KAKM's handling of Traini on Wednesday's "Running"

I'm not a Dick Traini fan. I'm far, far from it. But KAKM's last minute, uh - let's make that last second - decision to exclude him from yesterday evening's Running debates was wrong. Flat wrong.

Traini has served part of a term and a full term on the Municipality of Anchorage Assembly. He filed for another full term. The MOA determined he was a legal candidate, placing his name on the April ballot. A constituent sued in Superior Court, objecting to Traini's inclusion, winning the suit. Traini has appealed to the Alaska Supreme Court, which will hear the case very soon.

Kyle Hopkins posted an item at the ADN Politics Blog yesterday evening, soon after Traini was banned. Apparently, Traini was scripted into the seating chart, and Traini's opponent for the seat, Elvi Gray-Jackson, was expecting Traini to appear on the set with her. But he was kept off stage by KAKM staff. Here's a description of the backstage scene from the ADN Political blog's comments:

I was in the green room at KAKM before the Midtown debate started. A KAKM employee came in a couple minutes before it was to start and showed Elvi the seating chart of where she and Traini would sit. Elvi went in not knowing she would not have an opponent to debate. I watched that debate in the green room with Mike Guitierez and Steve Pratt, and we were stunned to see Elvi have to debate herself because we knew Traini had been in the building. Talking to Elvi afterword it sounds like she didn't know that Traini had been banned, and was assuming he backed out at the last minute. It must have been a very last minute decision and was very bizarre.

Should Traini be judged by the Supreme Court to be ineligible, his appearance yesterday, had it been allowed, would be moot. But should he be deemed eligible, his absence from the forum cannot be remedied.