LONG HAUL IN THE LAST FRONTIER: How Alaska’s COVID journey began — and how it’s ending
The first day of the pandemic started out pretty quiet. About 38–40 decibels, in fact.
That’s how loud it was outside the Chugach Electric Hale substation off O’Malley Road in South Anchorage on March 12, 2020. About as noisy as the inside of a library. I know this because I measured the sound levels at the substation that morning for a story I was working on about the Birchwood Community Council. The night before, the council held a rousing discussion inside the Beach Lake ski chalet about the planned placement of a similar facility in their neighborhood. It was big news in Birchwood, a small suburb on the outskirts of the Municipality of Anchorage.
By the evening of the 12th I was sitting alongside Anchorage Mayor Ethan Berkowitz in a cramped meeting room at City Hall, where an emergency meeting of the Anchorage Assembly was interrupted by a livestream of Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy announcing the state’s first confirmed case of the novel coronavirus we now call COVID-19.
“No reason to panic,” said Dunleavy, who declared a statewide emergency the day before. “No reason to get upset.”
Rumors of the state’s first positive test had been rumored throughout the day, but Dunleavy’s team hadn’t coordinated with Berkowitz on the announcement. The communication snafu was a small sign that the two men had very different ideas about how to handle the rapidly unfolding crisis, and Berkowitz came close to admitting as much during a brief hallway chat following the announcement.
“It highlighted how important it is to have coordination between the state and municipal authorities, and as we have more of these cases our coordination will get better,” Berkowitz told me.
When asked if he was happy with the level of coordination between himself and the governor, Berkowitz left room for interpretation.
“I think at the operational level it’s extremely good.”
Rather than telling people not to panic, Berkowitz was urging a drastic response to the virus.
“It’s our responsibility to slow the introduction of this disease to Alaska as much as possible and to flatten the effects of the disease once it’s here so that we don’t overwhelm our medical facilities,” said Berkowitz, who would go on to order all bars and restaurants closed on March 16.
Differences between the governor’s office and officials in Alaska’s largest city would become one of the key issues of the next 12 months as the pandemic unfolded in the nation’s northernmost state, where Dunleavy attempted to walk a fine line between what his public health experts were advising and what his political base was demanding. The governor’s top medical adviser — the previously unknown Dr. Anne ZInk — would go on to national stardom for her handling of the pandemic, while the governor himself received mixed marks for messaging.
In Anchorage, the early tone set by Berkowitz would be taken up by acting mayor Austin Quinn-Davidson and the Anchorage Assembly after the mayor resigned due to a bizarre sexting scandal in October.
Despite vocal opposition, the city imposed strict lockdowns on commerce throughout the pandemic, including an indoor dining closure before the St. Patrick’s Day holiday that may have helped keep the state’s virus levels low even as the “first wave” swept across the rest of the nation.
One year later, Alaska is on the brink of becoming one of the country’s coronavirus success stories. Vaccine rates are the highest in the nation in a state that has seen some of the lowest rates of infection and death in the nation. And this week, Alaska became the first state to offer vaccines to all residents over the age of 16.
It’s predicted things could be roughly back to normal in time for this summer’s salmon runs.
The first time most Alaskans heard of Dr. Anne Zink was following an appearance by Alaska’s Chief Medical Officer at a town hall meeting held at Chugiak High School on Feb. 29. There at the request of Sen. Lora Reinbold, Dr. Zink told the crowd inside the CHS cafeteria that the novel coronavirus — which had yet to appear in Alaska — was worth taking extremely seriously.
“Think about what would happen if we had a significant outbreak,” she said.
Zink urged the roughly 50 attendees to make sure and have enough food on hand to survive potential disruptions to daily life, and handed out a fact sheet urging people to wash their hands and stay six feet away from people who are sneezing or sick. She also urged people to stop touching their face — even as she herself inadvertently adjusted her glasses.
“I know, it’s hard — I’m a face-toucher,” she joked.
Anchorage School District Chief Operations Officer Tom Roth also attended the meeting, telling people the district had no plans to close schools despite a wave of closures happening in districts Outside. But both Roth and Zink said the situation was unfolding rapidly as officials monitored the continuing spread of the virus in the Lower-48. That same day, the first death from the virus was reported in a Washington man.
Less than two weeks after the town hall meeting in Chugiak, things were very different in Anchorage. On March 12, city officials held a press conference inside the bunker-like Emergency Operations Center at the edge of downtown.
There, Berkowitz said he was declaring an emergency and ASD Superintendent Dr. Deena Bishop said schools would be closed for at least a week following the conclusion of spring break. The mayor said he was confident Anchorage residents would be able to get through whatever the virus could throw at them.
“We live in a strong state. We know how to deal with adversity. We know how to be prepared. This is going to be a challenge for us but I have absolute confidence that we can do great things.”
Berkowitz’s philosophy would remain the same throughout his time leading the city as the virus progressed. Anchorage was among the first cities in Alaska to impose indoor dining restrictions, Berkowitz ordered an extended “hunker down phase in the spring” and in June, Berkowitz imposed a mask mandate that drew particular scorn from his critics.
A Facebook group called “Save Anchorage” was formed to oppose the mayor’s mandates, and rolling vehicle rallies were held throughout the summer to oppose the municipality’s coronavirus mitigation efforts.
But case numbers remained relatively low in Alaska, and the mayor remained steadfast in his belief that the strict measures were warranted.
