want to look at why the GOP-appointed members of the Board gave up all pretense of comity and just used their 3-2 majority to bulldoze their plan through.  I'm sure they felt upset by the previous attacks on the Senate pairings - but the attacks were well earned.  But there's been enough attention there.  So let's look at what they were fighting for.  

[I've put some background information down at the bottom for anyone who needs boning up on truncation and allocation of election years.  Look for the big bolded heading at the bottom of the post.]

At the time the allocation battle was fought on November 9, I wondered why this was so important.  I thought perhaps they were trying to make it more difficult for Democrats.  Forcing them into another election costs them time, money, and there's always the chance they could lose. But after reviewing who all got forced into an extra election via the election year allocation process,  for the most part they used it to punish those Republican senators who did not support Dunleavy, but worked with Democrats on many issues.  

Bethany Marcum, one of Dunleavy's picks for the Board, insisted on starting with Seat A and alternating through the alphabet of Senate seats assigning 2 year and 4 year terms. The members who were appointed by Independents suggested flipping a coin to determine if they started with Seat A or Seat T to avoid any appearance of partisanship.  When they asked the majority bloc of Republican appointees what their problem was with flipping a coin, they got answers that changed the subject or no answer at all.  The GOP members were not going to take a chance.  They clearly had an assignment to deliver and that's what they did.  

What was their goal?  To punish moderate Republicans and those who even only sometimes went against Dunleavy's wishes.  [I checked with a very politically savvy Alaskan who helped me divide the Republicans into these groups.]  The punishment is they have shortened terms (from four years to two years) to get back on the cycle of ten senators one election year and ten the next.) And thus they have an extra election they have to run in.  So, in the charts below: 

• Blue is Democrats.  
• Brownish is Moderate Republicans
• Pinkish is Republicans who sometimes work with Democrats
• Red is Dunleavy loyal Republicans

• Column 1 are the names of Senators.  
• Column 2 shows which ones have to run for an extra election based on allocation of seat rotation cycle.  (Some have an extra election because of truncation but that's not on here because it's not the result of allocation to a rotation cycle.)
• Column 3 shows the number of extra elections per senator and per group if the rotation had been switched. (Either starting with Senate seat T, or starting with 4 instead of 2.)

For Democrats it's kind of a wash.  Four extra elections either way, though all but Kawasaki are in relatively safe districts.  

But look at what happened to the Moderate Republicans.  All of them were forced into an extra election by the 3-2 allocation decision of the Board.  And von Imhoff?  Her seat was divided into three Senate seats and she's only listed as a footnote on the Board's chart.  Based on a Google search of her address, she would be in Mia Costello's district which is 88.3% the old Costello district.  

If the rotation had been reversed, none of the Moderate Republicans would have an extra election. 

Now let's look at the less moderate, but not totally loyal to the Governor, Republicans in pink.  The two were forced to each have an extra election because of the rotation.  If the rotation were reversed, neither would have had an extra election due to rotation. Wilson has two extra elections because he was due to run again in 2024, but because of truncation, he has to run in 2022 (a two year term) and again in 2024 (another two year term.) 

And finally those Republicans who are good Dunleavy loyalists.  Only one out of six has to run an extra election.  If it were switched, 5 out of six would have had to run.  

So, the impact on Republican Senators was the reason the GOP-appointed Board members were not even going to discuss why they were so hell bent on doing it their way and rammed this through over the objections of the two Independent appointed Board members.  

But, you might ask, if they rotated one seat this way and the other seat that way, how could it turn out so lopsided?  

1. First, there are 13 Republicans and only seven Democrats in the Senate, so more Republicans are going to be affected anyway.
2. By carefully numbering the House seats and carefully pairing them you can work out an order that alternates the Moderate Republicans. It's a bit tricky and you have to be thinking ahead.
3. Randy Ruedrich, the former Republican Party chair, has been heavily involved with redistricting since at least the 2000 process.  He has all the districts and all the incumbents in his head.  He is walking with a cane now and moves slower, but I saw no signs that his brain wasn't at full capacity.  And the Board didn't approve the final Senate pairings until the morning of November 9, the same day that truncation and allocation took place.  Marcum's map of the rejiggered Anchorage Senate pairings didn't show up until that morning.  They worked very carefully on those that night.  Board member Bahnke said that day, "I was taken totally by surprise."

They weren't able to make it work out perfectly, but they get every one of the Moderate Republicans and even the sometimes Moderate Republicans to run an extra election and all but one of the loyal Dunleavy Republicans got a free pass on the extra election from allocation.  (A few got an extra election through truncation.)

