Category Archives: news

Murkowski’s office documents experience of veterans

U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s office provides a nice tribute to those who have served our country with a monthly feature entitled, “Veteran Spotlight.” So far, 18 vets have been interviewed by Murkowski’s office. The veterans are from all across the state, have served in all branches of the military, and have fought in conflicts all across the world. The most recent story is particularly touching. The veteran’s name is Herb Stettler. He served in the U.S. Army and did a 13 month tour during the Korean War. Stettler lives in the Kenai and the story highlights how the community came together after his house burned down.

Read more about Settler below and click here to read the other stories amassed by Murkowski’s office:

Herb Stettler served in the U.S. Army and did a 13 month tour during the Korean War. Stettler is an active member of the Kenai Peninsula veteran community, supporting fellow veterans and honoring veteran sacrifice at local events and ceremonies – and has fostered a special bond with his neighbors for years that was reciprocated when they rallied to his aid last year.

During his interview, Stettler recalls being 18 years old when he was asked to register for the draft. At 20, he enlisted in the Army and his superior officers capitalized on his farm-honed strength making him a machine gun operator. During his Korean War tour, Stettler says there were some “hairy times” and he was often called upon to provide machine gun cover for his fellow soldiers to escape enemy fire.

“I hope that the Lord took all of our men up there for defending the freedoms of our people,” Said Herb Stettler. “For those of us who made it home, we are there for each other. It’s a camaraderie thing with your fellow veterans. You’ve got something in common. You don’t talk about it much- you’re mostly talking about day to day stuff, but you are there to support each other.”

Stettler was awarded the Bronze Star and the Combat Infantry Badge for his service. After he got out of the Army, Stettler made his way to Alaska, eventually settling on the Kenai Peninsula. Today, at 82 years old, he is an active officer for the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 10046 and the American Legion where he works to honor veterans, their service, and our country. It’s a commitment the Kenai community returned in an overwhelming way last year, when his home burnt to the ground and the community came together to build him a house.

“My house caught fire. It was a chimney fire that got away and the whole house went,” Said Stettler. “The community came in and everybody chipped in and they built me a 10 x 34 foot cabin and put a deck on it and an addition behind it. It is warm in there and it doesn’t take much to heat it. They put plumbing in there and my goodness, I am living good. I sure thank the community. I owe them a lot.”

“Herb Stettlers’ story is one of an American hero,” said Senator Murkowski. “He has served our country and returned home where he continues to support active duty military members, veterans and the community as a whole. We owe it to veterans like Herb to honor them through sharing their stories, and we owe it to the rest of us to learn from the high levels of patriotism, commitment and service they demonstrate for us.”

New political app helps consumers go beyond the ballot box

There is a new app that is a “must have” for political activists or people with strong political views to help them “walk their talk.” The app is called 2nd Vote, and it’s designed to rank companies’ ideological leanings and helps consumers who wish to keep spending aligned with political values. It is currently available for iphone and Android platforms.

The new app ranks companies based on five issues: gun rights, the environment, abortion, federal subsidies and same-sex marriage. The higher the ranking, the more conservative the company. While the app was designed for conservatives, liberals can take advantage of it as well by supporting companies that have low numbers.

The app ranks everything from fast food chains to airlines, from energy to insurance companies. While the creators of the app continue to expand their listings of businesses, most regional and local businesses are not yet listed and ranked. In other words, for now you can get a ranking for Starbucks coffee but not for Anchorage-based Kaladi Brothers coffee.

Starbucks is ranked liberal because of its contributions to Planned Parenthood, its corporate policy of providing same-sex benefits to employees and their support for pro-gay legislation; however, conservatives can find solace in the company’s tacit support of the second amendment by not banning firearms in their stores.

The app also allows provides options. Alaska Airlines has a score of six, but Frontier Airlines scores a seven and is a better option, according to the app.

Frontier’s CEO, Bryan Bedford, has “openly structured the company and its values around his Christian view of people and life,” 2nd Vote writes about Frontier.

Most interesting, to this Alaskan at least, is that among the big three producers – BP, Exxon and ConocoPhillips—the latter has the highest conservative store, while BP is only slightly more liberal than Exxon. Among other things, 2nd Vote dings BP for funding UNICEF, which is an “organization that pushes for legal abortion to be a right for women all over the world.”

