The AK Redistricting Board's Amateur Decision Making Process - Plus Marcum and Binkley Reasons For 3B Votes

In my previous post, I put up the video of the meeting where the three Republican Redistricting Board members go through their reasons for choosing Option 3B.  It also includes Board member Borromeo's rejection of those assertions and a plea to Judge Matthews to just fix the map himself and not remand it to the Board because they aren't going to change.  

In the post prior to that I went through Board member Budd Simpson's reasons for supporting Option 3B - as he laid them out in Wednesday's meeting - and pointed out problems I had with his reasons.  I thought this next post I would do the same with member Marcum's and member Binkley's reasons.  (And I do that as sort of an addendum to this post at the bottom.) But it seemed to be more useful to demonstrate that their reasons do not add up to a good, professional decision making exercise.   And in doing that, try to summarize their strategy so it's easier to understand what they did and what they didn't do, in terms of good decision making.  (But I wasn't quite done with it and so I put up the video of that meeting yesterday instead.)

Using a decision making model allows me to establish the flakiness of how they - in their words and actions - decided that Option 3B was the best option.  Because flaky as it might seem to many, the districts they created, while not optimal, could be considered Constitutional by the courts.  That depends on how they interpret "as contiguous as practicable."  Since other criteria, such as deviation and compactness, are applied more strictly in densely populated urban areas than more sparsely populated rural areas, why shouldn't contiguity be treated the same?  It's much easier to be contiguous in a densely populated area.  Will they see that such an urban/rural differentiation makes sense now?  At least in Anchorage.  

But if the Courts view the maps as basically in compliance with the Contiguity requirement, the other way I see that they might block the map is  by deciding it was politically motivated gerrymandering.  Part of the evidence for reaching that  conclusion is to:

• realize that the Board's decision making was haphazard at best,  simply the application of anecdotal evidence to 'prove' the 3B map was the best, because it's not the best on objective measures
• wonder why the majority fought so hard for Senate pairings that ignore the obvious pairings and force together much less natural pairings and  
• conclude there was an unspoken (by the majority) reason - getting another Republican Senate seat.

So first a brief description of what good decision making should NOT look like from a 1998 Harvard Business Review article, The Hidden Traps in Decision Making:

"So where do bad decisions come from? In many cases, they can be traced back to the way the decisions were made—the alternatives were not clearly defined, the right information was not collected, the costs and benefits were not accurately weighed. But sometimes the fault lies not in the decision-making process but rather in the mind of the decision maker. The way the human brain works can sabotage our decisions."

The article is more interested in the problems with the mind of the decision maker, and while I'm sure exploring the hidden biases in brains of the decision makers would yield fascinating results, we don't have to go there to find serious problems with the Redistricting Board's decision to select Option 3B over Option 2.  

If anyone wants to know what went wrong - and it's clear the decision was wrong from a public interest perspective - we need look no further than

1. the alternatives were not clearly defined, 
2. the right information was not collected, 
3. the costs and benefits were not accurately weighed

Click to enlarge
More detailed maps with the Simpson post

1. the alternatives were not clearly defined, 
1. The Board settled into two map options.  
2. One offered by the East Anchorage Plaintiffs - Option 2
3. One offered by Randy Ruedrich - Option 3B
4. They could have made more, but didn't.
5. The 3B Option chose to 
1. Pair north Muldoon (D20) with south Muldoon (D21)
6. That left D22 as an orphan district (not connected to another district to make a Senate district)
1. The two key options were to connect with D24 (to the north above the map) or D9.  Both were connected to other house districts, so both required at least one more change.  
2. Majority basically decided that 24 was not available because it was paired with 23 and they weren't going to change that.  
7. So the next choice was D9.  

So, basically, the majority had only ONE choice - pairing 22 with 9.  So, no, the alternatives were not clearly defined.  

1. [This loose 1. is here because I haven't figured out how to do lists that I can break for a moment and then continue on Blogger.  I even tried to make them white so you can't see them, but they are independent.  There will be more at 3.  If anyone has a suggestion I'm listening.]
2. the right information was not collected, 
1. The only information that the Board collected in any sort of organized way in the whole process was related to maps.  They used the census data and the Autobound software organized that data for the Board
2. The Board collected anecdotes, personal preferences, justifications, but did not pursue collecting data that would help verify which of these vague notions about the Senate seats was accurate
3. The Board was given more anecdotes, personal preferences, and justifications via the public testimony (I've offered a methodology for evaluating that here)
4. The Board received some actual data and information via the public testimony 
5. The majority did not study the data and information that came in.  Rather, they picked things that supported their preference and ignored data that didn't (example:  JBER students going to ER High School.  They cited Lance Pruitt's assertion that ER High School wouldn't exist without JBER.  They ignored Denny Wells statistics that showed more JBER residents live in areas of the bases zoned for West High and Bartlett.  And they never compared how many D9 students went to high schools in D22 or vice versa.)
6. This was a giant gap for the Board.  While they hired technicians for the technical mapping data gathering and organization, the only other professional decision making expertise used for evaluating how well they met the non-numerical criteria for redistricting was to hire the VRA expert. Most of that debate was hidden from the public and I'm guessing led Marcum to pair D22 with D20 because the VRA expert said pairing D22 with D21 (north Muldoon) wouldn't work because of the diversity of that district.  That would have been the majority's ideal pairing because it would have forced popular Democratic Sen Bill Wielechowsk into an Eagle River district.  But that's speculation on my part.  What's key is that they did not remotely follow the three steps of decision making outlined in the excerpt above.

1. 
   
2. 
   
