Bill Evans says he is the one mayoral candidate to appeal to most of Anchorage voters

By
Suzanne Downing
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37
428

Bill Evans, a former Anchorage Assembly member, told Must Read Alaska on Monday that he’s the candidate who can appeal to the broadest sector of voters in the upcoming race for Anchorage mayor.

Evans, appearing on the MRAK podcast, said that his experience working on the Assembly from 2014 to 2017, along with his business experience as an attorney in Anchorage, laid a foundation for his campaign.

Evans is a center-right candidate who was among the first to announce for mayor, over a year ago.

But he didn’t expect to run for mayor. He had built a thriving practice and was active in supporting other candidates. He did so after watching the decline and fall of Anchorage over the past six years under the Berkowitz Administration.

Evans was born and raised in Cleveland, the son of a single mother who supported the family as a bartender. He was the first person in his family to graduate from high school. He joined the military, was in the 82nd Airborne as a paratrooper, worked as a police officer and SWAT team officer. He went to college, studying history and political science, before earning his law degree, thinking he would become a prosecutor. In the 1990s, he and his wife and three small children moved to Anchorage.

“I didn’t know anybody up here, hadn’t been up to Alaska before, but took a chance, and came up here in 1998 and it’s been a wonderful experience, and it’s been home, where our kids were raised, and it’s a city we love.”

“I wasn’t planning on the mayor’s race, but city has gone downhill so fast I felt an obligation to throw my hat in the ring,” Evans said. “Driving from the hillside to downtown every day, seeing the city deteriorating before my very eyes,” with crime, homelessness and businesses boarding up were what encouraged him to step up.

Evans talked about the complicated nature of the municipality, with its many layers of governance, starting with the limited road service areas, and he talked about the recent shift of Anchorage Assembly and Mayor’s Office from a majority conservative to a super-majority of liberal.

“The demographics of Anchorage have changed. It’s gotten younger and more liberal than it used to be,” he said.

“I don’t think the city is as far left as the Assembly would make you think it is, but I think we have certainly come to the middle of the road, and are a very purple city. That has bearing on how we approach elections. We have to be realistic about who the electorate is, and what we’re able to get done,” Evans said.

“We need to have a conservative win this race because the alternative is going to be Forrest Dunbar. And Forrest is self-described to the very far left within the Democratic party.

“Forrest is not lying about being the most progressive candidate in this race. He runs on that and he is willing to stand on that. But if we don’t do a good job of putting someone who can beat Forrest in this race, that’s who we’re going to end up with.”

Listen to the entire conversation with Bill Evans on the Must Read Alaska Show. Available at any one of the links listed here.

As for the infamous “bathroom” equal rights ordinance that Evans helped negotiate, which allows people in Anchorage to use public bathrooms according to the gender identity they choose, Evans explained it was a compromise with a far-left mayor, Berkowitz, who was preparing far-reaching LGBTQ protections to the detriment of those with sincerely held religious beliefs. In the end, Evans said the ordinance was hijacked and the religious protections he had hoped for were diminished.

The ordinance was upheld by voters in Anchorage in 2018, with the defeat of Proposition 1, which would have required those using public facilities to restrict themselves to the locker room or bathroom that aligns with the gender relating to their chromosomes.

Evans: Anchorage perfects the art of money laundering

37 COMMENTS

  1. Nope. You think that Bill, but you’re wrong. Most Eagle River voters support a true conservative Dave Bronson. And being a consenus building candidate will not win you votes here. We just got screwed over by Kelly Merrick who handed control of a Republican majority house to the RINO Louise Stutes and the Demoncrats. We are angry and a moderate will not do. Bronson wants to attack crime, deal with homelessness (yes, Virginia vagrancy is a crime), stop taxing people to death to pay for teacher’s unions who don’t teach and buying resorts for the homeless. You think you are the best candidate, but compromise is not the path forward. Not supporting you. It’s Dave Bronson all the way!

      • Sure – If you are a retiree on a fixed income and the money you saved all your life and invested is taxed to the hilt your resources are finite. If you aren’t there now, you will be. Then off to the bone yard if you haven’t saved enough and your investments tank. Think about all the euthanasia, assisted suicide, and human composting articles in recent news. In the early 70s I thought Soylent Green was a sinister movie – not so much these days.

  2. So that means he is the MOST compromising out of all, what do Alaska and Anchorage want, the MORE of the same compromising tactics thats wallowing us in the Garbage dump surrounded by vultures, or a strong convicted leader leading us away from the landfill eventhough it makes the Eagles, Ravens, Seagulls, Rodents, and Flies forage and hunt harder for its food!?
    Compromising our ancestors values is what made Alaska a Dump!