Exxon also supports UNICEF, plus it gives matching gifts to Planned Parenthood, according to the app.

Who knew?

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

New Alaska Railroad reality show: The art of myth?

We’ve all experienced the phenomena of life imitating art. Your coworker who’s reading Hemingway ends his memo with the line, “Isn’t it pretty to think so.” The Sarah Palin you know begins to act like the Sarah Palin depicted in the media.

Alaskans probably experience this more than most, with a twist because increasingly, Alaskans themselves are both the life and the art. That fisherman, the trooper, the pilot, are heroes on that reality t.v. show, and probably much to their families’ chagrin, they begin to act the part.

Now there’s yet another reality t.v. show to join the dozens of others shot in Alaska. This one focuses on the Alaska Railroad and it will begin to air on the Discovery Channel on Nov. 16. Here’s how the show is described by one of the producers:

The railroad is critical to Alaska’s infrastructure, carrying vital resources around the state. The workers who risk their lives to make sure the trains can run, and the off grid passengers who depend on its existence are the stories we want to tell, and Destination America offers the perfect platform to do so.

Not to take anything away from the railroad workers, but off grid passengers depend on its existence? You mean, the off grid passengers who are dropped off and picked up on the rail belt, within site of a major road?

And here most of us thought that mostly what the railroad did was haul coal from Healy to Seward to send to Korea, and cart tourists around.

How many Alaskans actually ride the train? The railroad isn’t sure, but it does know that about 60 percent of the 400,000 people who ride the train come from cruise ships.

In the winter, which according to the railroad is the end of September until May, the railroad only carries passengers on the weekends from Anchorage to Fairbanks and back with stops along the way. One train, which runs from October to May, runs once a month between Anchorage and Hurricane.

Recently, the railroad requested $40 million from Gov. Sean Parnell, who will release his budget in December. The money is for federally mandated safety upgrades. Last year, at the request of Parnell, the railroad received a $19.1 appropriation.

The $40 million is for both fiscal year 2015 and 2016.

“At stake is the continuation of Alaska Railroad passenger service,” railroad spokesman Tim Sullivan recently told me.

The railroad’s assets total about $989 million and include about 500 miles of railroad line and about 36,000 acres of land, about half of which are available for lease, and which accounted for roughly $10 million of the railroad’s revenue in 2012.

The Legislature has no say over the railroad’s budget.

It’s unclear how much or if any tax credits — part of the film tax credits program — have gone into the production of the show. Getting information about who got the credits and how much was spent on an individual film was always difficult. In July, 2013, the program was moved from the Alaska Department of Commerce to the Department of Revenue. And now, what was once a semi-transparent program is by statute, opaque.

What is clear, however, is that the railroad cooperated with the production, which is all well and fine. So did the Alaska State Troopers when that show was being shot.

I suspect that the troopers’ show has made troopers better at their jobs. Perhaps the show featuring a romanticized version of how very much the railroad means to the Alaska passenger that it serves, will goad the railroad on to imitate art.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Anchorage NAACP adds name to long list of Medicaid expansion supporters

Faith-based organizations, the Alaska Chamber of Commerce, Alaska Federation of Natives, Alaska State Hospital and Nursing Home Association, Alaska Native Tribal Health Care Consortium, medical practitioners and their professional trade groups have endorsed and encouraged Gov. Sean Parnell to accept federal Medicaid expansion dollars.

This week, the Anchorage chapter of the NAACP joined the list. On Wednesday, the group sent out a press release also urging Parnell to accept federal Medicaid dollars. “Governor Parnell should listen to Alaskans and expand Medicaid,” said Kevin D. McGee, NAACP 1st Vice President and Chairman of the organization’s Political Action Committee.

Alaska’s share of federal Medicaid expansion would cover over 40,000 Alaskans and have an economic impact of $2.49 billion on the state, according to various studies.

“It is a right to have affordable health care not a privilege,” said Wanda V. Laws, President of the Anchorage NAACP.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

French questions Parnell about allegations of abuse in National Guard

Democratic Alaska state Sen. Hollis French sent a letter to Gov. Sean Parnell on Tuesday asking for more information about allegations of sexual misconduct within Alaska’s National Guard. Among other things, French is asking for information about prosecution rates, procedures and the number of cases that have been referred to law enforcement.