I'm guessing that Randy Ruedrich doesn't even care anymore about this intra-party squabble.  For him, I think this just a chess game.  It's a test of whether he can pull it off.  He's got a lot of knowledge due to his participation in this process over the years, and he's very smart.  And he likes to win.  He's played on the Oil Companies' team for so long it's just habit now. Or so I'm guessing.

How the House districts got configured and numbered didn't happen in public. Nor did the final Anchorage Senate pairings that showed up on that Tuesday morning and were quickly voted on with no discussion. In a future post I will go through the allocation process really carefully to show that:

1. It was really sloppy
1. If each of the Board members would have been asked to privately write down the motion that was passed, they would all be different
2. And if asked how it would be carried out, those would be all different too.
2. The GOP appointed members essentially stonewalled the Independent appointed members 
3. The GOP group had a prearranged plan (with Ruedrich's fingerprints on it) and they were not going to break ranks.  I'm pretty sure there was a lot of behind the scenes pressure on them to vote "the right way."  Especially after Budd Simpson broke ranks on the House districts previously.  I'd note that when I tried to ask him questions when it was over, he flatly refused to answer any questions. He said, "I don't talk to bloggers."

Here's the Board's chart post allocation that was created on November 9, 2021 after the allocation decisions were made.  It's taken me a long time to figure out the last two columns and how the staff figured out what to do.  And I think there's an error or two in the last column.  But that's for the post on the process that resulted in the chart. 

Do the extra elections matter?  It's not really clear.  But in the last election, two long standing Republican Senators lost their seats in the primaries to more conservative Republicans.  One was the Senate president who worked with the Democrats and the other was long time conservative Sen Coghill from the Fairbanks area.  These moderate Republicans are blocking Dunleavy from getting all he wants and the Republican party is set on getting rid of them.  

With closed primaries ended, it may be harder to bump off these Moderate Republicans and replace them with Republicans more loyal to Dunleavy.  The top four candidates of all parties now will run against each other in the ranked choice general election.  And Dunleavy himself is on the ballot.  So time will tell.  

In the meanwhile the allocation of Senate terms to one cycle or the next  was just as partisan and just as forced as the Eagle River pairings, but the outcome was less visible.  I hope I've made it more visible here.  

BACKGROUND   (I said this be down here at the end for those who need it)

There are three basic functions for the Board, regarding the Senate seats:

1. Pairing house seats into Senate seats.  There are 40 house seats.  Two house seats have to be paired to make a Senate seat.  The key criterion is that they are contiguous.  Compactness is another feature.  But how you pair seats can also affect the next election.  
1. In this round there's been a lot of justifiable fuss over the pairing of the two Eagle River seats, not with each other, but with Government Hill in one case and with South Muldoon in another.  Goldstream folks in Fairbanks were first upset that they weren't in a House district with nearby areas such as Ester and the University.  And in Anchorage Senator von Imhoff's Senate seat was so dismembered that on the Board's charts her name is left off (except for a footnote saying her seat was now in three different Senate seats) that only Mia Costello's name is listed for her Senate seat. (I think she's in Seat K based on an address on 100th Ave that Google provided.) 
2. Also, how the House seats are numbered affects the letters of the Senate seats. So House districts 1 and 2 are in Southeast Alaska and combine into Senate Seat A.  The order of the Senate seats matters when it comes to allocation of seats to the Senate election cycle - see below.
2. Truncation - once the seats are paired, they get truncated.  That is, those seats with a significant number of new voters have to run again in the very next election. This is based on the notion that people shouldn't be represented by people they didn't have a chance to vote for. This year they made the cutoff at 16.3% new voters (or less than 83.7% old voters) in a Senate seat.  The debate on this was polite and seemingly non-partisan.  (I say seemingly because there's always a chance I missed something.)  There are 20 Senate seats with four year terms and the Alaska constitution requires ten run at one election cycle and the others run at the next one.  So ten of the Senators would be running in 2022 anyway.  Only ten Senate seats were possibly subject to truncation.  Six of them had terms that were up in 2024 and were forced to run again in 2022.
3. Allocation of election year rotation. Finally, the Board has to make sure that ten Senators will run in one election year and the other ten in the next election year.  This is the part I'm focusing on here.  How they did it will come later, but here I'm going to show the outcome and why the GOP appointed members refused to budge.  

