Three Dans Too Many
An invitation! We got an invitation! And it’s pink and blue and calligraphied all fancy-like! Are Mayor Dan Sullivan and Bill and Michelle Bittner going to have a baby? Are Dan Coffey and his wife Pauline going to get married again? No, wait. It’s an “announcement of great importance to the future of Anchorage.” Wow. Hold on just a second… We’re getting a Red Lobster? Alas, no to all of the above. Instead, Dan Coffey, the former Assemblyman and Sullivan minion/mancrush, has decided to run for Mayor. Not really that surprising. You may recall Dan Coffey is the…
Assemblyman Admits Back Room Shenanigans
Tuesday’s Anchorage Assembly meeting promised to be more interesting than usual, but no one was expecting the jaw-dropping admission of blatant politicking by a supporter of the Mayor on the Assembly, and that the peoples’ referendum to repeal a draconian labor ordinance was being set up as a casualty of electoral manipulation. The Anchorage Assembly passed its anti-union, anti-public-employee Ordinance 37 back in March of 2013 despite hours and hours of testimony against it. In fact, Chair Ernie Hall even cut off testimony with many still waiting for an opportunity to speak. That led to the filing of a petition to…
AK Teens Rate Credibility of Famous Figures
A group of Anchorage high school juniors in an advanced placement class were asked to do the following in class: Analyze the following list of famous figures. Rank them from 1 on down based on their credibility. Remember to weigh honesty, wisdom, and credibility equally. Margaret Thatcher Martin Luther King, Jr. Sarah Palin Hillary Clinton Bill Gates Sandra Day O’Connor Martha Stewart Thomas Jefferson Lady Ga Ga George W. Bush Barack Obama Anthony Weiner After each student had compiled his or her personal list ranking, they were asked to come together as a class, and present one list that they…
July 4th Parade Photos – Anchorage (Part 1)
This July 4th was a wet one in Anchorage. The day started with a slight drizzle and then just petered out to be damp, a bit cold. Luckily there was a good amount to do and see on the Anchorage park strip – between the parade and the fair so I kept warm. There was also a chili cook off that unfortunately I forgot to test out. I took quite a few photos – and even after the edits ended up with a pretty size-able photo-essay so I decided to cut it into two parts. The second part will be…
Joe Miller Met Mayor Dan Once, It Went Awkwardly.
Joe Miller, age 46, US Senate Candidate came out of seemingly nowhere to beat incumbent and heir to the throne Senator Lisa Murkowski in the 2010 Republican primary. She then ran as an “Independent” – and won. Leaving Joe to fester in Fairbanks and become a lowly blogger. Now he’s running again – this time against Democrat (no, I’m sorry… “Independent”) Mark Begich who used to have…Mayor Dan Sullivan’s current gig. Mayor Dan Sullivan, age 61, son of Mayor George Sullivan now is running, um… for something. In 2010 he was spending a lot of time with a party planner…
Mayor Dan Sullivan Seeks Higher Office
On Thursday, Anchorage Mayor Dan Sullivan filed a letter of intent to run for statewide office. He did not report the office for which he will be running on his APOC form, but the rumor mill has ben churning on this one, and all indications are he’ll be running for Lt. Governor, just as all indications are that current Lite Gov Mead Treadwell will be running for the U.S. Senate seat currently occupied by Mark Begich. As in Hawaii and Utah, Alaska’s Lieutenant Governor runs a completely separate race from the gubernatorial candidates. So, who would get stuck with “Mayor…
Did You Miss Irony Week?
I have to admit, I missed it. Apparently it was Irony Week in the Municipality from May 5-11. Luckily we have Mayor Dan Sullivan on the job, raising Irony Week to new heights of… well, irony. This winter, hundreds of people – municipal workers of all stripes, and supporters from the community, filed into the Assembly chambers to protest the erosion of collective bargaining rights, and threats to the livelihood of public workers in the form of the Mayor’s Ordinance 37. They stood in line, they waited in seats, they filled the lobby. They went on their day off, their…
The View from Juneau
An old saying goes something like this, “We hate in others what we hate in ourselves.” I don’t think I’ve seen a better example of that than this 28th legislative session. I flew to Juneau to watch the last days of the session for myself. Home in Anchorage, I spend a remarkable amount of time watching Gavel to Gavel – I even Tivo it. But the cameras don’t show what’s really going on in the Capitol, restaurants and bars; they don’t show the lobbyists following lawmakers into the bathroom or to the smoking porch. (I have to wonder whether the…
Rep. Could Cash in from Bridge
A legislative audit recently revealed that Alaskans could be on the hook for up to $1.4 billion dollars as a result of insufficient projected toll revenue from the Knik Arm Bridge (aka KABATA, aka The Bridge from Hell). Not only that, but a land ownership analysis found that at least one state Representative in Juneau could stand to cash in from road construction to the area. The family of Representative Lynn Gattis (R-Wasilla) just happens to own land adjacent to the Knik Arm Bridge approach in the Mat-Su Borough, and would see her land become much more valuable as a result of the…
A Present for Linda! (VIDEOS)
Please join me in wishing Linda Kellen Biegel a very happy birthday! Linda is one of the three managing editors here at the Mudflats, and probably the one that gets the least appreciation and understanding of exactly how much she does. Linda’s the one that sits through endless school board meetings, Assembly meetings, brainstorming meetings… She’s the one who volunteers to oversee vote counts, examines ballots, and watch polls. She’s our workhorse, our researcher who disappears, burrows to the center of the earth, and comes up with a carrot. She’s our APOC guru, our ethics expert, and the one who…