Juneau\u2019s Republican representative to the Alaska Legislature will face a relative unknown in this fall\u2019s election.<\/p>\n
Before Wednesday\u2019s 5 p.m. deadline, Mendenhall Valley Democrat Justin Parish submitted his name to the Alaska Division of Elections as a challenger to Rep. Cathy Mu\u00f1oz.<\/p>\n
Parish and Mu\u00f1oz are in the only contested Juneau-area election on this fall\u2019s state ballot. Rep. Sam Kito III, D-Juneau, is running unopposed for his seat representing downtown Juneau, Haines and Skagway. Sen. Dennis Egan, D-Juneau, will not face election for another two years.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m running because Alaskans deserve a functioning Legislature and we don\u2019t have one right now,\u201d Parish said during a brief interview at the downtown Heritage Coffee.<\/p>\n
Parish, an active Democrat employed as a paraeducator at Floyd Dryden Middle School, pinpointed the state\u2019s subsidy of oil and gas drilling as a particular concern.<\/p>\n
He said it\u2019s \u201cabsurd\u201d that the subsidy is the state\u2019s third-largest budget item.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d further say that it is a result of the actions the majority coalition that my opponent is a part of,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
For her part, Munoz said she isn\u2019t yet familiar with Parish.<\/p>\n
\u201cI look forward to a robust debate. I think it\u2019s great when people get involved in the community, and running for public office is certainly one way to do it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know him personally, but I wish him well,\u201d Egan said of Parish. Kito said he has not yet met Parish either.<\/p>\n
As a newcomer to the political scene, Parish will face the challenge of getting his name out to voters and political donors alike. According to filings with the Alaska Public Offices Commission, Mu\u00f1oz began the year with $21,640 in her campaign account. Parish has registered with the commission but has reported no contributions or expenses.<\/p>\n
Parish said he comes from the Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic Party.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, I think Sanders has shown us that honest, consistent people have a place in politics,\u201d he said, adding that he doesn\u2019t want that comment to be read as a dig at Hillary Clinton or her supporters. \u201cReally, it\u2019s an indictment of a political system as it exists rather than any individual politician.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parish said he will be setting up a campaign website at Justinforjuneau.org in the next few weeks, but interested Juneauites may contact him on Facebook in the meantime.<\/p>\n
Kito said that even though he will not face an opponent (other than any write-in candidates), he \u201cwill still be trying to get out to the communities and talk to constituents.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added that if there are any other places he can contribute to this fall\u2019s elections, he will be there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Juneau\u2019s Republican representative to the Alaska Legislature will face a relative unknown in this fall\u2019s election. Before Wednesday\u2019s 5 p.m. deadline, Mendenhall Valley Democrat Justin Parish submitted his name to the Alaska Division of Elections as a challenger to Rep. Cathy Mu\u00f1oz. Parish and Mu\u00f1oz are in the only contested Juneau-area election on this fall\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":426,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-12512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/426"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12512"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=12512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}