The late Greg Fisk was viewed by many as a great unifier when he won the mayor\u2019s seat, but filling his position has become a reason for division among the city\u2019s Assembly members and mayoral hopefuls.<\/p>\n
At a time when Juneau is facing an economic recession, a heroin crisis, and nagging issues like affordable housing, homelessness and what to do with the city\u2019s solid waste, some elected officials are focusing on petty arguments.<\/p>\n
On Monday, Assembly members Debbie White and Jerry Nankervis, Mayor Mary Becker and former Mayor Merrill Sanford signed their names to a letter calling out former Assembly member and mayoral candidate Karen Crane for her use of a photo in a flyer promoting her candidacy. The photo shows the full Assembly in their seats in the Assembly Chambers. Printed below the photo were endorsements from members of the community and information about Crane.<\/p>\n
In the letter, White said using the photo \u2500 taken with public funds \u2500 was \u201cmost definitely a violation\u201d of campaign laws and a complaint would be filed with the Alaska Public Offices Commission.<\/p>\n
That complaint was filed, then dismissed about a day later by APOC. That it took APOC so little time to toss out the complaint speaks volumes.<\/p>\n
The photo belongs to the public and is beyond any copyright; it\u2019s the property of anyone and everyone. That\u2019s how public domain works. <\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the heart of the matter: White, Nankervis, Becker and Sanford are backing Crane\u2019s opponent, Ken Koelsch, and don\u2019t like that a photo that includes them is being used to promote a candidate they aren\u2019t endorsing. In trying to sling mud at Crane, they also got dirt on their hands.<\/p>\n
We understand their frustration, but not their handling of the situation.<\/p>\n
The campaign mailer doesn\u2019t say she has support from anyone in the photo, nor does it insinuate Assembly members are backing her candidacy. It\u2019s simply a photo of the Assembly, of which Crane was a part. If individuals read something more into the campaign mailer.<\/p>\n
Perhaps Crane should have notified those in the photo before she used it, but she wasn\u2019t legally or ethically obligated to do so. It would have been a matter of courtesy, just like letting Crane know there was a problem before filing a complaint. If the offended party wants to make this issue a matter of courtesy, there is room for blame on both sides.<\/p>\n
What troubles us the most is the apparent rift between current and past Assembly members, people who must be able to work together for all Juneau residents. We hope they\u2019ll be able to get past this squabble and focus on the big picture once ballots are cast on March 15.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The late Greg Fisk was viewed by many as a great unifier when he won the mayor\u2019s seat, but filling his position has become a reason for division among the city\u2019s Assembly members and mayoral hopefuls. At a time when Juneau is facing an economic recession, a heroin crisis, and nagging issues like affordable housing, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":8,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-22322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22322","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\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22322\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22322"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=22322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}