Bridging troubled legal waters

WASILLA — The cities of Houston and Wasilla will have to wait at least a couple more weeks for a ruling on their suit against Anchorage regarding the Knik Arm Bridge.

Last week, Houston Mayor Roger Purcell and Wasilla Mayor Verne Rupright filed for a temporary restraining order and asked an Anchorage judge to overturn a decision from the Anchorage Metropolitan Area Transportation Solutions board.

The board met that same week and voted that the bridge, a controversial project to link Anchorage to the Valley more directly, be moved from the municipality’s short-range transportation plan to its long-range plan.

Purcell and most everyone else who has provided an estimate said moving the bridge to the long-range plan delays building the bridge for at least 10 years.

Friday, the three cities and their attorneys met in an Anchorage courtroom before Superior Court Judge Sen K. Tan. The judge asked them to come back July 15 with briefs and oral arguments prepared, at which point he’ll issue a ruling, Purcell said.

Purcell and Rupright maintain that the law requires AMATS to give at least 30 days notice to any community a decision they make would affect. Notice was not given to Houston or Wasilla, they say.

“The big issue on this whole thing is the right for the public to be heard,” Purcell said, and if the judge rules in AMATS’s favor, “He’s making a precedent case saying that cities no longer have to give notice of major projects in their area.”

He claimed one early victory from the hearing: The attorneys involved all seemed to agree that a state Superior Court judge did have jurisdiction over the matter. Purcell said that initially Anchorage was disputing that claim, arguing it was a federal matter for federal court.

In an interview last week, Anchorage municipal attorney Jim Reeves said the Valley cities’ arguments are baseless and that, anyway, the recent actions of AMATS rendered them moot.

As the lawsuit was gearing up, state Sen. Linda Menard said she supported the bridge and called on the Palmer to join Purcell and Rupright in their suit.

In an interview Friday, Palmer City Manager Bill Allen said that wasn’t likely to happen, what with all the big summer construction projects currently under way in Palmer.

“I just don’t have the resources and I certainly don’t have the time to get engaged in something like that,” Allen said.

Purcell said he and Rupright are considering going to Anchorage and asking the city to direct its attorney to concede the Valley’s objections. He thinks he might have a chance once the municipality’s mayor-elect, Dan Sullivan, is seated.

The question of what will happen when Sullivan arrives in office has been at the center of much of the debate over the issue. Purcell claims that AMATS wanted to rush through a decision knowing they wouldn’t have the votes to change the matter once Sullivan was a member of the board. Purcell’s critics, meanwhile, have been alleging the opposite, that the Valley is trying to stall, waiting for Sullivan and a more bridge-friendly board.

Purcell, though, pointed out that if AMATS’s decision of last week isn’t overturned in court it can’t come up again for a year. The question of how Sullivan would vote, then, would seem to lose a bit of its relevance.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.