Valley would gain a House seat in redistricting board plans

MAT-SU — There’s a good chance that sometime soon the legislative district you live in will change.

Every 10 years the state re-draws the lines, taking into account data generated in the federal census. Mat-Su isn’t the only Alaskan community that will potentially see changes in those lines. But with the state’s fastest growing population over multiple years, changes in the Valley could be dramatic.

The process is relatively complicated. It starts with a state board appointed to draw the lines. That board on Wednesday released two possible plans. Those plans, in turn, have multiple alternatives for various regions, including Mat-Su.

So there’s no clear answer yet as to what those lines will be. Added to the complicating factors are a raft of what the state redistricting board is calling, “private plans” from political and advocacy groups.

And, as longtime Alaskans will usually note at this point in the process, all of that work is usually moot in the end, since appeals tend to send redistricting plans to court. In its history, Alaska has never completed this process without needing the Alaska Supreme Court to be the ultimate arbiter of district boundaries.

Still, now is the time to weigh in on the proposals from the redistricting board. “We’ve got community hearings that are going to be held around the state,” said Alaska Redistricting Board Executive Director Ron Miller.

He said the board has already heard from the community once. Notable pieces of advice — Wasilla wouldn’t mind if the board split the city at the Parks Highway. Chickaloon would like to somehow be incorporated into a Valley district.

And the board took some of those suggestions to heart. The Parks Highway is a major dividing line in most of its plans. But there is no board plan to tie Chickaloon into any other house district other than the one that also represents Delta Junction and Valdez, which essentially mirrors the way the lines are drawn currently.

Monday the board will have a hearing in Anchorage, Tuesday in Fairbanks and Wednesday in Juneau. There is a plan for a Palmer meeting sometime later in the week but dates haven’t been shored up yet.

Probably one of the biggest changes on both board plans has to do with the House of Representatives and Knik-Fairview. Currently, that area is split between multiple house districts. District 16, referred to often as the Butte-Chugiak district, has a big piece of it. Parts are also in the Wasilla district and the Palmer districts. And Knik-Goose Bay Road below Settler’s Bay Drive is included in the Willow-Big Lake district.

Both of the board’s plans would preserve that dividing line on Knik-Goose Bay Road, and would gather up the rest of Knik-Fairview into a brand new house district, tossing in a good portion of Wasilla south of the Parks Highway — including the Lake Lucille area — for good measure.

Other changes in house districts include moving the boundary for the Chugiak-Butte seat further north, drawing the line at Peter’s Creek — the actual creek, not the community — essentially lopping off a big chunk of the Anchorage end of it.

There also are big changes on the Senate side of the equation.

Senate districts are composed of two house districts. One of the board’s plans would pair that new Knik-Fairveiw district with the Palmer district for a senate seat. The Willow-Big Lake seat would join with the Wasilla seat. The Butte-Chugiak seat would pair with an Anchorage district just south of the Chugiak seat. That Chickaloon/Valdez/Sutton/Delta Junction seat would remain paired with a Fairbanks-area seat.

The other plan proposes entirely different pairings. The Chugiak-Butte seat would team up with the new Knik-Fairview seat. Palmer and Wasilla would join up to make a second senate district. That Chickaloon/Valdez/Delta Junction district would pair with a district in Southeast that includes Saxman and Wrangell.

And, finally, the Willow-Big Lake district would pair with that Fairbanks-area district previously teamed with the Delta Junction/Sutton/Valdez seat.

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