JUNEAU -- No Alaskan has ever taken the path taken by Byron Mallott -- either in life or in securing and then giving up his party's nomination for governor only to step back and become Alaska's lieutenant governor.
Now, Mallott and Gov. Bill Walker are promising that he's also going to be a lieutenant governor like none Alaska has ever seen before.
That was first obvious during Mallott's inauguration, when he doffed his coat and tie and highlighted his Tlingit heritage by being sworn in wearing clan regalia from his home village of Yakutat.
But Walker says what's equally important will be the unusual "partnership" between the state's top two executive officers and the prominent role the lieutenant governor will play in his administration.
That may be a dramatic change from past administrations, in which lieutenant governors' small roles sometimes were the stuff of jokes about having so little to do that they spent most of their time sitting back with their feet on the desk.
Former Gov. Sean Parnell sometimes communicated with then-Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell by testy memo when he thought Treadwell was taking too big a role in the administration. That was despite Parnell's offices being just down the hall from Treadwell's offices at the other end of the Capitol's third floor.
Walker says office locations will be an important indicator of Mallott's non-traditional role.
"The lieutenant governor's (official) suite of offices is at the far end of the third floor. Now, he has an office right next to mine," Walker said.
From that office, it will be the job of Mallott, a Democrat, to advocate for what he thinks is important. For Walker, who had long been a Republican before changing his registration to run an independent candidacy, that may mean everyone moderating their positions on behalf of the state.
"We're going to help Alaskans understand that it's OK to work together. It's OK to both be pulling on the same end of the rope," he said.
Exactly how that team approach will work and how it will respond to challenges and conflicts has yet to be seen. Mallott has said that when he stepped back from his quest for the state's highest office, it meant that Walker would be governor and would have the final say. But he said he wouldn't have supported Walker if he didn't have confidence in him doing what's right.
"I have come to know him so well. I have come to believe in him as one who has a powerful vision of our our state, one who has the utmost integrity, one who cares to the core of his being about creating opportunity for every single Alaskan," Mallott said.
Former Lt. Gov. Treadwell said recognition that Walker is ultimately in charge is important, even if Mallott does play an expanded role.
"You can only have one governor at a time," said Treadwell, whose term as lieutenant governor ended Dec. 1. "Structurally, the office of the governor is such that the governor can delegate decision-making on a certain set of issues, but the buck stops with the governor." Treadwell did not seek re-election, instead making a failed bid for the Republican U.S. Senate nomination eventually won by Dan Sullivan.
But Treadwell praised the decision to give Mallott his own office within the governor's suite of offices, along with access to Walker's personal office through a side door. Mallott's office will actually be closer to Walker's office than chief of staff Jim Whitaker's.
That's important, Treadwell said, if Mallott is to be involved in a meaningful way.
"Proximity to the governor or knowing when an issue is coming up is very helpful because you can weigh in when it matters," Treadwell said.
Walker's statements about working as a team with Mallott and having his office nearby were made at a tribal gathering in Juneau. One of Mallott's goals in the new administration is to ensure that all Alaskans' needs are served by their state government, no matter where they live.
Mallott currently lives in Juneau, where he's held such prominent jobs as mayor, executive director of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. and chairman and CEO of Sealaska Corp., Southeast Alaska's regional Native corporation.
But Mallott also hasn't forgotten his background in Yakutat, where he grew up during World War II with a mother who baked bread in her kitchen and sold it to other village residents. Family entrepreneurial spirit wound up turning that bread-baking business and a spare room into a store for the village.
Later, after the sudden death of his father, Mallott returned from school to Yakutat, where he followed in his father's footsteps as mayor, at 22 years old. In later jobs he increased his ties to other parts of rural Alaska, including as a director of RurAL CAP and as Gov. Bill Egan's local affairs director.
While becoming involved in Native land claims settlements, and later Native corporation management, Mallott continued to fish commercially out of Yakutat. Now one son continues to fish that permit while another serves as president of Sealaska. Mallott stepped down from Sealaska's board to run for governor.
That history was highlighted at the inauguration, where Mallott said he was honored to be able to wear his distinctive clan regalia, a tunic that had been made for him by his sister and other female clan members more than 20 years ago for a nephew's memorial potlatch.
With the tunic, Mallott wore a hat representing the Tlingit Raven moiety that was given to him by Sealaska Heritage Institute in honor of Walter Soboleff, a Raven leader who died in 2011. Mallott is also a member of the Raven clan.
Mallott called the opportunity for an Alaska Native to wear the clan regalia while being sworn in "pretty special."
"(To) symbolize the incredible richness and history of this wonderful state was an opportunity I was not going to pass up," Mallott said.
The Walker and Mallott team also has another first of its own, Mallott said: Interior-born Walker and Southeast-born Mallott are the state's first-ever all-Alaska-born governor and lieutenant governor team.
"If we mess up, we have nowhere to go. So we can't and we won't," he said.