French is running for lieutenant governor with Byron Mallott, who’s running for governor.

The questions were in response to an article published on Oct. 27 in the Anchorage Daily News detailing what appears to be a culture within the Guard of abuse and of the lack of local law enforcement to do anything about it. Since 2009, 29 cases of alleged sexual assault have been reported to local law enforcement. So far, no one has yet to be prosecuted, nor has Gov. Sean Parnell, who has made ridding the state of sexual abuse a hallmark of his campaign, spoken out about the issue or the culture that seemingly exists in the Guard.

Numerous people were quoted in ADN’s article about the problems, including two chaplains who say that women have been coming to them for years and that nothing has been done about it. They also say that Parnell, who oversees the Guard, was aware of the problems as far back as 2010.

One member of the guard, Lt. Col. Ken Blalock had about 15 victims come to him. He said that he told Parnell and the Anchorage Police about the issues, and got his “butt chewed” for going above his chain of command by the head of the Guard Gen. Tom Katkus.

Following the article, Katkus issued a statement and wrote a column in the ADN assuring the public that the Guard takes these issues seriously. In the ADN piece, Katkus answers many of the questions that French poses. Among other things, he wrote that “the Anchorage Police Department and the Alaska State Troopers, was (sic) contacted in 21 cases, and for reasons specific to each case, these law enforcement agencies did not open investigations.”

Mayor Dan Sullivan, who is running for lieutenant governor on the Republican ticket, has also not addressed these issues publicly.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Health insurance cancellation letters fail to tell the whole story

It was recently reported that Premera Blue Cross/Blue Shield has sent discontinuation notices to about 5,360 Alaskan customers who have purchased the plans on the individual market. The letters say that the insurance company will automatically renew insurance plans at an increased cost unless consumers cancel.

Gov. Sean Parnell has made the letters a campaign issue by pointing to them as proof of the failure of ObamaCare. So have Republican U.S. Senate candidates Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell and Joe Miller.

But the insurance company letters do not mention that consumers might get the same insurance at a much cheaper rate through the health care exchanges, if and when they’re up in Alaska.

The same letters went out to Washington state consumers, which caused that state’s division of insurance to issue a consumer alert lightly excoriating Blue Cross and urging its citizens to “know your rights and options.”

“Don’t just take what your insurance company says, make sure you shop around,” the alert says.

The Alaska Division of Insurance has yet to issue a consumer alert and appears to be abdicating responsibility to educate consumers about the health care law to the feds.

An article about the letters sent to Washington consumers tells the story of a woman named “Donna” who got such a letter:

If Donna had done nothing, she would have ended up spending about $1,000 more a month for insurance than she will now that she went to the marketplace, picked the best plan for her family and accessed tax credits at the heart of the health care reform law.

As it happened, Donna ended up shopping on the Washington exchange, which is up and running, and found a policy that was better than she was getting and will pay only $80 a month.

Eric Earling, director of corporate communications at Premera Blue Cross/Blue Shield, defended the letters it was sending consumers.

“Our experience is that our customers are already aware that they have other options in the market and that we’ve never had to tell them in the past that we have competitors,” he said.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Bill Corbus sells Juneau’s Alaska Electric Light and Power

Washington-based Avista, which operates in five Western states, announced on Monday that it bought Juneau’s Alaska Electric Light and Power. The purchase price was reported to be $170 million, plus cash outstanding.

AEL&P was a family owned business headed by Bill Corbus, who served as Gov. Frank Murkowski’s commissioner of the Alaska Department of Revenue. He remains very active in the Juneau community, and has been extremely active in anti-capital move campaigns. His interest in keeping the capital in Juneau will likely not subside anytime soon.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Gay rights bill set to pass Senate with support of Murkowski and Begich

With the support of a handful of Republican senators, including Sen. Lisa Murkowski, it’s likely that the most significant piece of gay rights legislation passed by Congress since it repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in 2010, will pass out of the Senate next week.

All of the Senate Democrats support the bill, including Sen. Mark Begich.

The Employment Non-Discrimination Act would ban workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. It is crafted to mirror Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, though unlike that act, it has certain religious and small-business exemptions.

A version of the bill passed the Democratic controlled House in 2007, but the Senate filibustered it.