    • Agree. Weed them out as quickly as possible. Need to keep Dunbar and the leftists out of the mayoral seat and off of the assembly by voting for one real conservative candidate………

  4. Bill Evans’ and the left’s wokeness is tiresome.

    Now it’s Dr. Seuss………..

    Former CIA Director John Brennan confessed to MSNBC’s audience on Monday that these days he’s “increasingly embarrassed to be a white male.”

    Never cared for Brennan, but this “wokeness” craze is spreading faster than COVID and it is mutating into more demented strains daily.

    We need a vaccine against this developed even faster than warp speed……..

    Or, perhaps, the COVID jab is causing it to spread faster……………

    • John Brennan is as far left as you can get. Wokeness is just another term for ‘divide and conquer’. Interestingly, I had two young 20 year old delivery guys at my house this morning. I nonchalantly asked what do you think of cancel culture? One guy was clueless, while the other snorted politely and said it was the stupidest thing he had come across. I do believe the far left is spoon feeding us what they want us to believe-do-say but most aren’t buying it!

  5. Someone crazy enough to jump out of a perfectly good airplane to kill people and break things for God and Country should “compromise” sincerely held religious beliefs… make excuses about who gets to use which bathroom, no matter whose children are in it?
    .
    Weak start, Bill, but recoverable. “Center-right” means desperate eagerness to curry favor with Socialist Democrats who kill babies, destroy lives, livelihoods, civil rights in the name of China flu, force children into illiteracy, defund police, bankrupt Anchorage, corrupt Anchorage’s voting system, disrespect America’s flag, burn cities, destroy monuments, destroy America’s borders, propagandize Americans, force their private perversions onthe public, etc.,etc… current events, in other words, you’re okay with just “center right”, Bill?
    .
    You tell your Airborne team you’re mostly on their side, but they gotta compromise with bad guys… “center”, as it were? Is that what “All the way!” means?
    .
    Get on the “right” side, commit to these things, you might even survive this jump:
    .
    Commission an outside forensic audit of city finances and management practices, eliminate funded but unfilled positions; return “slush funds” to taxpayers, terminate all executive employees and consultants hired during the Berkowitz administration;
    .
    veto upcoming sales-tax ordinances;
    .
    sponsor ordinances to repeal alcohol and fuel taxes, stop collecting them, refuse to enforce plastic-bag ban;
    .
    propose payment-in-lieu-of-taxes for non-profit organizations;
    .
    restructure building-code permit and building-code enforcement processes to make them less expensive, less adversarial, less vulnerable to habitual, spurious complaints;
    .
    verify annually that city voter rolls are accurate and current, generate strategy for limiting effects of fake ballots, postal fraud, nursing-home resident coercion, ballot harvesting, voter impersonation, bribery of voters;
    .
    sponsor an ordinance to: repeal mail-in voting, stop mailing unsolicited ballots, remove mail-in vote machinery, restore traditional signature-verified, polling-place balloting with verifiable ballot chain of custody;
    .
    sponsor an ordinance to withdraw Anchorage from the Alaska Municipal League, withdraw Anchorage’s share of money from the $600M+ Alaska Municipal League Investment Pool, return it to taxpayers;
    .
    divest the Municipality from buying or administering homeless housing, restore and sell city property occupied by homeless camps;
    .
    cancel all China flu “mandates”, cancel “emergency powers”, demand factual, verifiable China-flu reporting statistics, rebate property taxes paid for in-school services which school-district officials did not provide;
    .
    share post-Eaglexit vision for Anchorage, what policies and practices will be changed to persuade other groups not to secede, what will be changed to lessen the risk of another 1980’s-style exodus;
    .
    veto budgets which clearly “rubber stamp” school-district and public-employee union demands;
    .
    veto ordinances which undermine Anchorage Police Department arrest and enforcement processes;
    .
    refuse to attend, direct executives not to attend, Assembly meetings conducted in violation of Alaska’s Open Meetings Act (AS 44.62.310-.312);
    .
    enforce private-property rights;
    .
    make time for weekly call-in radio “fireside chats” on the state of the city;
    .
    use Art Chance’s “Red on Blue: Establishing Republican Governance” as the essential operating manual for city government.

    • I agree, Morrigan is speaking from the hearts of all alaskans and as far as that goes all Americans also. Thank you Morgan Enough is enough! And I am a proud life long Fairbanksan!

