Ethics board finds one line in school district bond video violated city code

The Anchorage Board of Ethics has concluded that one statement in an Anchorage School District video about last spring's school bond was political activity that violated the city's ethics code. The board approved its decision Thursday, Oct. 1, and recommended no further corrective action.

The complaint, filed before the April 7 election, accused Superintendent Jharrett Bryantt and Chief Operating Officer Jim Anderson of using municipal resources to promote Proposition 1, a nearly $79.5 million school bond. The board, which reviews alleged violations of the city's ethics code, voted April 2 to accept the complaint and heard from the complainant and the district's lawyers April 21. The final decision does not name the complainant.

The board dismissed the complaint against Bryantt. According to respondents' counsel, he did not authorize or approve the video, participate in making it or see it before it was shown at a Chamber of Commerce meeting. The board emphasized that the ethics code holds individual public servants responsible rather than treating a municipal department or the school district itself as the violator.

The board's finding concerns one sentence from Anderson: "So while this bond in aggregate is almost 80 million dollars, the state is going to pay nearly 40 million dollars of that, making this the cheapest bond to Anchorage taxpayers in well more than a decade."

The board found that statement presented state reimbursement as certain, even though it depended on annual legislative appropriations and remained subject to a governor's veto or other legislative action. The ballot language estimated an annual property-tax increase of $7.62 per $100,000 of assessed value if the state fully reimbursed the eligible debt. Without reimbursement, the estimated increase was $15.43 per $100,000. The board said Anderson's statement both omitted that uncertainty and made the bond more appealing by comparing its cost with earlier bonds.

Most of the video, including explanations of roof repairs and a proposed security vestibule, qualified as neutral education about what the bond would fund, the board said. The video remains on ASD's YouTube channel.

Counsel for the respondents argued that the complaint implicated free-speech rights, that ambiguity in the ethics code should be construed in the employees' favor, that the municipality had limited authority over school district operations and that the video served an educational purpose. Counsel also noted that the video never expressly asked viewers to support the bond.

The board rejected the argument that a public employee must explicitly tell people how to vote before a message can qualify as political activity. It said the municipal code expressly applies to school district employees, and that it had no authority to decide the respondents' First Amendment rights. The complaint concerned the use of municipal resources, the board said, not either employee's ability to speak personally without those resources.

The production itself was modest, according to the account provided by respondents' counsel. A communications employee filmed the video on an iPhone, used stock drone footage and spent no more than two days of employee time producing it. The district did not hire an outside production company or pay for advertising or social-media placement. Even that limited use mattered under the code, the board said, because municipal resources include employee time and equipment and cannot be used for political activity unless a specific exception applies.

The board recommended greater vigilance around future bond communications. It also suggested that departments planning a public-awareness campaign ask the Assembly to identify the campaign and its proposed cost in the ordinance authorizing the bond. The ordinance that put this bond on the ballot did not mention or authorize such a campaign, the board noted. That recommendation is guidance, not a new requirement imposed in the decision.

The opinion leaves one significant boundary unresolved. Anchorage's ethics code gives the superintendent and certain elected officials wider latitude to support or oppose municipal ballot measures while making limited use of public resources. The complainant asked the board to say how far that exception reaches. Because the superintendent neither approved the video nor designated someone to present the superintendent's views, the board did not decide whether a prerecorded video or social-media message could qualify for that exception.

Voters rejected Proposition 1, 33,207 to 32,657, a 550-vote margin, according to the municipality's official 2026 election-results archive.

The final opinion is dated Sept. 23, but the board's approved minutes say it lacked a quorum that day and no business could proceed. Draft minutes from Oct. 1 show four members voting to approve and disseminate the opinion.