3. the costs and benefits were not accurately weighed
1. The majority never compared the two basic options which were:
1. Pairing  22 and 24  versus pairing 22 and 9
2. Instead, they
1. took pairing 22 and 24 off the table from the beginning and
2. thus made it impossible, in their minds, to pair 22 and 24
3. used anecdotal information to argue the benefits of pairing 22 and 9
4. used anecdotal information to argue why 23 could not be separated from 24
5. used anecdotal information to argue why 23 could not be combined with 17 
6. only looked at data that favored what they wanted and disfavored what they didn't want
3. I say anecdotal because there were reliable or valid numbers available to evaluate,  that could be put into tables that neatly outlined factors that would help them compare how well each pairing met the constitutional criteria. (Actually the only criterion for Senate seats is contiguity, but that didn't stop them from talking about socio-economic integration (9SEI)when they thought it would help their cause.  They pointed out the primacy of contiguity when the proponents of Option 2 discussed SEI.
4. They never gathered objective numbers to fill into the non-existent cost/benefit chart (in this case perhaps advantages/disadvantages chart)

This was not professional decision making.  This was just marshaling claims and assertions to back up a decision that clearly had already been made:  To keep Senate seat L (D23 and D24) intact.  

Why all this effort to pretend that pairing D22 with D9 was the only option they had?  And was far superior to D22 and D24?    And what was the problem with pairing D23 with D17 ( downtown)? In Marcum's words, "Choosing option 2 is an intentional attempt to break up that natural pairing [23/24].  JBER should be with Chugiak." 

But these aren't dumb people.  

The only explanation that makes sense to me is one that the Court already found them guilty of:  political gerrymandering.  The proclamation plan would have given them (and Eagle River) control of two Senate seats.  The Court specifically broke up one of those (D21/D22).  Pairing D22 with D21 gave Eagle River control over a Senate seat that was half a swing district. Pairing D22 with D24 would force them to give up control over another swing district. (D23)  Eagle River would end up with just one solidly red Senate Seat.  So they had to pair D22, not with the obvious match Eagle River seat D24 - a perfect Senate seat by all the normal criteria - but with D9, across the mountains and with no adjoining neighborhoods.  And that would force pulling D9 apart from D10, another reasonable community of interest.  

And that's what they did. Since this doesn't make logical sense from a redistricting perspective and they had to manipulate data to pretend that it did, one has to ask why?   

Is it possible there is another explanation?    Given the attempted gerrymandering the first time around and the fact that this time the three Republican Board members teamed up to support a map made by Randy Ruedrich and voted for that map over the strenuous objections of the other two Board members, it's pretty compelling.  

Addendum:  Based on my notes from the Wednesday, April 13, 2022 Board meeting.

Board Member Bethany Marcum's Reasons for supporting Option 3B

[Board member's comments in black, mine in red]

Marcum:  I’m very uncomfortable with Option 2 because it moves JBER and links it with D17.  It makes the least sense for any possible pairings.  Downtown is the arts and tourism center, that's not what makes up JBER.  It is used to wake up?? the military community.  Choosing option 2 is an intentional intent to break up that natural pairing.  JBER should be with Chugiak.  

It was hard to sit through these comments without putting my hands over my face.  She’s just pulling words and ideas out of the blue here.   Let’s look carefully at the majority’s defense of 3B strategy.  

The first step is to assume the Chugiak/Eagle River(24) and JBER/Government Hill (D23) Senate district is untouchable.  That’s because this is the last district left for them to pull an extra Republican Senator from.  In the same way that the courts found linking (ER) D22 and south Muldoon (21) was political gerrymandering because it ‘cracks’ D21, this pairing ‘cracks’ D23.  

How?  Eagle River is solidly White, comfortably middle class, and Republican, Trump Republican.  It’s the voters who elected Lora Reinbold  and Jamie Allard.    D23 is, in general, lower income, and far more diverse.

Both Simpson and Marcum refer to D23 as the JBER district although 1//3 of the population does not live on JBER.  Other factors:  many military either don’t voter or they vote in their home states.  The JBER precincts had fewer people voting in the last few elections (including 2020) than the non-JBER districts even though they outnumber them 2-1.   So this is a perfect district to pair with a strongly Republican district.  Higher income white neighborhoods have a higher voting percentage than lower income diverse neighborhoods, so Eagle River will dominate Senate races.  As has been pointed out at different times in this process, when a Muldoon house district was paired with ER in the 2011 redistricting process, a popular Senator, and the only black in the State Senate at that time, was handily defeated by ER voters.  

It would appear the Republican majority of the Board is working hard to keep this district for themselves.

So, basically, they start out by putting it to the side, not even to be considered, as they look for a partner house district for a D22 Senate pairing.

But D23 is NOT just JBER.  It’s 1/3  off base, Downtown-adjacent neighborhoods.  

And if JBER and downtown are so different they can’t be paired, why did the Board  make a house district that does just that:  puts downtown in with JBER?  You can’t have it both ways.  It was ok as a house district, but not as a Senate District?

And none of the majority have considered the reverse problem of lumping Government Hill folks in with Eagle River.  If it’s bad one way, then it should be bad the other way.  But that doesn’t help their case.

I’ve been listening to the Redistricting Board debates since December 2020.  I don’t recall people talking about Downtown as the arts and tourism center of Anchorage before and I’m not sure why she thinks the military have no interest in the arts.  They don't go to the museum? They don't go to the Performing Arts Center?  She didn’t mention that downtown is probably the bar/tavern center of Anchorage too because she knows it would be harder to keep a straight face saying the young soldiers don’t spend time in the downtown bars.  