The landscape has changed since then, and it’s likely that the bill has enough support to stave off a similar filibuster. Murkowski is one of our Republican senators supporting the bill. The other three are Mark Kirk from Illinois, and Orrin Hatch from Utah, and Susan Collins from Maine.

One more vote, and they get to 60, which is the magic filibuster-proof number. Four Republicans are said to be wavering: Rob Portman (Ohio), Patrick J. Toomey (Pa.), Kelly Ayotte (N.H.) and Dean Heller (Nev.)

In recent years, Murkowski has been an advocate for gay rights. Some say that such a stance will hurt her reelection chances, particularly in the Republican primary, where she’ll likely be challenged.

But a lot can happen between now and then, and perhaps because of the evolution of support of gay rights, opposition to this bill hasn’t been nearly as strong as with other bills dealing with the issue. The Family Research Council has apparently decided not to expend political capital on the fight. The political action arm of the Heritage Foundation, Heritage Action, is urging members to vote against the act. They say that it would “severely undermine civil liberties, increase government interference in the labor market, and trample on religious liberty.” But it appears that they aren’t putting too much time into it.

Although the bill is expected to die in the Republican-controlled House, gay rights advocates think that they have a winning issue here, and plan to use congressional members’ votes against them in the mid-term elections.

It’s unclear where Rep. Don Young stands on the issue. His spokesman did not return a phone call requesting comment. In any case, his appears safe, and a vote either way probably won’t change that.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

State bigwigs slated for higher paychecks

Gov. Sean Parnell makes $145,000 a year. The Alaska State Compensation Commission this week has recommended Parnell’s compensation be increased almost $6,000 to $150,872.

Governors across the country are paid on average $133,348 according to the Council of State Governments. In 2013, governors in Idaho, Indiana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and Tennessee got raises. The average raise was $4,115.

The highest paid governor is in Pennsylvania and the lowest in Maine, being paid respectively $187,256 and $70,000.

The State Compensation Commission also recommended that the lieutenant governor’s salary be increased from $115,000 to $119,657. Salaries for lieutenant governors across the country range from a low of $30,400 in Idaho, to a high of $153,907 in Pennsylvania. Many other states, including those, also have secretaries of state.

The largest increases recommended are for cabinet members who are the commissioners that serve as the principal department heads in state government. Commissioners are currently paid $136,350. That would increase almost $10,000 to $146,142.

The recommendations are slated to take effect in the new fiscal year on July 1 unless the Legislature passes a bill denying the recommended increases within 60 days of their submission in the 2014 legislative session.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Dems use spicy chili to fire up the base

Give a politician a mic and they’ll certainly use it. Give it to a dozen or so, each having his or her turn, and that’s a lot of mic time. It’s a lot easier to listen to politicians talking into those mics with a beer in hand, and it was a good thing they had plenty of those at the Democrat’s annual chili cook off contest on Wednesday night at the IBEW hall in Anchorage.

Don’t get me wrong: it’s not that the Dems are hard to listen to, and the 150 or so there seemed to enjoy doing so. Joe Griffith, the President of MEA, was there.Lobbyist Jim Lottsfeldt was there. As was Anchorage Assemblyman Pat Flynn, Dean and Rhonda Roberts, and Jake Metcalf, Jane and Norman Schlittler, Malcom and Cindy Roberts, to name a few, all there, smiling and fired up.

In fact, the Dems were about as happy as I’ve seen them for a long time. They have a good candidate for governor in Byron Mallott, who was there briefly. Former Rep. Harry Crawford announced that he’s going to run again. He said he’ll wait until the redistricting mess is worked out before making the final decision about whether to run for House or Senate. As the district is drawn now, it will be against either Rep. Lance Pruitt or Sen. Cathy Giessel. In any case, he’s going to be a strong candidate.

The Dems also feel that they have an issue to rally around in repealing SB 21, or, in their words, the “oil tax give away.” The issue has turned into a Democratic litmus test of sorts, and even Byron Mallott, who has historically supported business, has gone along.

Going against an industry that supports 90 percent of your state budget, say nothing of an industry with no end of pockets, probably isn’t, in the long run, a winning strategy. But for the moment at least, it makes good politics. In the same way that repealing ObamaCare is, at the moment, good politics, among a certain crowd. But that’s a small crowd. In the middle, where most of us live, those who are arguing to fix, rather than repeal, are making the most sense.