Anchorage International Film Festival (AIFF2021) Dec 3-12 - Hybrid Live/Online

There are lots of details here that make it difficult to  report this clearly and painlessly.  And there are various loose ends that need to get mentioned somehow.  I've been working on this for close to a week now.  My approach is to do this on several levels of detail.  Sort of a USA Today synopsis, then maybe a Daily News type overview, and then a trip into the basement where you can see all the moving parts.  I'm hoping that will allow people with different attention spans and different levels of interest to get the gist, if not the grist, of what happened.

There's now an AIFF page where ticket holders and members can log in.  But it doesn't say how to get tickets or become a member. 

OK, I put in the email address I used last year and it got me to a page where I could buy passes. If you didn't get a pass last year, you might try clicking the forgot button and see if it will get you in. There's a household pass (which I bought) for $150 and what I guess is an individual pass for $100.  Both say for online viewing only, not for in person events.  

Then I was able to go back to that page (above) and sign in and get to the AIFF page 

And I've also gone to the Facebook page.  (Wear a mask there)  Just to wet your appetite, I found the list of the features.  Features are longer films (generally over 50-60 minutes).  Documentaries are non-fiction and Narrative are fiction.  

The FEATURE FILMS you can watch at the festival in December are:

DOCUMENTARY FEATURES

80.000 Schnitzel • Hannah Schweier • Germany

A Sexplanation • Alex Liu • USA

Captive • Mellissa Fung • Canada

From the Hood to the Holler • Pat McGee • USA

I'm Wanita • Matthew Walker • Australia

Newtok • Andrew Burton & Michael Kirby Smith • USA

Not About Me Documentary • Kelly Milner • Canada

On These Grounds • Garrett Zevgetis • USA

Out Loud • Gail Willumsen • USA

Run Raven Run • Michael Rainin • USA

Scrum • Thomas Morgan • USA

The Art of Sin • Ibrahim Mursal • Norway

The form • Filip Flatau • France

NARRATIVE FEATURES

18½ • Dan Mirvish • USA

Americanish Film • Iman Zawahry • USA

Atlas • Niccolò Castelli • Switzerland

Christmas Freak The Movie • Sean Brown • USA

Culpa • Ulrike Grote • Germany

Everything in The End • Mylissa Fitzsimmons• Iceland/USA

Landlocked • Tim Hall (Timothy Hall) • USA

Lune • Aviva Armour-Ostroff & @Arturo Perez Torres • Canada

Tall Tales • Attila Szász • Hungary

The Wanderers • Hwang Lee • Korea

We're All In This Together • Katie Boland • Canada

Just looking through the list I see two familiar names:

Dan Mirvish - 18 1/2 - had a film - Between Us - in the 2013 festival.  He didn't come to the festival but I interviewed him via Skype and ended up with a rather long (for me) 17 minute video which you can see below.  In 2017 he came to the festival and did a stimulating workshop.

 

 

Another film - Tall Tales - is by Attila Szász, who has had two gorgeous films in prior festivals.  The Ambassador to Bern in 2014 and Demimonde.   both won the top prize for Narrative Features.  Below is the Skype interview I did with Szász in 2014.  I'm looking forward to the new film.

 

This is much more fun and much easier than the Redistricting Board.  

Point White Pier

 I went along with my daughter as she ran errands around the island.  The last one was near Point White Pier.  The sun was below the hills and the light was magical.  The clouds were moving and the water was moving and there was a kaleidoscope effect on the water.  

I saved this picture with higher resolution so you could enlarge it to better see the king fisher sitting on the adjacent dock.  

Here's looking down at the rocks through the water below the pier.  

Negative

 My wife and I got our boosters about two weeks before getting on a plane.  Our 8 year old granddaughter got her first shot about the same time.  There's a longer interval between shots for her - don't know if that's for all kids or just here.  The island is about 82% fully vaccinated for folks over 12. And most people are wearing masks, even walking outside.  

But our daughter decided that we should take tests four days after we got here (long enough for the virus to show from our airplane trip).  So yesterday, while the granddaughter got tested at school, we used a home testing kit.  My daughter got tested and here stepson also got tested.  Everyone negative.

Waiting

Just one red line means negative.  Two would be positive.

So last night for the first time since we got here Thursday, we all had dinner together.  Maskless. 

Two tests were $45.  And I'm not happy that the rest of the world can't get the vaccines available to us.  So let your Congressional representatives know you want all of Africa to have access as well.  

Yes, I'm stalling.  Still trying to distill the key points on the truncation and cycle allocation post.   

How Much Do You Know About Kyle Rittenhouse?

True or False?

