Capital should remain in Southeast

Nov. 28, 2006

WHAT OTHERS SAY/Ketchikan Daily News

This originally appeared as an editorial in the Ketchikan Daily News.

Setting aside the issue of whether the same-sex-benefits special session was necessary; and setting aside, for the moment, the implication that weather-related problems are unique to Juneau in all of Alaska (good heavens, schools were closed in Barrow last week due to weather-related problems) - we find it curious that some farther north are unconcerned about Southeast legislators participating, or not, in state government.

And that is why the capital should stay in Juneau.

If the Legislature met in Anchorage, as was being bandied about with we-told-you-so fervor by move proponents last week, and weather prevented flights from leaving Southeast, the representatives from Southeast would not have arrived in time.

Yet, the Juneau-is-impossible contingent suggests that if only the session had been held in Anchorage, it would have been much more convenient and, of course, on time.

Without Southeast.

Who would care? After all, the bulk of the people live in the Anchorage area. Why would anyone outside of the big city want representation in state government?

As the crotchety Voice of the Times, after noting that &#8220the handful of legislators who live in Southeast would have to travel here,” wrote recently, &#8220Airplanes don't just fly one way to Juneau.”

We here in Southeast know that for sure. When the planes leave Juneau for Anchorage at the end of the session, no one looks back. The only reason some legislators are aware there is a Southeast portion of the state is because they grudgingly come here to do the state's business.

As it is, some from Anchorage seem to want to plunder any program that isn't for the Southcentral region. Others don't seem to get that the &#8220marine highway” is not just a catchy marketing term for an expensive tour boat; that for us island dwellers, those ships really are our highway. Some in Anchorage don't understand why people just don't live in Anchorage if they want luxuries like roads.

If they didn't have to go to Juneau once a year, we shudder to contemplate the ignorance about all things Southeast that would emanate from the state's power brokers. We think it's a character-building experience for our legislators to join the unwashed masses in Southeast for a few months out of the year. Even if it's foggy.

Whenever we think about the capital-move issue, we think about the single time in the history of the world that state high school wrestling championships were held in Ketchikan. (Usually state championships go to the same city three years in a row, but apparently planes only leave the Anchorage area every three years, because it was established from the outset that Ketchikan's turn would be a one-year thing.)

When tournament time came, it was foggy, and the kids from Anchorage and other points north couldn't get in right away. Some Southeast kids, used to weather trumping personal planning, hopped on ferries and got here on time.

Of course, we waited to start the tournament. It was, after all, a &#8220state” tournament. We wouldn't think of starting without all the Alaskans who were supposed to be here. When they arrived, they had the time of their lives and couldn't believe the generosity, hospitality and caliber of competition in a part of Alaska so different from home.

What few talked about, afterward, was how one group from up north attempted to hijack the tournament. Because they had &#8220everybody” there already, the reasoning went, why not just switch the tournament to a school conveniently located up there? So what if Southeast couldn't come?

Southeast who?

Thank goodness the state school activities association stuck to its guns and wouldn't be bullied.

That story, sadly typical of our experience with some of our northern brethren, is why we don't want the capital to move from Juneau.

There's a reason the capital of Illinois isn't Chicago - and it's not because Springfield has a better football team. It's because all the power - economic, population-based, and political - must not be concentrated in a single area.

If we truly believe in representative government, the same holds true for Alaska, in spades. It holds true especially when people complain about the weather.

If you can't get to Juneau, we can't get to Anchorage.

The difference is, we don't run roughshod over Anchorage when its representatives can't be here. We understand that we're all in this together. We understand that whatever our ZIP code, we're all Alaskans.