Mayor race draws interest

June 10, 2005

KATE GOLDEN/Frontiersman reporter

WASILLA - A Wasilla City Council member has announced that she'll fight for the mayoral position this year against the woman whose campaign she once managed.

After she filed the official papers of intent with the state, Diana Straub said that she'd been "asked by several people" to run three years earlier than she'd previously intended.

"I have anticipated opposition," current Wasilla Mayor Dianne M. Keller said Thursday. "It was a surprise that the opposition is her."

Straub has been a Wasilla resident since 1989. She worked in the beauty industry for 16 years as a beauty consultant and businesswoman. Straub got her start in politics as Keller's campaign manager in 2003. When Keller won the mayor's position, the council appointed Straub to Keller's newly vacant seat.

This year, she worked for three months as a legislative assistant to freshman Rep. Mark Neuman in the 2005 Alaska Legislature, while maintaining her seat on the council.

Explaining her decision to run early, Straub said she intends to orchestrate city business through diplomacy, macro-managing, and intense fund-raising.

"The department heads are fabulous. I don't have to know all about how to build a road to get a road," she said.

Diplomacy should apply to the council, she added.

"It is improper to stall city business because of a personality conflict," she said.

Yet she qualified that Mark Ewing, a freshman councilor who often has been at odds with the mayor and the rest of the council, has some valuable input. He often been "misinterpreted because of his tone of voice," she said.

Straub said she wants to build a stronger relationship with Wasilla's sister city.

"It doesn't take a visionary to see that Palmer and Wasilla are going to grow together … in our lifetimes," she said. "We're not going to put a fence between the two, and a toll booth."

Keller, who kicked off her own mayoral campaign with a Thursday fund-raiser, said she welcomes the competition.

"That's what makes America the greatest place on earth," she said.

But Keller said that she and Straub haven't been speaking much this year.

"We don't have a personal relationship," Keller said. "Not since she decided to go to Juneau. I thought she should have resigned her seat, and she thought otherwise."

Keller said her plans haven't changed a bit. She's been working hard for the city for the last 10 years, she said, and she plans to continue doing so.

"I really enjoy my job," she said.

Contact Kate Golden at 352-2284 or kate.golden@frontiersman.com.