1. Kyle Rittenhouse 
1. was bullied as a kid  
2. was a bully at his school
3. fled the scene of the crime
4. turned himself in
5. was a Proud Boy
6. drove 200 miles to be in Kenosha
2. His
1. parents had three kids in less than four years
2. mother is a certified nursing assistant
3. sister is a Bernie Sanders supporter
3. Rittenhouse fundraising efforts 
1. raised over more than $1 million
2. were misused by his attorneys

Just letting you check how much you know.

I realized lately that the name Kyle Rittenhouse was bombarding my consciousness.  I knew he was the kid who traveled from Illinois to Kenosha and  killed two people who were demonstrating against police violence in Kenosha.  And his trial was starting.

But I realized I knew really very little about who the person was and what actually happened that night in Kenosha.  

So I googled Rittenhouse biography and came up with this New Yorker article on how he got to Kenosha, what happened there, and how the right raised money for him and the Proud Boys claimed him.  

Too often the relentless repetition from the media and social media implants images into our heads that take root there without our attention and we unconsciously and uncritically form opinions on things.  

For instance - something I learned in the article - 

"The Rittenhouse apartment was a mile south of the Wisconsin border, and Rittenhouse had been storing his gun in Kenosha, at the house of a friend’s stepfather."

There wasn't too much about his family life, but here's some of it:

"Wendy [his mom] sometimes felt too overwhelmed to help her kids navigate difficulties. In 2017, when Kyle was fourteen, she tried to resolve a conflict between him and two classmates, twins named Anthony and Jonathan, by seeking restraining orders. In a handwritten petition to the court, Wendy, who has dyslexia, wrote, “Anthony calls Klye dumb stupid say that going to hurt Kyle. Anthony follows Kyle around to take picture of Klye and post them on soical media.”

"That fall, Rittenhouse, a pudgy ninth grader in dark-framed glasses, joined the Explorers program at the Grayslake Police Department, near Antioch. The police chief viewed the program as a way to “teach self-discipline, responsibility and other appropriate ‘life lessons’ ” to youths who “may have a challenging home, social, or school life.” Rittenhouse participated in a similar cadet program through the Antioch Fire Department. Jon Cokefair, the fire chief, told me, “Most of the kids that are doing this, they don’t play football, they’re not cheerleaders—this is their focus.”

Jeff Myhra, the deputy chief who ran Grayslake’s Police Explorers program, told me that participants trained with harmless replicas of service weapons. Explorers wore uniforms and often helped manage parade traffic. Rittenhouse went on police ride-alongs, a practice that may impart a false sense of competence, or authority. One brochure declared, “Like Police Officers, Explorers must be ready and willing to encounter any emergency situation such as first responders to accidents or injuries.”

There's also a lot about how prominent Trump related lawyers swooped in to raise money for Kyle's defense and took big payments from the accounts for themselves.  

There is usually a way to find out more about what's happening than we get through normal life.  But we also have to take accounts like this New Yorker article with a grain of salt too until we have enough evidence that it's accurate.  

I recommend using normal channels of information to find out what's happening and who's getting attention.  From there it makes more sense to find someone who has done a deep dive to find out a lot more details about the person and/or the situation.  

You can find answers to the True or False quiz in the article.  Yes, I could give you the answers, but then you'd just have a lot of out-of-context trivia that would not make you wiser about what's going on.  

Working On A Truncation Post, But In The Meantime A Visual Break

 When I sat in at the Redistricting Board meeting when they were doing truncation and then assigning Senate seats to the required staggered terms, I kept scratching my head and wondering, what is happening?  Lots of things didn't make sense.  So I've been listening to the video of the meeting and trying to write down exactly what was said so I'm certain about what I'm writing about it.  It's taking forever.  Especially with an eight year old granddaughter who hasn't seen her grandparents in almost two yers.  So here are some pictures - mostly ones she took yesterday.  I won't say which are which.  Today we baked a bread, played war, and were very silly, and I didn't get much done on the Board.  But priorities.

Downtown Seattle off in the distance

This one we played with together in Photoshop

Redistricting Board Has Posted The Video From Their Final Meeting Where Bahnke and Borromeo Refused To Back Down - See Below

 

The last Redistricting Board meeting was contentious, even explosive. I commend the Board for quicly posting the video of that meeting for all to see and judge for themselves.

Joint Redistricting Board, 11/10/21, 9am from AlaskaLegislature.tv on Vimeo.

Here's the link to the page with the video and many more.   Watch the Nov 8 video and see if you can find where John Binkley called for a vote on the Senate pairings. I missed it and I was there.