While Marcum has taken umbrage when people have characterized her intent, she has no problem jumping to the conclusion that pairing D23 with downtown is an intentional attempt to break up “the natural pairing” of JBER and Chugiak/Eagle River.  See, it’s just such a natural pairing that it’s off the table when we make these adjustments.  And I suspect that Marcum has convinced herself of this.  The problem is that pairing D22 with D24 is the most natural pairing to be had.  It’s not just me saying that.  Lots of people did, including Dr. Chase Hensel and Dr. Phyllis Morrow.  Dr. Hensel was the expert witness for the East Anchorage plaintiffs.  The two submitted about six pages of testimony about why the two ER districts were a community of interest, the crux is this:

“Because a large data set informs the question of whether and to what degree a population constitutes a community of interest, it can be a judgment call as to where the boundaries of a community of interest lie. In the Eagle River case, however, there is no question: all the signposts point in the same direction.”    

You can read it all in the public testimony listed for April 7-April 8 on pages 327 - 332.  

In that same file there is testimony (pp. 312-316)  from Doug Robbins who offers a long list of references to “Chugiak Eagle River” by the Municipality, by businesses, by Eagle River organizations, to make the point that we all know that Chugiak Eagle River is the most natural pairing.  

Marcum:  Looking back at E Anchorage lawsuit.  Challenged K and L.  L - 23/24, not found to be invalid.  Both are proposals we are not considering.  Both addressed K issue the same way.  It’s what the E Anchorage plaintiffs wanted, satisfactory.  Those individuals still very involved pushing one plan over the other.  Why are they investing themselves in this?  I have to conclude there is political motive.  

I’d have to go back and review the East Anchorage plaintiffs’ suit before commenting on what it did or didn’t do.  

 I have learned over the years that people often project their own thinking and actions on to others.  The Supreme Court found the majority Board members had politically gerrymandered the map.  And so with no proof offered other than they are proposing Option 2, Marcum concludes it’s political.  I’m guessing that she knows that her preference against the common sense pairings, is for political reasons, then opposing her choice must also be for political reasons.  There are other reasons to do things, like fairness and equity in voting.

I didn’t gerrymander.  Here’s why I support pairings.

Courts ruling on Senate K - key response created Muldoon Road district.  

When you put 20 and 21 together, you are left with 22 empty.  The only pairing is D9.  

This is exactly what Simpson said.  The other part of Eagle River (D24), what is known by so many organizations and people as Greater Chugiak and Eagle River, is not an obvious pairing?  Only if you’re locking D24 with D23.  The rational way to proceed is to look at the two adjacent districts - D24 and D9.  When you do that and measure the pairings by every criteria (other than political advantage) then the obvious choice is D24 and D22.  And since it is so obvious, Marcum and Simpson have simply taken that option off the table.  D24 and D23 is a done deal, end of discussion.  So all that is left is D9.  

That leaves 10 without a partner.  ???  That leaves 14 stranded and requires a new pairing.  Take two primary midtown roads.  Four remaining districts 23/24   17/18 same as current    11/12  no changes.  15/16   four changes that result from responding to court ruling and four that remain the same.  

In comparison, Simpson had a set of points and arguments that he went through.  Like Marcum, pairing D22 with D24 was never an option.  So there were never any comparisons of that pairing with the D22/D9 pairing.  Because everything they said about how compatible D22 and D9 are - non-urban neighborhoods, mountainous, wild life encounters (as though those don’t also happen in the Anchorage bowl), fire and snow, service areas for roads - all that is true and a much better match with D24 than D22, as former ER representative/senator Randy Phillips testified.

So let’s move on to Chair John Binkley’s reasons.

Binkley:  Thank you Bethany.  My position.  Then the second round.  Outpouring of public testimony.  Shows me Alaskans are engaged.  Seven different public hearings.  Heard from 100 Anchorage residents.  Heartening that Alaskans care.  People are supportive or opposing one of the other. We step back it’s our job to replace Sen K  - concerned with our pairing of 22 and 21.  Heartening that both proposals repaired that.  It is noteworthy that is how we solved the problem.   

No dispute with them on the process. 

Heard from people that  D22 and D24 should be paired.  Those people are articulate about how ER Chugiak, Peters Creek are closely tied together.  But as Budd pointed out earlier, the two Republican Senators and former Sen President all testified they should be together.  There are factions in the Republican Party who think they should be paired.  Budd mentioned another member of the administration.  Also supported 22 and 24 together.    I take it seriously and those are legitimate moves by people

Let’s give him points for even talking about the D22 and D24 option.  He did not rule it out from the get go.  He likes to ramble a bit and seems to have gotten off the prescribed talking points.

But also heard similarities between 22 and 9.  Both more rural, larger lot sizes.  Single family homes.  Served by road service districts.  Share the Chugach state park.  Close to mountains, deal with wildlife, wildfire danger.  Could be important.  Most house districts are compact and larger districts large rural districts on the outskirts.  Also heard that ER and Hillside were once in a single house districts - met a higher standard.  

The judge said that the Board members’ simple preference doesn’t outweigh the preponderance of public opinion.  Binkley has given us NO hard data to support his feelings about this.  There is no serious comparison of the two possible Senate pairings.  Just words with little or no factual support.  And in the past Eagle River didn't have a big enough population to form two house seats so the population was shared with other house seats.  

I'd also note that nine of the 2021 map districts border Chugach State Park either directly or border other park land that spills into the park.  And no district in town is more than 15 minutes from Chugach State Park.  

JBER in District 23 one of the most compelling.  Extends from D23 into D24.  If underlying house districts different it could have been done differently.  

The only one who recognizes something about how D23 was drawn.  But he doesn’t explain what he means.  Perhaps if they hadn’t made the district 1/3 off base, downtown adjacent?  He also doesn't mention that Government Hill in D23 extends from D23 to D17 (downtown).

Really active and retired military reside in 24 and have that connection to 23.   Direct highway connection Arctic Valley and closer to town.  Also heard testimony to JBER and N Muldoon.  Also legitimate.  Not an option presented to us.   

He’s saying here, I think, that he heard compelling testimony that pairing the JBER with N. Muldoon was another option, but it was “not an option presented to us.”   Excuse me?!  You are chair of the Board.  It’s the Board’s job to create the maps.  Why didn’t you pursue that option yourself if you thought it viable?  Are you saying the Board’s hands are tied? Unless someone else offers an option they can’t entertain it?  