    • Excellent!
      It would bode well for those who are running for Anchorage Mayor to pay attention to your Mayoral solutions – everyone of them.

      All the answers are there.

      BTW – Morrigan, I wish you were running – you’d get my vote.

  6. Ain’t gettin my vote, he admits compromising with the radical left in hopes of getting some crumbs of compromise and decency….
    ooooookkkkkaaaaayyyy, how’d that work out for you? We need someone with a backbone who can stand up to the ADN and the rest of the liberal mob and take back our city. Yes I agree Anchorage is liberal on a lot of issues but our economy is a joke, our schools are a mess, our streets need more plowing and less panhandlers and our property taxes are climbing ever higher. Stop investing in hotels for bums and start investing in infrastructure improvements and try to revive our dying business sector. Ditch the horse crap COVID laws and reinstate the spirit of “The Last Frontier”
    Jacob Seth Kern for Mayor!!!

  7. Bill Evans may or may not get the majority of votes, that remains to be seen. But I want a principled, conservative mayor…that is who will get my vote; not a weak-kneed compromiser. Be true to your principles and fight for them; do not yield to other’s values you don’t share. Stop allowing weak people and weak values from ruining Anchorage.

  8. Mayoral Candidate Dave Bronson is the only true Conservative!!! Mayoral Candidate Dave Bronson believes in his OATH OF OFFICE and will not stray!!! Mayoral Candidate Dave Bronson’s Personal Agenda is to do what is best for ALL Citizens of the Municipality of Anchorage!!! Mayoral Candidate Dave Bronson is not and will not be beholden to any Special Interest Groups!!! Conservatives get out the VOTE, 50% will avoid a Runoff. Conservatives change Mayoral Candidate Dave Bronson to Mayor Dave Bronson, April 6th, remember no Runoff.
    ?? DAVE BRONSON FOR MAYOR ??
    A TRUE CONSERVATIVE

  9. Posting this from Alaskan Family Action Website:
    Why Bill Evans Should NOT Be The Next Mayor of Anchorage – By Jim Minnery – Alaska Family Action
    January 27th, 2021
    During the Anchorage Assembly election in 2014, Alaska Family Action sent a survey to candidates Adam Trombley and Bill Evans asking them a simple question.

    Would they support or oppose adding “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to the Municipal Code section regarding discrimination? In community after community across the United States, wherever these “SOGI” laws have passed, fundamental liberties have been trampled and individuals’ rights have been unnecessarily impinged so that people can no longer live in ways consistent with their values.

    Both candidates said they would oppose adding the language. Bill Evans response was signed and dated March 23rd, 2014.

    In turn, assuming Trombley and Evans were responding in good faith, Alaska Family Action endorsed both candidates. Trombley lost his election but Evans won.

    Fast forward to 2015 and not only did Assembly member Bill Evans go back on his word, he actually joined with liberal Assembly member Patrick Flynn to introduce a measure adding “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to the Municipal Code. And, as it turned out, Evans had been working behind the scenes with activists in the LGBTQ community all along to get the language before the Anchorage Assembly. Alaska Family Action, who had endorsed Evans based on his survey response, was never contacted by Evans to let us know he was planning to renege.

    In the years since Evans lied to Alaska Family Action and worked actively to stir up this pot, the Anchorage Assembly and Mayor have gone all out progressive with only two conservatives out of eleven seats now on the local governing body. Mayor Ethan Berkowitz, who stepped down after a “#Me Too” moment, was replaced by uber-liberal Austin Quinn-Davidson who has done her best to economically collapse Anchorage with Covid shutdowns and, with a willing Assembly, turn Anchorage into a socialist suburb of Seattle, Portland and San Francisco.

    Not surprisingly, liberty-minded residents have been aroused and we now have several social/fiscal conservative candidates running for Mayor and the Anchorage School Board who are doing their part to bring some sanity back to Alaska’s largest community.

    Alaska Family Action will have much more to say about these candidates running in the upcoming Municipality of Anchorage Election taking place on Tuesday, April 6th but for now, we simply want to make one thing perfectly clear – Bill Evans is not an ally on fundamental issues of faith, family and freedoms we care deeply about and quite frankly, cannot be trusted.

    Although he is gaining some traction in terms of “heavy hitters” in the Republican establishment joining his campaign recently, Evans does not deserve the support of social conservatives or, for that matter, anyone who cares about honesty and integrity. In particular, Evans has shown he supports banning disagreement on LGBT issues by enforcing a sexual orthodoxy that treats reasonable actions and disagreements on fundamental biology and sexuality as discriminatory. Evans is much more aligned with Joe Biden on these matters than he is with conservatives who value liberty and free markets.