There's lots more to talk about this event.  I think it will be seen as the day that two Alaskan Native women stood up and refused to be polite and obedient partners of the three white Board members who pushed through a 3-2 vote to approve what seems to many to be a blatant partisan gerrymandering of the Eagle River senate pairings.  John Binkley, who throughout this process has been friendly and open and conciliatory, seemed like a different person was he pushed this through.  No attempt to find a way to resolve this other than the 3-2 vote.  He wanted to erase their names from the Proclamation because they wouldn't sign it. It took the Board's attorney to resolve the issue by proposing that people sign the document as approving or opposing.  This was a big day for Alaskan Natives all over the state and for everyone who believes in fair, non-partisan redistricting.  

[UPDATE Nov 13, 2021:  After watching this again, I think there are a number of important issues.  One is the point, made by Melanie Bahnke, that this shines a light on how things get done by elected and appointed officials, not just in this case, but in all situations.  Also important to me was that neither Bethany Marcum nor Budd Simpson, when asked, chose to counter anything that Borromeo and Bahnke said. 1.  Because they can't offer any legitimate rebuttal, and 2) because they know they have three votes to two votes. ]

How Do Supreme Court Justices Determine Someone's Sincerity?

The Supreme Court justices were asking questions in a  case where a condemned man wants to have his pastor pray for him and touch him while he's dying.  The lower court sided with Texas, so if the Supreme Court had done nothing, he wouldn't have been allowed to have these last contacts with his pastor. 

 The AP story reported by Jessica Gresko said they're asking questions like:

“What’s going to happen when the next prisoner says that I have a religious belief that he should touch my knee. He should hold my hand. He should put his hand over my heart. He should be able to put his hand on my head. We’re going to have to go through the whole human anatomy with a series of cases,” Justice Samuel Alito said.

Yeah, this claiming religious privilege could get out of hand. This claiming religious privilege could get out of hand.  Why, a baker might refuse to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple because it goes against his strongly held religious beliefs.  What's the difference between a religious belief and a personal prejudice?  After all, Southerners claimed the Bible supported slavery.  What if people believe that Jews killed Jesus (something I've been told on more than one occasion), do they have the right to impose the death penalty?

"Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh also expressed concerns about what a ruling for the inmate would mean for requests in the future, with Kavanaugh asking whether all states would have to offer equivalent accommodations.

What if, he asked, one state “allows bread and wine in the execution room right before the execution” or allows the minister to “hug the inmate.” Do other states have to do the same?"

I get that this question deals with setting precedents. Why are they so worried about some decency for a dying man? But maybe they should look at all claims to do or not do something based on a religious right. 

"Arguing for Texas, state Solicitor General Judd Stone II also told the justices that Ramirez’s request is just an attempt to delay his execution. Justice Clarence Thomas seemed to agree, asking what the justices should do if they believe Ramirez has “changed his requests a number of times” and “filed last minute complaints” and “if we assume that’s some indication of gaming the system.'”

'He [the prosecutor] also said it’s hard to know how a spiritual adviser might react during that time. That person could faint or stumble and jostle the IV lines, he said. “Anything going wrong here would be catastrophic,” he said.'

Really?  More catastrophic to whom?  Certainly not the person being put to death. 

Think about this.  Five of the Supreme Court Justices are Catholics and one more was raised Catholic.  All but one is strongly anti-abortion, but they have much less problem with the death penalty. It's good they are not bound to the Pope's position on everything.  The AP article says they've been less interested lately in staying executions, except when there's a religious aspect. 

The Court has already defined 'religion' pretty broadly.  From the Free Dictionary Legal Dictionary

"To determine whether an action of the federal or state government infringes upon a person's right to freedom of religion, the court must decide what qualifies as religion or religious activities for purposes of the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has interpreted religion to mean a sincere and meaningful belief that occupies in the life of its possessor a place parallel to the place held by God in the lives of other persons. The religion or religious concept need not include belief in the existence of God or a supreme being to be within the scope of the First Amendment."

This puts a burden on the Justices to determine if a belief is sincere.  That's hard to do in any event, but the Justices never see or hear the actual person whose case is before them.  This is, in fact, moving from interpreting the law to discerning a person's sincerity.   How do you interpret someone's deeply held beliefs in the first place.

? And  for those who belong to established religions how do you determine if someone actually believes the institution's doctrines or not?  Surely we have seen examples of, say, anti-abortion voting politicians who arranged abortions for their pregnant mistresses.  For a dying man, I say, risk being wrong and let him have his last request.  So what if he turns out to be gaming the system?  He's going to die.  

Most Western,  actually most,  countries have abolished the death penalty.  But our conservative Supreme Court justices seem to have no heart.  They're hung up on the myth of all people can be rich if they just put their minds and backs into working hard.  And punishment takes precedence over empathy and kindness.  So, they have to ascertain the difference between a legitimate religious belief or being gamed by a condemned man.  