But, of course, the East Anchorage plaintiffs’ preference was to pair the two Muldoon districts, so they didn't  offer it to you.  And the other option was a map which both member Marcum and Randy Ruedrich prepared independently (according to Marcum.)  But if you start with the assumption that  the D24 and D23  pairing is untouchable,  then it wouldn’t be hard to come up with the rest of the maps exactly the same.  

I don’t find compelling the idea of JBER with downtown Anchorage. For 13 years I’ve had a condo here and  been in that district for work and with Alaska RR and in my experience the downtown area part of D23 is dominated by professional services.  

Hearing this, member Borromeo jumped in and said something like, “You deferred Anchorage to Marcum because you said you didn’t know Anchorage well, and only now you are telling us you had a condo in Anchorage for 13 years?

Just moments before Marcum said that Anchorage is the arts and tourism center of Anchorage.  Now it’s portrayed as dominated by professional services.  But no data, no statistics to back up either claim.  Just feelings, personal experience in the past.  I’m not saying that there aren't art galleries and a museum downtown or that there aren’t professional services.  But why does this make the district incompatible with the Base?  There actually wasn't much testimony from the base.  The only person I recall is retired Air Force doctor Felisa Wilson and she said people on the base use their nearest gates and the base should be connected to the part of Anchorage nearest their gate.

Military is a community of interest

Did everyone notice how all three pointed out the commonalities between the pairings they favored and the lack of commonalities between the pairings they opposed?  And how they are long on rhetoric and short on documented evidence?   

I’d point out one more thing.  They’ve spent a lot of time saying that every part of Anchorage is socio-economically integrated to dismiss such comments for house districts and senate pairings they opposed.  But now that’s pretty much their whole argument.  Even though Socio-Economic Integration is a criterion for House districts, but not Senate districts.  Though the related concept of community of interest is considered in Senate districts.

I believe we have two good options.  I’m more comfortable with Option 3B.  I plan to support.

"I feel more comfortable with", not, ‘the preponderance of evidence clearly shows 3B is the plan to support.”  Because the preponderance of evidence goes the other way.  And they did their best to not have any sort of direct, professional comparison of the two key options:  22/24 ER and 22/9 ER/Hillside.

I’d make one final point:  Although the Board members cited the extensive public testimony, there was no serious analysis of that testimony.  I offered a methodology for that there.

Nor did the Board do any serious evaluation of their options.  The Option 2 folks seemed to have gathered more specific reasons.  The Option 3B people, even Simpson’s organized list of reason - had sound bytes and talking points that were based on personal preference rather than any hard data that compared the potential Senate pairings.  And as I said, early on, their strategy was to

Claim Senate District L (23 and 24) as a done deal, the ideal pairing that shouldn’t be touched.

They claimed D23 as the JBER district, even though 1/3 of the district lives off base around downtown and other north Anchorage neighborhoods.  

So their only option left is pairing 22 with 9.  

Me again in black.  There are just so many details that could be added in.  As it is, I'm trying the patience of all but the most obsessed redistricting folks.  The mass of data makes it hard for people who haven't followed closely to see the forest for the trees.  

[UPDATE April 18, 2022, 6pm:  Someone did text me some suggestions for getting into the html code to make my own fix for the numbered list.  Thanks!   Also someone sent to me:  

"Must Read Alaska" is written by a former Republican Party Communications Director in Alaska and runs a sensationalist right wing blog on Alaska politics even though now she apparently lives in Florida.  While Board member Simpson said the fact that some Republican current and former Senators opposed Option 3B proved 3B wasn't partisan, Ms. Downing's headline here seems to acknowledge the obvious.]

Redistricting Board Decision Day (Wed April 13, 2022) Video

The Board has posted the video of the April 13 Board meeting (embedded below) when the three Republican appointed majority members voted to approve the map Option 3B, submitted by long time Republican strategist (and past Republican Party Chair) Randy Ruedrich.  

They did these explanations because the Court found the previous map unconstitutional and had said that the Board needed to justify its decisions on the record, especially if they are contrary to public opinion.

As you listen, I remind you that Judge Matthews concluded  that contiguity simply means the two districts have touching boundaries in his order in the court cases - see pages 40-42.  He repeats it again on page 74-75, rejecting the concept of 'transportation contiguity.'

But he also notes that Marcum started the November approved Senate maps in Anchorage with the firm belief that JBER and Eagle River could not be pulled apart.  I'd note that D23 which includes most of JBER is also 1/3 off base areas left over from cutting downtown apart along 4th Avenue.  I mention that here because Simpson strongly defended the 23/24 pairing and he saw any attempt to split them as an attack on "our soldiers' and proof of partisan gerrymandering.  (Note how often Republicans these days are quick to accuse anyone who opposes of doing the exact same illegal or immoral thing they are doing.) He noted that protecting this pairing is what prevented the Board from pairing the two Eagle River districts which were shown to be communities of interest by the East Anchorage plaintiffs' expert witness, Dr. Chase Hensel.  

Enough preface.  I'm working the next post which will look at how their decision was based on unsupported assertions, anecdotes, and attacks on alternatives.  Not on any kind of professional decision making process.  

This is the video of that meeting.  My previous post reviewed member Budd Simpson's reasons.  That begins right about 20 minutes into the video and goes to about 45 minutes in.  This is followed by member Nicole Borromeo's critical response (beginning about 46) which includes asking the Court not to remand this back to the Board but to just finish the map because the Board will just continue with partisan gerrymandering.  

