After nearly a year without a permanent municipal attorney, Mayor Dave Bronson’s latest pick for the job appears likely to be confirmed by the Anchorage Assembly.
Anne Helzer, who served in an acting role since Bronson hired her in mid-February, cleared a crucial hurdle with a Thursday hearing before the Anchorage Assembly, which will vote on her confirmation at its April 11 regular meeting.
City law dictates that top executive roles within Anchorage city government, like the municipal attorney, are chosen by the mayor but must be confirmed by a vote of the Assembly. Confirmation hearings precede the Assembly’s vote and offer an opportunity for Assembly members to ask questions of nominees, including any concerns.
Assembly members Kevin Cross and Pete Peterson voiced support for Helzer’s confirmation during the hearing. After, Assembly member Austin Quinn-Davidson said it was her sense that Helzer would be confirmed.
“Given the approach of our current mayor and the many departures we’ve seen from the legal department, I think we are fortunate to have someone like Ms. Helzer interested in serving,” Quinn-Davidson said.
Assembly member Daniel Volland praised Helzer and said he would be “inclined to vote in favor of her confirmation.”
Helzer is a New York native and registered Republican who moved to Anchorage in 2008 and founded her private practice, Helzer Law LLC, in 2011. Beginning in 2017, Helzer was appointed by then-Gov. Bill Walker to a five-year term on the Alaska Public Offices Commission, which oversees compliance with the state’s campaign finance laws. In 2020, Gov. Mike Dunleavy appointed Helzer to the Alaska Violent Crimes Compensation Board and her term expired in March.
If confirmed, Helzer would be the fourth municipal attorney to serve during Bronson’s tenure, and the second to be confirmed. After nearly a year in the role, Bronson’s first municipal attorney, Patrick Bergt, resigned in June 2022.
Bronson then appointed Mario Bird, who had represented a group of Anchorage residents in a lawsuit against the municipality and the Assembly in 2020 for closing Assembly meetings to in-person participation during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Bird failed confirmation in September 2022.
Bronson then appointed Blair Christensen, a veteran of the city’s law department, as acting municipal attorney. In late January, Christensen resigned after a tumultuous month of allegations and resignations following Bronson’s firing of Amy Demboski, his first municipal manager.
In Helzer’s opening statement at the confirmation hearing, she promised to work for the good of the entire municipality and to insist on accountability and competence.
“I will cultivate a respectful, collaborative, professional workplace with integrity and excellence, and a place where trust can exist,” she said. “I hope that with these values, we can work together to bridge any gaps, with full confidence that we can provide the citizens of Anchorage with competence in their local government.”
Several Assembly members asked Helzer how she would navigate allegations of corruption and law-breaking within the Bronson administration, and conflict between the administration and Assembly.
“I would be concerned, myself, taking this job, that I would be put in an uncomfortable position or I would be asked to do things that were illegal or inappropriate,” Quinn-Davidson said, before asking Helzer why she wanted to accept the job.
Helzer responded that she was a public servant and a “reasonable and caring attorney” that could do something about all the allegations of wrongdoing by the administration, before assuring the Assembly that she would not be a party to unethical behavior. Helzer said her options were either to stand idly by and read the news, or take the job and do something about it.
“I will say I did not need this job,” Helzer said “I have a very thriving, very well-respected and happy practice, and I can always go back to that, and I was aware of that. So if things got to a point where I would have to make a tough decision such as to resign because somebody was asking me to do something uncomfortable, if that situation occurred, I have no problem, I go right back to what I was doing.”