Leap Of Faith - Flying To Seattle After Deicing

 March 4, 2020, we returned from a long trip with our daughter and granddaughter and assorted family members.  We'd also been to San Francisco to visit our son and his two kids.  Early US COVID deaths were happening at Seattle area nursing homes.  Our daughter was concerned enough to give us each an N-95 mask and drove us all the way out to the airport. (We usually just caught a train out after the ferry to downtown Seattle.)  After a few days I had mild COVID symptoms, but even though I could check off three symptoms and being the right age group and coming from a COVID outbreak area and testing negative for the flu, I couldn't get tested.  

I was near the end of  Michael Lewis'  The Premonition  on the plane today, a story of 'outlaw' doctors

who on their own came up with a plan for what to do when there's a pandemic.  About that time there just weren't enough tests available.  I wasn't sick enough to get tested.  They were saving tests for people in the hospital.  Premontion  tells of a UCSF lab that created, with lots of volunteer help (Post-Phd grad volunteers) a way to provide free tests, but Kaiser said no because they were afraid they'd lose their contract with their regular supplier (according to the book) and a non-profit said no because they couldn't put $0 for cost in their accounting system.

In any case. there was over a foot of snow in some places in my driveway when I shoveled at 8am.  We watched the cab drive by looking for an address.  We couldn't catch his attention, but he stopped down the block and asked someone who was out.  We caught that guy's attention.  

There was a lot of snow.  Wednesday afternoon there hadn't been any.  

Getting through security at 8:45am wasn't bad.  It felt both odd and familiar as we walked through the airport to our gate.  Soon we were on the plane.  We had an empty middle seat, though the pilot kept saying it was full.  Finally at the very end, someone showed up and I moved to the middle seat as a barrier for J.  (Usually I'm at the window with my camera, but it's COVID.  But my neighbor had a good mask on and I saw a Providence screen, then a UAA screen on her computer, so I'm assuming she has a good understanding of the virus.  But still being that close to so many strangers can be uncomfortable.  But I just dismissed the anxiety - I was on the plane and I could either enjoy the ride or have a miserable trip.  I chose option A.

But we weren't leaving that fast.  We had snow on the wings and had to be deiced first.  But another plane was ahead of us.  

Here's our snowy wing.  And it was really a low cloud cover. 

Finally our deicer is on the way.  Our window wasn't very clear. 

Our turn.

We got to the 10,000 foot level still shrouded in flat opaque gray clouds.  It was a full ten minutes before we emerged above it and saw blue again.  

It turned out that our seat mate had missed her 6:30 flight to Portland because the security line was so long.  So she'd had to wait around for our 10:30 flight which was delayed over an hour and still had to get to Portland.  Which I guess explains why she showed up at the last minute - they had to see how many empty seats there were.  

I'd semi decided that we'd skip the train - we'd been cooped up in a plane full of masked, but potential COVID spreaders, and I didn't need more of that.  And we were an hour late.  And it was raining pretty hard, so we took a cab which we'd never done before.  The cab driver asked what time our ferry left.  It was 4:18 at that point.  "We won't make it - it's at 4:45."  The cab driver assured us we'd make it, and we did.  After eating another of the sandwiches we'd brought along (the food service on the ferry was shut down), I needed to get outside.  But it was raining hard and the wind was blowing.  But I found a protected spot in the back.  (As I typed that I thought do ferries have a front and back - since cars come in one end in Seattle and they leave out the other end on Bainbridge Island?  So, I checked with you know who and got this answer to the same question someone asked at sailnet in 2013:

"Washington State Ferries have a pilothouse at each end, so when the boat is ready to leave the dock, the crew moves to the new front of the boat. Sometimes they do turn around or back in, but that is because they loaded cars at the end of the load that need to be offloaded first. That mostly happens on Lopez, Shaw, and Orcas islands and sometimes on Vashon island. Most of the routes are point A to point B though."

Well, here's the view from the back (for that trip anyway) of the ferry looking towards downtown Seattle.  

What a pleasure to be met by our daughter and granddaughter after all this time.  My son-in-law is off on a business trip in Nairobi, 

Today begins two days of discussions amongst the Africa Eats investees on how to speed up the growth of their solutions, how to fill in the gaps African businesses face, and to make Africa Eats more than the sum of its portfolio companies.#hunger #poverty #Africa pic.twitter.com/WxisPMmsd6

— Africa Eats (@AfricaEats) November 12, 2021

but he's due back before Thanksgiving. 

