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Alaska (KTUU) – The Anchorage Assembly voted 5-6 Tuesday night to reject a resolution that would have launched formal removal proceedings against East Anchorage Member George Martinez, ending — at least for now — a months-long campaign to oust a sitting elected official over disputed travel expenses and financial disclosure questions
The outcome capped a contentious, hours-long meeting in which members clashed not only over Martinez’s conduct, but over whether the accusations against him were themselves built on a complete and honest record
The push to oust Martinez began in early July, when Assembly Members Jared Goecker and Donald Handeland introduced AR 2026-192, a resolution that would have initiated removal proceedings under Anchorage Municipal Code Section 2.70.030. The measure alleged Martinez used taxpayer-funded travel to accumulate personal airline rewards and that some of those trips may have overlapped with private business activity. It also questioned whether he had properly disclosed his work as an adjunct professor and his ownership stake in a company called Consoach LLC.
Martinez denied wrongdoing from the start
“The civil APOC matter has been adjudicated and resolved, and I’ve fully complied with the Commission’s order,” he said in a statement to Alaska’s Newsor legitimate legislative purposes, and, to the best of my knowledge, I am in compliance with all applicable reporting and disclosure requirements.”
The Assembly censured Martinez at its July 21 meeting, a formal rebuke short of removal, and delayed the removal vote to Tuesday, Aug. 4
Tuesday’s debate quickly turned into a fight over the facts themselves
Assembly Member Yarrow Silvers, who said she was “not here to defend Member Martinez,” told the body she had reviewed the full travel documents and found that the stated reason for a trip to New York was a meeting with the city’s founding nightlife mayor, context she said had been omitted from public statements and the accusation document alike
“A narrative has been formed that is very disappointing on the basis of an incomplete and misrepresented record that I believe has damaged the credibility of the accuser,” Silvers said
Handeland pushed back sharply. He said the accusation documents were prepared with legal assistance and that the travel request email explicitly listed the International Conference on Extreme Tourism Activities as a reason for the New York trip. He added that the assembly had verified the conference did not actually take place on the date Martinez claimed to have attended it
“We have verified proof that conference did not occur on the 27th,” Handeland said. “He was in New York for that conference in a hotel room, who knows what was happening. And then he submitted a record sitting there saying that how great this conference was. He put that on the official record.”
The resolution also scrutinized a separate trip to Puerto Rico, which the resolution said lasted 10 days, double the length of the five-day conference it was tied to
Vice Chair Daniel Volland pressed the municipal attorney’s office on whether the body could itself be acting on flawed information. He asked whether assembly members who make false or misleading public statements could be held to the same removal standard being applied to Martinez
Attorneys said they did not believe that standard applied to public communications, citing wide legislative latitude and potential First Amendment concerns, though they acknowledged the question was being answered in real time and without full deliberation
The assembly attorney who drafted the original accusation document confirmed it was based solely on evidence provided by the sponsoring members. No independent corroboration of the facts was conducted before the document was filed
The municipal attorney’s office separately disclosed it had done its own preliminary review of publicly available records and had “further questions,” but declined to elaborate
Before the final vote, the body worked through a tangle of amendments. Silvers introduced a two-part amendment requiring the municipal attorney to first conduct a preliminary factual review before any full investigation could proceed. That amendment passed unanimously, 11-0
A subsequent amendment by Member Erin Baldwin Day sought to strip the resolution of its subpoena powers and records preservation requirements, leaving only the preliminary review. Critics of the amendment argued that stripping those tools would leave investigators without the power to do the job
Another amendment briefly turned the proceedings on their head. It named Handeland directly, calling for scrutiny of his public statements and social media posts related to the Martinez accusations. The moment it was introduced, attorneys ruled that because the amendment named him personally, Handeland had a substantial conflict of interest. He was directed to step away from the dais
The amendment drew an immediate and fierce response from Goecker, who warned of the consequences beyond the chamber
“What about the chilling effect this is going to have on other whistleblowers here in the city?” he said
Handeland asked before leaving whether he would still be allowed to speak. Attorneys said yes. But before debate could even begin, the amendment was withdrawn entirely, Handeland returned to his seat, the conflict dissolved, and the body moved on. It had lasted only minutes
Baldwin Day delivered one of the night’s most pointed speeches against the resolution, arguing that the facts in dispute did not clear the bar for removal
“None of what we are actually factually talking about here tonight rises to a threshold that I would consider egregious enough to warrant removing, actively deciding as a body that we would remove a sitting member,” she said
She warned that the removal path “ultimately means a functional override of the will of the voting public.”
Volland acknowledged he had previously signaled support for the resolution, but said Tuesday’s disclosures had changed his position. “I no longer believe the accusation document,” he said. “Knowing what I know now, I think it is flawed.”
When the final vote came, the resolution fell two votes short of passage. A motion to reconsider the vote then failed 3-8, signaling the assembly did not plan to revisit the resolution immediately
Assembly Chair Anna Brawley confirmed Tuesday that she had commissioned an expedited internal review of all member travel between January 2025 and April 2026 to examine whether approval procedures were followed
The defeat does not preclude future action. Under city code, removal proceedings can be initiated by a majority vote of the full assembly or a referral from the municipal Board of Ethics
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