The speeches went on too long, but it helped that Hollis French knows how to entertain an audience. He was electrifying. Johnny Ellis made people in the room feel special through introductions and recognition. Bill Wielechowski used his boyish charm. Berta Gardner has enough moral authority to smack down Ted Cruz with a smile, and it showed.

They spoke about health care, about more money for education, about social programs, about women’s rights. But most of the discussion centered around the repeal of SB 21. Buttons, proclaiming that “It’s our oil,” were even made in the repeal’s honor.

I’ve been told that the oil companies will spend whatever it takes to make sure that the law isn’t repealed. The repeal effort will not be able to match them in funds. But money doesn’t always win. The public, the reasonable ones, is pretty good at listening to both sides and ferreting out the truth.

The award for the best chili of the night went Heidi Drygas who is a labor union lawyer and has a food blog. She deserved the win. It had just the right amount of spices. It wasn’t too spicy, nor too mild.

It appealed to the middle.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Correction: The original piece said that Drygas worked for the IBEW.

GOP official and Keithley take their fight to Facebook

Some sort of public brouhaha was bound to transpire between Brad Keithley, who is threatening to run for governor, and Frank McQueary, who’s fast becoming the whole trust in Alaska’s GOP shrinking braintrust. They’ve been griping about each other through intermediaries, one of whom would be me, for months.

Now, it’s spread onto Facebook. (Read here and here.)

To be fair, McQueary is the one doing the griping, and Keithley is the one defending himself, but I do detect a gripe in his voice as he does so. As there should be.

Keithley has been touting a message, and it’s one that Republicans, especially Republicans in the governor’s office, don’t much like. Namely, he’s been criticizing Gov. Sean Parnell for overspending and has been calling on him to walk his fiscal conservative talk and to substantially cut the budget. He has said on numerous occasions that if Parnell’s budget isn’t substantially decreased, then he’d consider taking a shot at running as an independent candidate.

By substantial he’s talking about $1.5 billion. That’s a lot of money. Keithley’s been taking his message to the people, armed with charts and graphs, which lay out a worst-case scenario if the budget isn’t cut.

McQueary doesn’t believe that our economy can sustain such a serious budget cut. Besides, he’s suspicious of Keithley’s motives. He’s long been wondering if Keithley isn’t a Democratic spoiler. He points to contributions that Keithley has made to the Dems. Further, he points out that the Alaska Constitution mandates that a candidate for governor be a resident of Alaska for seven years. Keithley says that by the time he runs, if he runs, he will have fulfilled the residency requirements. McQueary isn’t buying it. He points out that Keithley didn’t registered to vote here until 2010.

Keithley argues back that residency doesn’t require voter registration.

And it goes on.

This piece is on the verge of epitomizing the kind of “he-said-she-said” reporting for which sites like this were supposed to provide an antidote.

But I have no great insights here, except to say that perhaps they should get together and have a cup coffee. They’re both smart people and agree on more than they disagree, and if they used their brain powers to figure out HOW to cut to the budget, then we’ll all be in better shape.

Keithley: Since you brought it up, this one’s mostly on you.

As McQueary said when I talked to him, quod erat demonstrandum. Spenard translation: Them’s fightin’ words.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Among old Anchorage, Dan Coffey announces his candidacy for mayor

Maybe it’s the lack of more than a handful of places to shop, of a sparkling downtown, of fancy events, of more than a few nice restaurants, but you can forget that there’s money in this town. Old money. Not like the money in Seattle, Dallas, or even Denver, say, and it doesn’t present itself like it does in those places, but it’s here, and on Tuesday night, much of it was concentrated in a house in downtown Anchorage with a killer view of the Cook Inlet.

The house belongs to Bill and Michelle Bittner, who opened their home to Dan Coffey to announce that he’s running for mayor in 2015. Bill is an Anchorage boy and like many in the room, grew up with Coffey. He’s a brilliant lawyer, and he’s easy company. You want to tell him things. And Michelle looks like she just walked out of a commercial for women who want to look like they just walked out of a commercial effortlessly.

Anyway, this isn’t a piece about the Bittners, though I could spend time on them on page forever. This is a piece about those who helped build this city, about misconceptions, and about Dan Coffey.