Today's Final Board Meeting.- A Board Divided Signs A Divided Proclamation

The Board's divisions between those members appointed by Republicans (Marcum and Simpson were appointed by Gov. Dunleavy and Binkley was appointed by then Senate President Giessel) and those appointed by non-party affiliated (Borromeo by then House Speaker Bryce Edgmon  and Bahnke by Alaska Supreme Court Chief Justice Joel Bolger).  

Nicole Borromeo (l) and Melanie Bahnke

Bahnke and Borromeo tried once again to make changes to the Senate pairings, particularly splitting the two ER districts and pairing one ER district with JBER and Government Hill and the other with a south Muldoon district.  Chair Binkley listened to them and then asked for the vote to finally approve the Board's proclamation.  It was 3-2 to approve the proclamation.  When Board members Borromeo and Bahnke refused to sign their names on the proclamation, Chair Binkley wanted their names taken off the proclamation.  They said they did not want to be erased from the Board and wanted their names on the proclamation. There was a brief stalemate.  Then they took the proclamation and apparently signed but wrote something about it being a partisan, illegal gerrymandering on the proclamation.  Chair Binkley refused to use that page.  The Board's attorney Matt Singer suggested a signature page which differentiated between those in favor and those opposed.  That was accepted.  Then Borromeo and Bahnke made statements.  The other Board members declined to make statements.  [Borromeo's statement was written and I was able to get a copy and it's included below. 

My notes of the meeting below.  [Remember these are very rough, things missing, etc.  but gives you an idea of what happened and when the transcripts/audio comes out, you have an idea of what to look for.]

About 10:03  Motion to adopt.  

Bahnke:  I 'd like to talk about the process

Borromeo: No reason to split ER and in fact there are legal reasons to NOT split the Muldoon districts.  I look forward to being able to speak on these issues.  On the last day, takes downtown Anchorage all the way out to Chugiak.

Bahnke:  Also speak against the motion.  Evidence of partisan gerrymandering which raises questions of the whole plan.  Alaskans deserve better.  Maybe 80% of the plan is fair and non-partisan.  We could have had a 100% non-partisan plan.  

Bethany Marcum

Marcum:  I respect your opinion my experience of military 

Bahnke:  Also point out the cracking of the Muldoon.

Borromeo:  This area of Muldoon is a residential area, and expectation that we have 20,000 Alaskans traveling from this residential area into ER and vice versa is beyond belief.  [Played some audio???]  That's the reason.

All those in favor:

Yes - Marcum, Simpson, Binkley

No - Bahnke, Borromeo

Binkley:  That takes us to signing

Binkley: Take names off the page for the no votes

Borromeo:  Do not take me off the Board by taking my name off the page.  

John Binkley (l) Budd Simpson, Matt Singer,
Board attorney, across the table

Binkley: It makes sense to leave your names off.

Bahnke:  I want it on the record that I am on the Board

Binkley:  You should sign and you can write a minority report.

Bahnke:  You are erasing me from the Board because I vote no.

[Bahnke took the paper back - not sure what she is writing.  Bizarre that Binkley wants to take their names off the signature page.  There has been no attempt in the last two days to forge a compromise.  It's just plowing through using the 3-2 majority.]

[UPDATE Nov 13:  Here's what she was writing -  Image from DermotCole tweet- bottom of this thread - today]

10:13 Binkley:  Lets stand at ease

Matt Singer - You could have those in favor - signatures and those opposed signed there.  

Binkley:  Have signature page with those in opposition and those in favor separate.

AT ease: [Went off the record, but the discussion continued]

Borromeo:  I'm opposed to pairing of 21K/22K [ER and S. Muldoon] 20J/19J [N. Muldoon and U-Med}   23L/24L ( [ER & JBER/Govt Hill)  Other than that I'm fine with the plan.  I don't like all the shuffling of Anchorage. 

Juli [Board Administrator] offering refused statement for signing.  

Borromeo:  I just want to leave our names on.

Bahnke:  For the record not opposed to the whole plan, but integrity breached with Senate pairings.  That raises questions of the rest of the plan.  Can't approve if 20% is [very bad.]  I'm not living in districts where problem takes place, but I can step back and see it disenfranchises a part of Alaska.  I don't mind how that is indicated.  Wasn't opposed to all of them.  Only where I saw cracking and illegal gerrymandering  [Cracking is where you combine a low income diverse district with a higher income white district which tends to diminish the representation of the low income neighborhood.]

Simpson:  I agree with attorney, 

Bahnke:  I would have called this out if Democrats were doing this.