We also have much shorter (than Simpson) reasons from Marcum and Binkley.   Then there's the vote.  I like John Binkley as a person - he cheerful, has a ready smile, and genuinely seems to like people - all kinds.  And he has this amazing ability to keep that cordiality going even facing diversity.  Listen to him right after Borromeo blasts the majority decision. He couldn't be sweeter if she had praised the majority decision highly.  But also not how he tends to keep talking much longer than necessary - wanting to keep every possible option open as long as possible.  The procedural decisions that should have taken 15 seconds or more just go on and on.  

Joint Redistricting Board - 4/13/2022 - 1:00pm from AlaskaLegislature.tv on Vimeo.

Alaska Redistricting Board: A Critical Look At Budd Simpson's Arguments Supporting Option 3B [UPDATED]

There's so much to write about following the Redistricting Boards 3-2 vote to approve Option 3B, the plan written by Randy Ruedrich and approved by the three Republican appointed Board members against the vehement objections of the two Board members who were appointed by people not affiliated with a political party in Alaska.  

In this post I'm going to go through Board Member Budd Simpson's reasons for supporting Option 3B.  His explanation was by far the best of the three explanations by the majority.  But first, let me give a little bit of background of the districts in question.  

[Let me first note and apologize.  I'm going to use the House numbers and Senate letters used in the November proclamation plan map.  Some of these got changed yesterday, but I think it would be more confusing if I used the new numbers.  For the points I'm making here, it doesn't matter.]

Both Options 2 and 3B paired north and south Muldoon districts.  That was what the Court pretty much told them to do.  

But that left D22 (Eagle River) orphaned.    Option 2, as I see it, had the most obvious pairings.  It joined districts that had been split apart right through neighborhoods.  Let me show you what I mean:

  

District 9 is a huge district that runs down Turnagain Arm to Girdwood and then on down to Whittier.  But in town, it connects to D10 via the Seward Highway and neighborhoods east of the highway. Neighborhoods along the coast line.  You can see that clearly in this map.  

These two districts were paired in the original map approved in November and in the Option 2 map.  

The two Eagle River districts are also large and cover lots of unpopulated land in Chugach State Park.  But the two districts 22 and 24 have closely joined populations near ER Valley and along the Glenn Highway.  They fit like puzzle pieces.  Neighbors nearby.  

Option 2 put them together in one Senate seat.

And D24 (this map just shows part of the off-base portion, which is attached to the JBER portion.  You can see Fourth Avenue is split in half.  The olive part is in D23, the purple in D17.  D23 also includes parts of Mountain View and goes east to Bartlett High School. Again, people across the street from each other are in different districts.  Reconnecting them in a Senate seat makes perfect sense to me.  That's what Option 2 did.

But when you pair them the way Option 3B does, you're connecting not the communities that have been split, but wilderness.  Below is a larger view of part of D9 and D10.  Option 3B splits them and pairs D9 with D22.  Across the uninhabited (by people) Chugach State Park.  To get from a populated area in D9 crossing the "contiguous" border" to a populated area in D22, you have to walk across mountain ranges and river drainages  - probably about 10-15 miles.  Eagle River Valley is not on this map, it's further north in the yellow part.  To get to the people in D10, many people in D9 could just walk down the street.  Just the same as between the two ER districts and downtown and Government Hill/JBER.  

But not between D9 and D22.

The same is true on the JBER side of D23 that connects to D24.  Wilderness.  The olive district is 23, the brighter green is 24.  

As many people testified, people in D9 would have to drive through four or more other house districts to get to the district they're paired with.  The same is true for people in districts 23 and 24.

I'm putting these maps here so it's clear that Option 3B is not the most obvious, the most natural pairing of house seats.  It would seem that the burden should be on the proponents to demonstrate why 3B is the better choice.  

At Wednesday's meeting each member of the majority did lay out their reasons in quite  bit of detail. The court had faulted them for not doing that last time.  Will the judge accept member Simpson's definition of  'reasonable'?   In his deposition he was asked for a definition and he said it meant you had a reason.  Does it have to be a good reason?  Apparently not.  

I was at the Legislative Information Office and took notes on my laptop.  (Only members Bahnke and Borromeo were also in the LIO.  The others were there by Zoom.)  Budd Simpson doesn't speak a lot and when he does, he speaks fairly slowly.  I mention that because that makes it easier for me to keep up with him.  Simpson's arguments were also the best of the three.  So, below are his words in black (as close as I could catch them) and then I comment in red.  

 

Budd Simpson's explanation of why he voted for Option 3B

Simpson:  Interesting to me between option 2 and 3B, there are a number of things in common.  Both options only change four districts.  A reasonable number.  Both independently came up with solution that only changes four districts.  Gives credibility to both.

They didn’t “both independently come up with a four district solution.”  First, there was only the Bahnke plan - Option 1.  Option 1 was the alternative plan that was proposed last November that had different Senate pairings throughout Anchorage from the pairings that were in the adopted plan, which was later ruled unconstitutional.  

Then the East Anchorage plaintiffs submitted a proposal to adopt another plan.  This would become Option 2.

Option 2 followed the rules of the Court to the T.  It only changed four districts and left the other four as member Marcum had paired them in the Proclamation Plan.   Meanwhile, the Ruedrich Plan was submitted.  It changed more than just the minimum number of districts affected by making the court corrections.  

Then Borromeo and Bahnke moved to withdraw Option 1 and just go with Option 2.  They did this because they recognized Option 2 more closely followed the Court’s orders which were to make other changes only if necessary because of taking apart D22 and D21.  (ER and Muldoon)

It was only then that Ruedrich submitted an amended plan which also limited the changes in Anchorage.  

So, this wasn’t independent.  The Republicans saw that their plan would be less likely to meet the Court’s approval if it had more changes than Option 2, so they then changed their map and Option 3B was born.  

Both dealt with Senate D to join 20 and 21 - best solution probably.  Also leave in place the pairings districts 11 and 12 and 15 and 16.