You’ll likely not find many of the people who showed on Tuesday night at other political fundraisers. It might be true that Republicans generally have the lock on the business vote, and that trial lawyers vote Democrat, but successful people tend not to be ideologues, and most have better things to do with their evenings than go to fundraisers.

But Coffey is one of their own. He’s from the Anchorage class of 1964, and give or take a few years, so were many of the people at the party. LIke Coffey, many of them or their parents came to Alaska to find and help build a new city. They built the banks, the stores, the insurance and construction companies, the businesses that create a community.

Among the 100 or so present was Dan Cuddy, president of the homespun First National Bank. There was Bob Mintz, who manages the Carr Gottstein properties. Bill Odom, whose father more than 70 years ago founded Odom Corp., one of the biggest wholesale beverage distribution companies in the Pacific Northwest. John McManamin showed. The McManamin family owns some of the most valuable land in the city. Businessman Mike Renfro was there. Chris and Mike Swalling were there. Their father, Al, brought Coffey from Seattle to Anchorage when he was six days old and handed him over to his adoptive parents. Mary Hughes was there. The infamous Bob Gilliam wasn’t there, but he’ll show eventually. He was, after all, in that class of 1964.

Current Mayor Dan Sullivan introduced and endorsed Coffey.

I had never seen most of these people, and political consultant Marc Hellenthal had to help me figure out who was who. Hellenthal grew up with Coffey and is from one of those old Anchorage families.

Coffey couldn’t be missed, however. He’s got a presence, as people who get things done often do. He sometimes doesn’t know when to tone that presence down, and it has gotten him in trouble more than a few times in the past.

“I think I can offer something,” he told me. “I think I can make this a better place to live,” he said, as if it were a new idea to him. Prior to Tuesday night, I only knew Coffey by reputation, and one thing I wouldn’t have guessed about him is how sincere he can be.

Turns out there is a lot about him that I didn’t know. Although he maybe a lawyer to the liquor lobby, he’s also a recovering alcoholic who hasn’t had a drink for more than 30 years. I didn’t know that he was a registered Democrat before changing to independent when he ran for Anchorage Assembly. I knew that he has a reputation as a fiscal conservative, but I didn’t know that at heart, he’s a social liberal, particularly when it comes to the homeless and the poor.

Mostly it didn’t occur to me how much courage it takes for him to run. He’s got long history here, and he’s going to be put under a microscope, slammed by his opponents and criticized by the media (maybe even by me), and he knows it and yet he’s still going for it. Why? He doesn’t need the money or the prestige or the name recognition. After all, there’s already a street named after his family.

Coffey said that Anchorage has been good to him, to his family, and to many of the families in the room. He wants others to have the opportunities that they all had. His friends, those who showed on Tuesday night, understood.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Government shutdown could cost Alaska up to $39 million

Using Moody’s Analytics and the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee says that the recent government shutdown could cost Alaska as much as $39 million in lost wages, federal funds, and in impacts from lost federal contracts.

The 16-day federal government shutdown was at its heart a fight over the funding of Obamacare and affected, among other things, disability checks, veterans’ benefits, and federal lands and contracts.

Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, who is running in the U.S. Senate Republican primary, has been repeatedly calling for the repeal of Obamacare. At one point Treadwell said that he would “stand” with the senators who were supporting the shutdown, and at other times said that he wouldn’t. Another candidate, Joe Miller, unequivocally supported it.

The DSCC called both of them “reckless,” and said that they were putting “partisanship ahead of Alaska.”

Former DNR Commissioner Dan Sullivan, who is also running in the Republican primary, has yet to address the issue. He declined to answer questions on the day that he announced his run on Oct. 15, the day before the shutdown ended.

Both Sens. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican, and Democrat Mark Begich worked to end the impasse.

Alaska appears to be faring better than other states with a high federal presence. Washington D.C. is expected to be hit hardest, followed by Maryland and West Virginia.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

Get your meatballs here! This week in fundraising fun.

Are there more fundraisers in Alaska than elsewhere? It sure feels that we’re awash in them and that if you really wanted to, you could spend all your evenings, for eternity, eating meatballs and celery sticks while men who use hair products talk about how they’re going to redecorate their new Anchorage legislative offices that they never use while bureaucrats discuss their ever-bulging mileage accounts.