10:20  Binkley:  Let's get back on the record.  Compromise proposed by counsel.  Signature blocks of all five members but indicates which ones support and those who oppose it.

Bahnke:  I think that's better than not signing it.  

Borromeo: [This was my attempt to get down her words.  Below is a copy of her written text] True, fair representation was required by founders.  We failed.  I had to go to DC to deal with VRA, when I came back to Alaska. We used testimony of Alaskans to develop fair map of House districts.  We abandoned that.     22 [ER Valley]&24[N.ER] - same streets, neighborhoods, schools, watersheds, utility, and ER has been trying to annex from Anchorage.  No connection between ER and these Government Hill - only way to access is blocked by Base.  Besides objective - we failed to connect these.   We opposed it.  Worth noting South Muldoon does not have a single road connecting - 4 miles down Muldoon through district 20, then another 12 mies to get to ER.  ER not a hot bed of commerce, basically residential.  To argue S Muldoon goes there to shop etc. is ridiculous.  I was told I won too much.  I didn't win anything.  It's not personal.  Alaska lost.  

Even if it's true I had already whined too much, it's no reason to oppose my maps.  Marcum said that her map would extend ER's political power.  You will hear this.  One of the most diverse neighborhoods is the loser.

I want to thank Alaskans for their attention to all this.  And rural Alaskans.  The hospitality you have shown us can only be found in Alaska.  I remain dedicated to fair maps in the next round.  The violations that occurred inlets two days, prevented me from signing.

Bahnke:  15 months of this process.  What we saw.  The way that Board took action tend  [muffle?] discussion and debate yesterday was contrary to Roberts Rules.  Not an expert.  As a former legislator I think you know those rules well.  The outcome has resulted in muffling of particular segment of Alaskan voters.  One point, legitimacy of my authority to speak for Alaska Natives in my own district was questioned.  I've put up with a lot.  That's micro level.  Macro level it silences  part of our population.  More encouraged today.  The greater victory is shining a light to expect  and deserve better not only from elected and appointed level.  Alaskans are seeing what happens.  Whether Republicans, Dems, white, brown, rural urban - we are all Alaskans.  Shed a bigger light on statewide level.  

Binkley asks Marcum and Simpson if they want to say anything.

Marcum  no

Budd?  no

Binkley:  We took great effort to get testimony, all around the state.  Very informative to get the sense from Alaskans and how they felt.  Guided by constitution, our first priority.  Letter and by rulings that have come out to give us sense of direction.  Adhered to that tightly.  Make certain we have legal and defensible process.  Difficult and unfortunate everyone can't be happy.  Tried to put fair plan together.  Some people can look and say fair and others see it differently.  It would be great to be unanimous.  Public has opportunity to look at it and be engaged  Judicial system will reviewed and that's a wonderful part of this.  

I thank all of my fellow Board members, a lot of time, wonderful. As Melanie and Nicole pointed out Alaskans have been very hospital.  Unfortunate we couldn't reach unanimity.  Tremendous experience for me personally.  

Finally thank staff, did an incredible job under Peter Torkelson's leadership.  Tremendous amount time and fair.  And our legal counsel as well. 

Motion to adjourn, seconded. Opposition?  Adjourned.  

I'd note that after the meeting I introduced myself as a blogger to Budd Simpson and asked if I could ask a couple of questions.  He responded, "I don't talk to bloggers."  I was a little taken aback, but expanded my introduction to say I was a professor emeritus of public administration and that I blogged all of the previous redistricting ten years ago and this time.  He still had nothing to say.  So I asked anyway, "You said you were persuaded by the testimony to accept the house map of Anchorage that kept Eagle River districts separate from the east anchorage and JBER/Govt Hill districts.  There was also overwhelming testimony to keep the ER districts in one Senate seat.  What changed that you weren't persuaded this time?"  He said something like I could ask all I wanted but he wasn't answering.  

This part of the process is over.  Now it's up to the public to legally challenge the Board's proclamation in court.  I expect that will happen given how divided the board was.  

I still have observations to make about a lot that's happened with the Board and will try to do that soon.  Meanwhile I do want to say that this whole process was much more open and transparent than the last Board.  Partly that was due to changes in technology that made accessing interactive maps much easier for the public.  But it also took a Board that was willing to make them accessible and a staff that was incredibly responsive and fast in getting things up.  So I want to thank the Board and staff for doing that.  

I'm scheduled to get on an airplane tomorrow for the first time in almost two years.  I'm looking forward to seeing family and having Thanksgiving with them there.  So I've got lots of things to do to prepare for the house sitter and so I'm going to stop for now.