Bent Alaska reader Christina Logan asked us to share this alert. If you have complaints about being unable to vote, contact the Municipal Clerk’s office (info given below). If you are support an independent investigation into the election irregularities, write to the people included in Christina’s alert.

Alert from Christina Logan

Hello friends

The Anchorage Assembly has reported that they have only received 30 voter complaints, so they do not feel that an investigation into the election shenanigans is warranted at this time. Would you please take a moment to write them a note voicing your concern?

The email addresses for the relevant assembly members are below.

Debbie Ossiander, Assembly Chairwoman — ossianderda@muni.org
Harriet Drummond, Chair of the Elections and Ethics Committee (only other committee member Paul Honeman) — harrietdrummond@alaska.com
Municipal Clerk Barbara Gruenstein — wwmasmc@muni.org
All Anchorage Assembly members — wwmas@muni.org

Thank you
Chris

If you were unable to vote because of the ballot shortage

Per the Municipal Clerk’s office: “The Clerk’s Office reminds people who attempted to vote, but were unable to because of a shortage of ballots, that they may Contact the Clerk’s Ofñce. Please email the Clerk’s Ofñce at  election2012@muni.org. When doing so, please include your full name and the number, name or location of the precinct(s) involved. If you are willing to be contacted by phone, please also include your phone number.”

Christina’s email to the Assembly and Municipal Clerk

From: [email address redacted for privacy]
To: elections@muni.org; ossianderda@muni.org; harrietdrummond@alaska.com; honemanps@muni.org; wwmas@muni.org; wwmasmc@muni.org
Subject: Anchorage election concerns
Date: Fri, 6 Apr 2012 10:23:31 -0800

Dear Chairperson Ossiander, Anchorage Assembly, Committee for Elections and Ethics Chairperson Drummond, Municipal Clerk Gruenstein,

As a citizen and resident of Anchorage, registered voter, and property tax payer, I am writing to express my concern over the April 5 municipal election. I am very disturbed that many polling places ran out of ballots, resulting in voters being turned away. It is outrageous that this has occurred in a municipality the size of Anchorage.

While I don’t personally feel that the cost of an “election re-do” would change the outcome of the election, I do feel that it is imperative that every vote be counted, and questioned ballots be carefully verified before being either counted or discarded and that this process be monitored and verified by unbiased witnesses.

The actions of Jim Minnery and the Alaska Family Council, through social media outlets, knowingly and fraudulently incited unregistered voters, and, by the Municipal Clerk’s Office own assessment, voters from outside the municipality of Anchorage to attempt to vote in the April 5 election. These actions quite possibly contributed to ballot shortages and disenfranchisement of legal registered voters.

I demand that Jim Minnery and the Alaska Family Council be investigated by the Anchorage Assembly for election tampering and election fraud.

I support the ACLU’s call for an outside investigator to be appointed by the Anchorage Assembly. I feel that Mayor Dan Sullivan and the city attorney have an extreme conflict of interest in investigating this election, as he was one of the candidates. The same is true for Assemblyman Paul Honeman, member of the Election and Ethics Committee.

Please do right by the citizens of Anchorage. It is our right as citizens and your duty as elected officials to ensure free and fair elections.

Respectfully,
Christina Logan

Editor’s note

Editor’s note: While Minnery heads up the Alaska Family Council, he is also the chair of “Protect Your Rights — Vote NO on 5,” the group under whose auspices he actually sent out misinformation on April 3.  Bent Alaska has seen no indication that Alaska Family Council as an organization participated in promulgating Minnery’s April 3 misinformation.

Bent Alaska is working on election stories as we have time as followup to our April 4 story. The April 4 story was posted at 5:22 AM that day based largely on Anchorage mainstream media coverage of the night of April 3. Much has been learned since. Importantly, Municipal Clerk Barbara Gruenstein was widely quoted in news stories the night of April 3 and early morning hours of April 4 attributing the ballot shortage problems to misinformation in Minnery’s April 3 Action Alert. It was on those stories that we based the our April story. Information which came out later in the day on April 4 made it clear that Minnery’s misinformation was not enough BY ITSELF to cause all the ballot shortages and other problems of election day.  However, it still contributed to the problem.

Stay tuned.