“I want to make sure that the public is aware the mask order is something that is a burden on all of us. But you measure of potential harm of allowing COVID to spread in our community against the inconvenience of masking up,” he told the Anchorage Daily News.
At that point, Anchorage had just 174 active cases of the coronavirus.
Berkowitz would not remain in office long enough to see his policies through to completion.
In October, local TV news anchor Maria Athens accused Berkowitz of having an inappropriate relationship with her, and posted a photo of a man’s rear end to social media — claiming the backside belonged to Berkowitz. The mayor initially denied the allegations, but two days later he stepped aside after admitting to texting Athens.
He hasn’t been heard from publicly since.
Assembly member Austin Quinn-Davidson was appointed to serve out the rest of the mayor’s term, and her policies have not been dissimilar to those of her predecessor.
Under Quinn-Davidson, Anchorage’s mask mandate has remained in place, restrictions on indoor gatherings have been imposed and the city has remained relatively free from disease. Anchorage reached its peak number of cases in mid November with more than 400 new cases per day, but that number dropped rapidly and has been in the double digits for most of 2021.
While his initial emergency declaration preceded Anchorage’s by a day, Dunleavy’s handling of the pandemic has been more hands off than that of city officials. Though he supported mask wearing publicly, the first-term governor consistently rejected calls to restrict businesses or issue mask mandates, saying those are decisions best left to local leaders.
“He cannot and will not overstep local control,” read a Nov. 17 memo from the governor’s office.
That stance rankled local leaders, who said they, too, could not impose mask mandates on their citizens.
“We just don’t have the authority,” Kenai Peninsula Borough Attorney Colette Thompson told the ADN in November.
Dunleavy’s position was made tricky by his support base, which is made up heavily by conservatives from areas outside of Anchorage such as the Kenai Peninsula and his home of Wasilla. Those folks have been against coronavirus mitigation efforts from the beginning, leaving Anchorage as an island of mask-wearing in an otherwise anti-mask state.
That opposition was spearheaded by none other than Sen. Reinbold, a Republican who represents Chugiak-Eagle River in the Alaska Legislature and who would become one of the leading voices in opposition to state and local mandates as the pandemic wore on.
Reinbold’s public protestations — the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee repeatedly held hearings where she questioned mask mandates — drew the ire of Alaska’s Republican governor, who sent her an extraordinary letter last month admonishing her for her continued questioning of coronavirus mitigation measures.
Reinbold’s efforts came to a head earlier this week, when her continued flaunting of Senate rules got her barred from the state Capitol in Juneau.
But Dunleavy’s policies have also resulted in praise, and Dr. Zink has shot to national prominence for her handling of the pandemic. The 43-year-old, Stanford-educated doctor was featured in the New York Times after Alaska’s cases remained low despite rising numbers elsewhere in the country.
Zink embraced her role as the state’s coronavirus messenger, and Dunleavy was happy to step aside and let her run point as Zink tweeted and zoomed her way into Alaska consciousness. Her consistent message of social distancing, hand-washing, empathy and patience became a hallmark of the state’s handling of the outbreak.
“She’s intelligent and capable and well-mannered and thoughtful and that expression of caring comes out in every interaction you ever have with her,” Dr. David Scordino, a medical director at Alaska Regional Hospital, told the Associated Press.
Alaska’s economy has suffered more than most during the past 12 months. Cruise ships have disappeared, tourists are an endangered species and dozens or even hundreds of businesses have closed and will never reopen. Anchorage’s downtown was particularly sleepy last weekend after the annual Iditarod Trail Sled Dog cancelled its annual ceremonial run through the city’s streets and trails.
But there are signs of life. Dunleavy has created an Economic Stability Team to help the state emerge from the disaster, and Anchorage officials have recently relaxed restrictions on indoor gatherings. After a year away, students are now returning to their classrooms.
The coronavirus pandemic that has ravaged other areas of the United States has had an unquestioned impact on the economy of Anchorage and Alaska. But the virus has not extracted the same physical and emotional toll as in other places. As of this week, Alaska had the third-lowest rate of Covid-19 deaths in the nation and the third highest rate of testing. And so far just 301 Alaskans have died with the virus — the fewest of any state other than Vermont.
And perhaps the best news of all came earlier this week when the state announced anyone over the age of 16 who wants a vaccine can now get one. Dunleavy — who himself recovered from the disease in February — called the vaccine news “a game changer.”
“A healthy community means a healthy economy,” he said.
The news came after Alaska vaulted to the top of the list of states with the highest vaccination rates, in part due to a rapid and widespread campaign by Alaska Native health groups such as the Southcentral Foundation.
As Alaska looks back on the first days of the pandemic, it now appears the hopefulness of those first press conferences may soon be realized. It will be years before the full impact of the coronavirus is known, and perhaps the reasons for Alaska’s successes never fully understood.
But it’s clear that the efforts of local and state leaders have at least contributed to a flattening of the coronavirus curve not seen elsewhere. In the end, the lessons learned from politicians’ response to the outbreak may not lie in who receives fault or credit, but in how the conflicts that hindered and shaped governmental responses were often themselves the main impediments to action.
As for the Birchwood Community Council…the local electric utility eventually agreed to redesign the proposed substation in response to community concerns about light and noise pollution.
The council now meets over Zoom.
Matt Tunseth is a freelance writer from Anchorage, Alaska. He previously worked as editor of the Chugiak-Eagle River Star and as a reporter for the Anchorage Daily News.