The Court specifically said to fix D 21 and talked about  keeping the Muldoon community whole.  The most obvious way was to connect it to 20.  

Left with ER Chugiak, S Anchorage Hillside,   JBER Military,  and Downtown.  

Bear with me as I . . . Whether we pair 17 and [this must be 23, but my notes had something else] or 23 and 24 - Military and Chugiak.  How you decide those two options, drives what happens with ER 22 and south side of Chugiak.  

He sets this up with a false starting point. 

Why is the choice 17 and 24 or 23 and 24?  We should start with the new orphan district 22, that is left over after putting 21 with 20.  And the most obvious pairing is with the other half of ER - the two districts are a unit.  The house districts split them neighbor from neighbor, the Senate district can repair that split.  

How does Hillside come into the picture?  The first question is after separating 22 from 21, what do we do with 22?  The most obvious pairing is with 24.  Lots and lots of evidence for this.  But the Republicans on the Board want to keep Chugiak/Eagle River (24) paired with JBER/Government Hill (23) because that will pick up an extra Republican Senator.  So they make keeping 23/24 together the only option.  

When you make a decision you have fewer other options to choose from as you go forward.

As to motion for Option 2 - I find the pairing of 23 and 24 ER and Chugiak the more compelling solution.  Pairing JBER with downtown overlooks a conflict of interest and opens us to a challenge to that constituency.  Chugiak has developed as a bedroom community for the military families.  They send their kids to middle school and high school there.  That testimony was compelling to that pairing.

Lots of false assumptions here.  What conflict of interest is there with pairing JBER with Downtown?  And why do you refer to D23 as JBER.  Yes, 2/3 of the population lives on JBER.  But 1/3 lives in downtown adjacent areas.  The Board already paired JBER with downtown in the House district.  To say pairing JBER and downtown is a problem now, overlooks the fact that the Board already paired them.  

In fact, the Board split downtown along 4th Avenue when they created D23.  Right in the middle of downtown Anchorage.  And although the downtown parts of 23 only have 1/3 the voters of the JBER section, more downtown people actually vote than JBER people in that district.  I haven’t gotten all the details (and nor has the Board), but a significant percent of the population of JBER are actually residents of other states, only in Anchorage for their rotation.  

A former East Anchorage Rep testified that ER high school wouldn’t exist without JBER.   But another person testified with data that showed  ASD students who had JBER addresses actually came out this way: [UPDATE April 16 - I realized I described these numbers incorrectly.  Here's the description from Denny Wells:  

"JBER High School boundaries are not included in maps from the Anchorage School District, but if you look up JBER addresses via the Anchorage School District School finder, you will see that addresses in the Richardson portion of the base, accessed via the Richardson gate, are zoned to Eagle River, while the

addresses in the Elmendorf portion of JBER accessed via Government Hill, Boniface, and Muldoon gates are zoned to Bartlett. The Downtown and Government Hill portions of District 23 are zoned to West High School. In total, in district 23, the populations in the various High School boundaries are these:"]

Bartlett High School (inside District 23) – 8733 people

West High School (inside District 17) – 4802 people

Eagle River High School (inside District 22) – 4488 people

More JBER students go to West High School - in District 17 “the Downtown District” according to Simpson, than to Eagle River.  And twice as many go to Bartlett which is in D23!  So this argument is bogus.  The data was actually in the testimony but Simpson either decided to ignore it or didn't read it.    We don't have this data.  It's something the Board should have looked up before jumping to their conclusions.  (And I should have been more careful when I put the numbers up.]

And then, let’s check on how many students from the Hillside go to ER high school or vice versa.  Probably close to zero.  But no one mentioned those numbers.  Why are these issues relevant to one pairing but not the other. 

Further, if you look at the demographic data of people living on base and the downtown off base parts of District 23, they are quite different from D24 - income level, types of homes, ethnicity.  But Simpson doesn’t pay attention to any of that.  Just like they ignored those difference between D22 and D21 in the original plan.  

Heard the argument repeatedly that under the court ruling that ER should be with Chugiak.  Not what the court said.  ER was done at the expense of Muldoon.  Order told us to reconfigure District K, but didn’t say anything about L.  The plaintiffs asked that as part of their relief. But the court didn’t grant that.  Court told us to repair the problematic part of DK and both options made that repair.  That should be sufficient to meet the intent of the court.  

The court rulings  didn't say anything about District 9 or 10 either.  The court also was concerned about political gerrymandering.  And the only explanation that make sense out of these pairings is that it gives ER and the Alaska Senate one more Republican Senator.  

If ER paired together or split, either way does not happen at the expense of Muldoon, because Muldoon is taken care of in both versions.

As far as the pairings, there’s no real advantage either splitting or dividing them.  The house districts were approved.  They are all in the MOA and all contain the same people.  There will be 37,000 in it and all get a vote and have a Senator and representative. 

Districts 23 and 24 is a pairing already in place.  Under option 3b, that isn’t changed.  If there are folks who have thought about running or not running, that stays in place and there is less to change.

But Districts 9 and 10 were also already paired and neither of them have populated areas that are anywhere near the populated areas of D22. But D10 has  an adjoining neighborhood to 9 and the Seward  Highway runs through them.  Just as the Glenn Highway runs through D22 and D24.  People in one district live across the street from people in the other district.  But pairing 22 rips them asunder and has the same detrimental effects Simpson ascribes to splitting 23 and 24.  Only in the case of 9 and 10, the effects are real.

The most obvious pairing is the two house districts that are in Eagle River.  There was testimony by at least two people that identified all the organizations that call themselves “Chugiak Eagle River”.  Nobody talks about the Eagle River Glen Alps community.  Both districts 22 and 24  are part of the EagleExit movement.  If you put ER back together with ER as Option 2 does, then you can also repair the splitting of downtown along 4th Avenue.  