Sound fun? Welcome to my world. Anyway, there may be others, but here’s what’s going on just this week:

On Monday night, Gov. Sean Parnell attended a campaign event in Kenai held at a private residence. More than 50 people showed. Tuesday at noon, Parnell will be attending a fundraising luncheon in Anchorage that is reportedly already over-subscribed. And in case you’re just coming fresh from a root canal, on Tuesday night, Parnell will be having a fundraiser at the appropriately named Advanced Pain Centers on Abbott Road from 5:30 to 7 p.m. The public is welcome.

Independent gubernatorial candidate Bill Walker will be having an event on Tuesday evening as well. It is hosted by, among many others, Wayne Anthony Ross. WAR doesn’t use hair products or talk about redecorating anything, except perhaps his own private shooting range. (P.S. I’ve missed that guy.)

Also on Tuesday evening Dan Coffey is expected to announce his candidacy for mayor of Anchorage at the residence of Bill and Michelle Bittner, and that election isn’t until 2015.

If you’re in D.C. and feeling left out of the fun, DNR Commissioner Dan Sullivan will be attending an early evening event supporting his candidacy with several prominent and well-known hosts from the Bush White House. And Mead Treadwell is in D.C. at a fundraiseron Monday night hosted by tea party braintrust Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform.

On Wednesday evening, the Alaska Senate Democrats in conjunction with the Alaska Young Democrats are hosting their Fall Fiesta and Chili Cook Off from 5:30 – 7:30 pm at 3333 Denali Street. Everyone is welcome and anyone can participate in the contest. Bring your best chili. The chili judges are Senator Bettye Davis, Anchorage Assembly members Pat Flynn and Tim Steele, and AK Young Democrats’ president Joe Samaniego. The price tag for this event is whatever you’d like to give all the way up to $5000.00.

And if you still have any interest or money left in your checkbook, there is an event Thursday evening at La Mex off Diamond for Speaker of the House Mike Chenault and uber fundraiser Rep. Gabrielle LeDoux who are both seeking reelection.

If you know of others, email me at the address below.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com

DNR Dan Sullivan’s primary election voting problem

Of the three candidates in the U.S. Senate Republican primary race so far, it looks like former DNR Commissioner Dan Sullivan is the candidate who can raise money. His first fundraiser brought in about $50,000, which was more than 25 percent of what his most heavily financed primary challenger, Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, managed to raise in 90 days.

His opponents know this. Both Treadwell and incumbent Sen. Mark Begich are trying to stick him with the rap that he’s not a real Alaskan and that he’s using the state for his own personal political advancement.

His voting record, specifically that he missed voting in primary elections, will likely be used to further that rap.

While Sullivan has voted in every general since at least 2004, when public records are available, he has only voted in two of five primaries in those years. He skipped the 2004, 2006 and 2008 primary elections.

The Republican primary race in Alaska in 2004 was relatively uneventful. There was no governor’s race, and U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski was the only member of the delegation to have a challenger, whom she beat handily. In 2006, however, the governor’s primary race was a three-way one, pitting challengers Sarah Palin and John Binkley against incumbent Frank Murkowski. (The rest of that story, as they say, is history.)

In 2008, Rep. Don Young only won the primary by about 300 votes against current Gov. Sean Parnell.

Joe Miller did not vote in the 2008 primary, but voted in all of the others since 2004. Neither Treadwell or Begich have missed an election.

Sullivan’s spokesperson Mike Anderson sent the following email in response to questions about his voting record:

Since coming to Alaska over 16 years ago, Dan has always voted in the state. While serving his country after 9/11, he stayed engaged in voting in Alaska while working as a National Security Council staff at the White House, then as a Marine Corps Infantry officer and finally as an Assistant Secretary of State. During that period, he did miss a few primary votes, but never missed a general election vote.

Sullivan moved to Alaska in 1997 after getting a Georgetown law degree to clerk for judges, including Chief Justice Warren Matthews. He was in private practice until 2002, when he moved to D.C. to head the International Economics Directorate of the National Economic Council and National Security Council under George W. Bush. He left the White House to become an assistant secretary of state.

In 2009, then Gov. Sarah Palin appointed him to become Alaska’s attorney general. Sullivan has also served in the Marine Corps since 1993, both on active duty and in the reserves. He was recently called to active duty to work on a counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com