Opinion ID: 2543483
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Anchorage House Districts

Text: We have long held that population deviations under 10% are minor deviations that do not require further justification; they are presumptively constitutional. [15] The superior court found that the board's attempt to preserve neighborhood boundaries in Anchorage was not improperly motivated, a conclusion that this court accepts. Yet today's Order invalidates sixteen house districts in Anchorage on the ground that the board did not make a sufficient effort to further reduce deviations that we have consistently said are minor and need no further justification. [16] The order attempts to justify this surprising result on two grounds. Neither survives scrutiny. First, the Order suggests that the constitutional change adopted by the voters in 1999 justifies dramatically stricter standards in redistricting. But a simple comparison of the language of the former provision and the current provision shows that the change made the standard more flexible, not more strict. Article VI, section 6 previously provided: Each area shall contain a population at least equal to the quotient obtained by dividing the total civilian population by forty. That provision literally required that each district contain the same number of civilians as every other district: Each had to be at least equal to every other; once any district contained an excess of population, another district would fail to have at least that many persons. Whatever might be said about the feasibility of meeting this standard, it is clear that the standard was very high. In 1998 [17] the citizens of Alaska voted to adopt new language for article VI, section 6. The new language provides, Each [house district] shall contain a population as near as practicable to the quotient obtained by dividing the population of the state by forty. Clearly, the new languageas near as practicablecreated a more flexible standard than the language it replacedequal. [18] Second, today's Order relies on Groh v. Egan [19] for the proposition that Anchorage neighborhood patterns cannot justify deviations so close to the ten percent threshold. But in Groh v. Egan we were faced with a plan with a total deviation of 29%. [20] We addressed three Anchorage districts, which respectively were underrepresented by 5.9%, 6.5%, and 8.6%, [21] in the context of a total deviation of 29%. In holding that neighborhood patterns cannot justify substantial disparities, we were unmistakably referring to total deviations over 10%. By comparison, the greatest Anchorage deviation struck down today is 4.8%, and the maximum statewide deviationa deviation figure that Anchorage has nothing to do with [22] is 12%. Groh v. Egan simply does not support the court's invalidation of sixteen Anchorage house districts. Here, the board's stated purpose of trying to maintain neighborhood boundaries within Anchorage, once it had fully complied with the one person, one vote requirement, resulted in the board's decision not to attempt to further minimize deviations within Anchorage below what we have previously determined to be de minimis. [23] It did so in order to preserve neighborhoods, [24] a proper motive. [25] It had no impermissible effect. In sum, I believe that the board's approach was entirely proper and conformed to all constitutional requirements. This court should uphold Judge Rindner's affirmance of the board.