That leaves us to pairing of 22 and 9 and there has been a lot of testimony and discussion on that on both sides.  When making the  pairing described for JBER and ER, that leaves us with 22 with no place to go except 9.  That just flows naturally from the 23/24 decision

Slick.  The only reason that leaves us 22 and 9 is that you magically decided that the JBER/Government Hill district had to be paired with 24.  You never give us a direct comparison between  22/24 Senate seat versus 22/9  or versus a 9/10 Senate seat.  The far more natural pairing was ER with ER/Chugiak.  And then the logic would be the only “natural pairing” would be JBER/Government hill together with downtown, which then matches the puzzle pieces of Fourth Avenue.  

.  Most discussion about contiguity and the concept of ‘nearly as practicable’ has been discussed.  The concept has been misconstrued a lot of the mite in those discussion. Practicable means possible or able to be done.  The way used in constitution it doesn’t mean you have to have the best pairing, but rather as an exception, when you have two districts that aren’t touching.  Intended as an exception of the contiguity rule.  Not the best, most compact whatever.  The pairing of house districts is not the same rule as for house districts.  While we have fought to find pairings to have reasonable rational standard, there is nothing wrong with the pairing of 9 and 22.  They are contiguous.  They have a 35 mile border.  Two districts SEI and demographically similar in many ways.  And of course are included in MOA and therefore are legally SEI base on precedent.  People mentioned you had to drive out of the district.  The concept of transportation contiguity debunked as constitutional requirement.  Contiguity question is a visual, binary question.  Look at map, these are contiguous, they touch.  We heard the concept of false contiguity brought up and my name was invoked.   What I brought up was what community of Skagway Borough, they used water where nobody was and went around the main part of Juneau.  It was not compact.  And that ended up prevailing and the false contiguity rejected.  9 and 22 have 35 miles of real contiguity.

Continuity works for him when he wants it to but not if it isn’t in his favor. Am I stretching it?  Possibly, but surely not as much as he's been stretching things.   The courts have clearly said contiguity over water works and compactness IS NOT a criterion for Senate districts.  Contiguity has been a key issue in the 3B map because it is the only Constitutional requirement for Senate districts.  

There’s no question that the two districts (9 and 22) are geographically contiguous.  But by using that boundary, the 3B map is breaking apart two districts that connect neatly through streets and neighborhoods for two districts that are, as people testified, 15 to 87 miles (I think) apart by road.  

It’s been interesting how the advocates for this map have talked about all the similarities between the populations of these two districts.  Simpson even does it with D23 and D24 even though at other times they turn around and tell us that all of Anchorage is socio-economically integrated, so none of that really matters.  Nor does the alleged military connections between JBER and Chugiak/Eagle River matter.  Again, he’s using one line of logic when it suits him and saying it doesn’t matter when it doesn’t suit him.  Swapping out criteria for convenience or merely changing their weight, has been something the Board - particularly the majority - has done since they started making maps.     

A key question here is whether the Courts will accept the 35 miles of cross roadless state park to connect two distant neighborhoods in the state’s most populated borough.  Even when there are much more obvious options where pairing is like putting together two matching puzzle pieces that neatly connect neighborhoods, connect neighbors who live across the street from each other.  

The courts use different deviation standards for cities and rural areas and they stretch socio-economic matches more in rural areas, and compactness in rural areas has a different standard too.  The nature of Alaska’s geography makes those compromises necessary.  But it’s not necessary to do that in rural areas.  The courts could take the easy path and say, yes they are contiguous, end of story.  Or they could ask why the three most obvious pairings - obvious because neighborhoods are split into two house districts - are abandoned for this technically complying, but really meaningless pairing.  Will they ask if there were better options?  If they do, these pairings will be thrown out.  If they say, as they did in the Skagway case,  it’s constitutional and we won’t substitute a ‘more constitutional’ pairing, they’ll leave it be.  

But there are other considerations which Simpson brings up next. 

Finally I want to address the charge of partisan gerrymandering.  Two Republican senators and a member from Gov. Dunleavy’s admin spoke out against Option 3B.  I’m an appointee of the Governor and I’m lined up with Option 3B.  If Option 3B is a naked partisan attempt, then why did Reinhold and Holland argue against it.  They think something in Option 3B harms them.  That goes against the argument that it attempts to protect or enhance Republican attempts.

This was a clever ploy, I admit.  If two Republicans disagree, then ipso facto, it’s not partisan.  Unless logic matters.  

Partisan gerrymandering would be the other reason for the courts to overrule Option 3B.  On its face, if you knew nothing else, the idea that several prominent Republicans objected to this map proves it’s not partisan might make sense.  But let’s also remember that this is the map drawn by Randy Ruedrich, Alaska’s most practiced Republican strategist and mapper for the last 30+ years.  He’s a former head of the Republican Party.  Nobody is even hiding this.  

Let’s also remember that political parties have competing factions as well.  Lora Reinbold, the Senator from ER opposed this pairing because, presumably, it pits her against the Republican Senator on the Hillside.  But Reinbold is one of the wild Republicans who thumbs her nose at the governor.  She’s someone that would be nice for the Governor to get rid of and replace with a more controllable Republican.  And ER will elect a Republican, there’s no doubt. Sen Holland doesn’t always follow the governor’s orders either, but again, Hillside is a reliably Republican area.  Pitting these two together doesn’t risk losing a Republican seat. It simply might replace an unreliable Republican with a more pliable one.  But pairing Chugiak/ER with JBER/Government Hill, insures an extra Republican seat.  But is Reinbold really just protecting her seat?  Is it possible she knows that Eagle River just naturally belongs as one community?  After all, if 22 and 24 were joined, then she'd get another fiery Republican opponent.  I'm not sure whether Jamie Allard lives in 22 or 24, but she worked hard for Option 3B.  Maybe she doesn't want to run against Reinbold.   

