Suzanne LaFrance, who will be sworn in as mayor of Anchorage on July 1, has appointed her transition team, a group of volunteers who are to guide policy in different areas of concern, specifically in three categories: Good government; safe streets and trails; and building our future.
In the Good Government category, LaFrance tapped Mike Abbott, Eleanor Andrews, Jane Angvik, Jennifer Johnston, and Jasmin Smith.
In the Safe Streets and Trails category, she picked Bob Doehl, LeeAnn Garrick, Walt Monegan, Beth Nordland, and Dave Rittenberg.
For the vaguely named Building Our Future category, she chose Sheldon Fisher, Carol Gore, Joelle Hall, Radhika Krishna, Aaron Leggett, Bill Popp, Ivy Spohnholz, and Jonathon Taylor.
They are all from the Left side of the political fulcrum, with a few tied to the old Ethan Berkowitz era or to former Gov. Bill Walker.
For instance, Mike Abbott, a veteran of the Mark Begich Administration, was the city manager for former Mayor Ethan Berkowitz.
Eleanor Andrews is a Democrat heavyweight and is a key officer in the dark-money 907 Initiative, which worked to get LaFrance elected.
Jasmin Smith is a Black Lives Matter activist, while Joelle Hall runs the AFL-CIO and Ivy Spohnholz was a Democrat legislator. Bill Popp launched a campaign for mayor that many thought was a strategy to drain votes from Mayor Dave Bronson; he quickly endorsed LaFrance after the first ballot and before the runoff.
Last week, LaFrance named Katie Scovic as her chief of staff and Becky Windt Pearson as municipal manager.