    Ultimately, someone in the first round of this contest has to get 45% of the vote or there will be a runoff between the top two vote getters. One of those will very likely be Forrest Dunbar, a current Anchorage Assembly Member, who has called the U.S. Constitution “shot through” with racism, and is a liberal’s liberal. Dunbar most assuredly will double down on everything Berkowitz and Quinn-Davidson have done to shut down our city and bring Left Coast politics to a whole new level from Girdwood to Eagle River.

    We can’t let that happen. Thankfully, there are good conservative choices for the Mayor of Anchorage to turn this ship around.

    Bill Evans is not one of them.

    This communication was paid for by Alaska Family Action, Inc., Anchorage, Alaska. I am Jim Minnery, President of Alaska Family Action, Inc., and I approve this message.
    This NOTICE TO VOTERS is required by Alaska law. We certify that this communication is not authorized, paid for, or approved by any candidate being endorsed or opposed.

  11. Why do lawyers keep running for public office ? A better question is why do we keep voting for them ?
    Most of them are self-serving power hungry over educated people that think they know what is best for us.

    • doubtful, personally Id rather my city die a quick death with outsiders like falsey or dunbar rather than a slow painful boil with an outsider like Evans

    • Not me. Sounds like whack job.
      Eagle should exit. Good luck with the bond debt on the muni buildings.

  13. Changed his registration from Dem to Rep to run for the assembly, no claims to be undeclared; quit after one term, sponsored the legislation he now says was hijacked. He is more Center Left than Center right, and that is based on the new “center” which is left of any center I have ever believed in.

    Robbins or Bronson please!!

    also
    “The demographics of Anchorage have changed. It’s gotten younger and more liberal than it used to be,” he said.
    NO, mail in ballots have allowed the left to take over, I hear lip service for dealing with mail in ballots, but not seeing any action being taken. WHERE are the Republican leaders, still too busy supporting Murkowski to care about Anchorage evidently.

  14. He’s done. We need a pitbull like Bronson. Please tell everyone you know to get out and vote in April.

  16. Whatever flavor conservative we voters choose – we need a solid win to eject the cabal that is bringing this city down. My best hope is Bronson for Anchorage, but can he win with all the skullduggery going on and the big money exchanging hands? Perhaps a question we don’t want to ask ourselves.

    Witness Merrick in Eagle River. You can bet big money put her in her position, and with all the hue and cry and censures from the furious voters, she will remain in the House with a smirk to the ones who voted for her.

    As honest citizens, how do we trust the politicians who tend to stab us in the back at every turn? Do our homework and vote? Hope we pick the right one out of this field of candidates for mayor. The future of Anchorage depends on it, and your vote is the only power you have at this point. Bronson is at the top of my list. Hope he can pull off a win for this city.

  17. What is needed is a strong defender of the US Constitution as it is plainly written. It is criminal to hold two emoluments at once. What is so hard to understand. The Constitution is the laid down, declared, guaranteed unalienable primary law of this country. One guy, one emolument/pay spigot. What is so hard to understand about that? what is to quibble about. Never voting for ANYONE who is not in love with the US Constitution as it is written!

  18. Thinking the long pole in the tent to stopping the ultra left from maintaining control, is fixing the election process. If it remains unchanged nothing will change.

  20. “Far-reaching LGBTQ protections to the detriment of those with sincerely held religious beliefs”…
    How to LGBTQ+ protections degrade people’s religious beliefs, exactly?
    The ability to legally discriminate? If that’s permissible, why not against women, or POC or Jews? Where does the hate end? And why do you think espousing hatred is a religious belief?

  21. After reading the story and comments it seems to me that Anchorage conservatives are in for another shocking defeat next month. Dave Bronson is a good candidate, no question and will doubtless garner enough votes to place in the top 5 in the upcoming election. Unfortunately for Bronson Supporters Mr. Evans is correct in his analysis of the Anchorage electorate. I think a population within a given district will vote for their jobs and or their entitlements if no job exists. The younger, more diverse group that Mr. Evans refers to are not inherently left leaning, they are however going to vote their best interest. What Anchorage needs is to build a productive economy and not continue to be the biggest welfare state in Alaska. Furthermore the lesson of our failed Republican leadership on display in the State House is one of ideology over statesmanship. Like it or not you have to work with those in opposition to accomplish your goals. Sorry folks, just remember that Republicans are the Stupid Party!, (I am a republican and I speak from experience)

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