Wasilla Prepares for Life After Palin

Moose Bites, a catering outfit that specializes in Cajun dishes such as chicken and sausage gumbo, was named Business of the Week at a recent Chamber of Commerce luncheon in Wasilla, Alaska. The exclusive event, which takes place every Tuesday at the Grand View Inn & Suites, just off East Parks Highway, draws the most important people in this town of 10,000: the mayor, state senators, small business owners, and others who just want to network. Nearly everyone at the Grand View—a pharmacist, a fitness club manager, a member of a prominent rockabilly band—said they were there simply to meet other VIPs. That’s because Wasilla, once famous for being the home of Sarah Palin, is scurrying to forge a post-Palin identity now that the onetime mayor and Alaska governor appears to have deserted politics—and the city—in favor of bus tours, Fox News, Twitter, reality television, and big-money book deals.

Hoping to avoid the fates of Hope, Ark., Plains, Ga., and other Presidential hometown backwaters that briefly garnered national attention merely to return to being backwaters, Wasilla is in the midst of a rebranding campaign. The city’s elite are hoping to jettison their hockey mom, lock ’n’ load image in favor of a yuppified bedroom community. That’s why the town is lobbying for a $715 million bridge that would link Wasilla and Anchorage, slicing the one-hour trip in half and jacking up real estate prices. And it’s why Mayor Verne Rupright, a chain-smoking ex-U.S. Air Force medic with the manner of Boss Tweed, is considering the development of an historic district that would feature antique shops, art galleries, and cultural exhibits about things like Eskimos and the Iditarod dog-sled race. And it’s why Paul Villnerve, who co-owns Moose Bites with his wife, Janice, recently decamped to Wasilla from New Orleans to offer “palate-specific personal meals” for $350 per week. “Once we get that bridge, in 20 or 30 years, we’ll be San Francisco,” says Mayor Rupright. Then he gestures toward Anchorage. “And that’ll be Oakland.”