Opinion ID: 2546657
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Initial Observations

Text: The plaintiffs ultimately found their appellate arguments on two main propositions. The first proposition is that the state's VPSO and VPO programs, which exist largely in predominantly Alaska Native off-road communities and whose officers have less law enforcement training and authority than Alaska State Troopers, show that the state operates a race-based system of law enforcement in rural Alaska. Thus, plaintiffs contend that significant disparities between troopers and VPSOs and VPOs in qualifications, experience, training, arms, equipment, salaries, benefits, working conditions, and authority result in a lower level of police protection for off-road, predominately Native communities than the protection afforded by the Troopers to on-road predominately white communities. As to this first proposition, the superior court found that trooper allocation decisions are racially neutral, and that the VPO and VPSO programs are supplements to and not substitutes for trooper law enforcement services. The second proposition is that for purposes of allocating the troopers' law enforcement services, off-road and on-road communities are similarly situated. Thus, plaintiffs assert that despite some differences between on-road and off-road places,  all Alaska communities, whether on or off the road grid, are similarly situated in the only two relevant waystheir basic need for and right to equal access to adequate police protection. (Emphasis in original.) As to this second proposition, the superior court ruled after trial that on-road and off-road communities are not similarly situated due to significant differences such as population and accessibility.