Petersburg officials are happy with the latest plan for legislative boundaries under consideration by the Alaska Redistricting Board.
That board on Sunday adopted a conceptual election map for the 2014 election cycle.The map puts Petersburg in a House district with Sitka, Craig and other small Southeast villages from Hoonah to Hollis. Petersburg’s acting mayor Sue Flint said she likes the proposed district. “It puts us with Sitka and some smaller communities and takes us out of downtown Juneau and that is sort of what we were after,” Flint said. “The mayor is happy with this and I also heard Craig is happy with this. So, we aren’t with Wrangell anymore but it looks like a good plan.”
Petersburg is in a house district with downtown Juneau through next session of the legislature. Community leaders challenged that alignment in court but it became the interim electoral map for the 2012 election.
The redistricting board was ordered to come up with a new permanent plan for the 2014 election. This latest conceptual plan keeps Ketchikan in the same House district as Wrangell. Metlakatla and Hydaburg are also included. That house district would be paired with Sitka-Petersburg-Craig to make a new southern Southeast Senate district.
