Court Opinion

ID: 9537568
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:20:00.488639+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:56:47.892493
License: Public Domain

*1222COMPTON, Justice,
joined by BURKE, Chief Justice, dissenting in part.
Although I concur for the most part with the court’s opinion, I dissent from the conclusion reached in Part IV that the inclusion of Cordova in District 2 violates the requirement that each new district be “as nearly as practicable a relatively integrated socio-economic area.” Alaska Const, art. IV, § 6. The court fails to acknowledge the flexibility of these constitutional guidelines. In addition, the court’s conclusion does not explain what Cordova’s fate is to be, now that it has been extracted from District 2. Since the difficult choice of placing it there was made by a reapportionment board that considered likely alternatives, this court should defer to its judgment on such a close question and affirm the superior court’s holding.
A “relatively integrated socio-economic area” is not the same as an integrated socio-economic area. The Board is not required to find perfectly integrated areas on which to base its election districts; it is permitted by the constitutional language to consider the relative economic integration of various areas and to fashion the election districts according to its judgment. One of Carpenter’s own exhibits states that “[fjfrom the economic perspective, Cordova is closer to Seattle and Tokyo than it is to Valdez.” If the alternative is Tokyo, then it seems relatively reasonable to include Cordova with the other waterlo'cked fishing communities in District 2 that share similar interests.
Furthermore, while the constitutional requirements for reapportionment were designed to prevent rotten boroughs,1 Carpenter did not argue that the Board included Cordova in District 2 for political reasons, and she presented no evidence of gerrymandering. According to the authors of article VI, section 6, the clause concerning integrated socio-economic areas “prohibits gerrymandering .... [Tjhe Committee feels that gerrymandering is definitely prevented by these restrictive limits.”2 In the absence of evidence that the Board manipulated the District to create improper political advantages, there is no showing that the Board frustrated the intent of the Constitution’s framers, and therefore no showing that the Board exceeded its constitutional authority.
Given the acknowledged closeness of the question, (Majority Opinion, 667 P.2d at 1215), it is inappropriate for this court to substitute its judgment for that of the Board. The court’s role is not “to decide what is preferable between alternative rational plans.” Groh v. Egan, 526 P.2d 863, 866 (Alaska 1974). Rather, if the choice made by the Board was reasonable and within constitutional limits, this court should defer to the Board’s expertise. Id.
The inclusion of Cordova in District 2 is within constitutional limits because election districts need only be “as nearly as practicable” relatively integrated socio-economic areas. Alaska Const, art. IV, § 6. Like the standard of relative integration, the practicability standard allows the Board to be flexible in drawing its lines. Together, these standards give the Board wide discretion in creating election districts.
In addition, I believe that the practicability standard applies to more than how practicable a certain degree of socio-economic integration may be. The Board must also consider the practicability of integrated districts from the standpoint of other constraints on election districts. The Board is required by both the Alaska Constitution and the mandate of Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964), to create districts with equal populations. This requirement should be viewed *1223as a practicable limit on the Board’s ability to designate economically integrated districts. Just as the Board cannot arbitrarily divide the state into equipopulous districts without regard to relative economic integration, it also cannot create a district based solely on socio-economic criteria without considering the effect such a district will have on the requirement of equal numbers within districts.
The effect of creating one district with a population unequal to that of the other districts is to throw off the entire reapportionment scheme. By removing Cordova from District 2, the court does just that. The population shortfall in District 2 will presumably be made up by borrowing from the present District 4. The testimony at trial suggested that this might be accomplished by separating the north end of Juneau or the island of Douglas from the rest of Juneau, and adding the population of that area to District 2.
The district created by this “solution” is not any more socio-economically integrated than the area produced by linking Cordova with the southeast communities of Yakutat and Haines. The economy of Juneau relies on government, not fishing or logging. The Board considered this alternative to the present District 2, and rejected it. The Board also considered the relative socio-eco-nomic integration of District 2, and decided that while Cordova was indisputably physically closer to Valdez, “from a socio-eco-nomic standpoint, Cordova has less in common with the predominantly commercialized and industrialized economies of Seward and Valdez than with the fishing communities of the Inside Passage.”3
The Board’s judgment on these matters should not be taken lightly. As the standard of review in Groh v. Egan, 526 P.2d at 866, suggests, this court should not feel free to choose between the same alternatives that the Board has already considered merely because it does not like the Board’s conclusions. I would therefore accept the Board’s reapportionment plan and affirm the superior court’s decision.

. A rotten borough originally referred to a voting district in England which had become depopulated over the years but still had the power to elect a Parliamentary representative. The term has come to mean any political subdivision in a republic with more than its fair share of representation. For a discussion of rotten boroughs and their effect on representative government, see Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 302-07, 82 S.Ct. 691, 756-759, 7 L.Ed.2d 663, 735-38 (1962) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting).

. 3 Alaska Legislative Council, Alaska Constitutional Convention 1846 (1965).

. The Reapportionment Board, Reapportionment and Redistricting Plan for the Alaska State Legislature, 13-14 (1981).