The judge said they couldn't have the 22 and 21 pairing.  But they are going to cling to the 23/24 pairing.  That is political gerrymandering.  And again, what the three Republicans on the Board call the “JBER district” is actually one third downtown-ish Anchorage - and that southern edge of the district fits neatly with the rest of downtown where it was split right along Fourth Avenue.  So, this is an empty argument about partisanship.  Ruedrich doesn’t draw maps that don’t give Republicans an edge.  He plays to win.  They weren’t even subtle about this.  

I’d also note that the majority here ignored the testimony of the two sitting Senators from the districts they are pairing - people who in other situations they would give great deference to - and they are also ignoring  two other past Senators, all of whom say Eagle River should be paired as one Senate seat.  It’s a neat trick to turn around and say this proves they are not partisan. The fact that they are ignoring the testimony of four Senators who have represented this area shows how much they need to keep the 24/23 pairing.  

The most partisan is the proposed pairing of JBER and downtown.  This would diminish the voice of our valued military personal.  I can’t accept that.  I will vote for 3B.  

Oh please.  First, as I’ve said above, this is a seat whose population is 2/3 on JBER and 1/3 urban neighborhoods directly attached to downtown.  One side of Fourth Avenue has been put in one district and the other half in another district. Joining them in a Senate seat makes perfect sense.   Meanwhile the JBER part of the district has no neighborhoods that connect it with D24 - just woods.  

Then Simpson plays on patriotism and our natural admiration for the military. Let’s get the statistics - how many of the military living on JBER are even Alaska voters?  How many vote in other states?  The 1980 Redistricting Board spent a lot of time deciding whether they should even count the Military personnel who were actually residents of other states.  In the end, they included them because they couldn’t figure out how to accurately count them.  That’s all described in detail in the Hickel decision.  

And, as pointed out earlier, more JBER students go to D17’s West High School than go to ER High School.  And twice as many go to Bartlett which is D23.  Because as people have testified, people on JBER are connected to the neighborhoods near the Muldoon and Government Hill exits.  

I’d also point out here that the military is one of the best represented groups in our State legislature and they receive more special benefits than probably any other group of people.  I’ve spelled this out here.   There’s no chance that the military personnel will be diminished in Juneau no matter what district JBER is paired with.  This is a very red herring.  

As the judge weighs political gerrymandering in this case, I'd point out that the Board had no problem dispatching the Cantwell issues.  They all worked easily on it and agreed quickly. No one had a stake it the outcome and the Court's directions were clear. They also complied  with half of the judge's instructions for fixing Senate seat K - pairing north and south Muldoon.  But like with the original pairings of D22 and D21 there was no compromise.  There was acrimony. No one said anything like, "You guys are really upset.  Let's see if we can work something out."  

Instead, it was basically, we have three votes and you have two votes.   You don't act that way unless you have a very specific objective you need to achieve.  There was nothing in what Simpson said that would justify the callousness of the final vote.  There was a mission on the part of the Board majority.  And as one testifier pointed out, there is nothing to lose.  They were able to power this past a very adamant minority and it either gets accepted by the Superior Court or not.  If not, they will appeal it.  They don't have to pay for the attorney.  And if they lose at the Supreme Court level, they have no personal liability.  They will be patted on the back and rewarded by their party colleagues.  But probably not in ways that the public will see.

Simpson spoke at other times at the meeting, but this was the argument he laid you for voting for 3B.  The judge said the Board members' personal preference should not trump overwhelming public opinion.  While this was an organized narration of reasons, most were assertions that were not backed up by facts and are more about giving the Judge reasons  - even if their shaky at best - for choosing Option 3B.  The reasons of Marcum and Binkley are much looser than Simpson's.  Marcum is the Chief Executive Officer of the Koch affiliated Alaska Policy Forum whose goals are to pass legislation that favors a libertarian view point.  She truly believes that getting more Republicans in the Senate is one of her missions.  

I'll try to put up the Marcum and Binkley testimony, but no promises.  

Redistricting Board Votes 3-2 To Approve Option 3B

 The Board listened closely to some things the Court said - like explain your reasons for your choice.  The three Republican appointees did this at length.  Some of what they said is clearly wrong or only partially right.  I'll get into that tomorrow, but I'm redistricted out for now.  So, here's a map I got at the end that show's the numbers of the Anchorage House districts and the letters of the Senate districts in the new map.  

click on image to enlarge

The Senate Rotation they used is the same they used last November.  Starting with A then B with the revised numbers put into the rotation.  This was not discussed or agreed on by the Board.  The staff did this.  There's no change in the truncation - all but one seat is truncated.

click to enlarge

I haven't had time to go through this carefully, but you can figure out the districts from the map above, for example House Districts 11 and 12 are Senate Seat F;  9 and 10 (was 22 in the 2021 plan - Eagle River - is Senate Seat E.  

More tomorrow.  

Next, the judge has to decide if it satisfies his order.  The three Republicans believe it will because it satisfies his concerns with pairing South Muldoon with Eagle River.  (South Muldoon is now paired with North Muldoon in Senate Seat K).  The two Board members who voted for Option 2 think it will not because it splits Eagle River and they don't think the new Seat F (Eagle River and Hillside)  as 'contiguous as practicable.  

If the judge doesn't like it he could send it back with new instructions.  Or, he could, as Board member Borromeo asked him to do at the meeting today, repair it himself.  In either case, I suspect court challenges will follow.  

People have raised the concern that this won't be settled by the June 1 date for candidates to submit their applications to run for the state legislature in the November election.  I did address that issue in a post one week ago, looking at what happened prior to the 2012 election.  

No meeting tomorrow.  The Board is done for now.

Good night.  Sleep well.  As we move into the bottom of the ninth with the possibility of extra innings.