Hmm, thanks for that explanation. I've been wondering. Hopefully I'll be awake enough to comprehend it tomorrow.
Region 1 is the southern area, including House districts 1-5 in the panhandle, and 33-36 south of Angchorage (Kenai Peninsula, Kodiak Island, mainland Aleutian Peninsula).
1819 R1 early votes were cast for president, and they show up in the district count for all 9 districts. But if you look at the R1 early votes for state house they vary greatly by district and they
total 1819. These were cast at the regional office in Juneau and 95.9% were for the two Juneau house districts. 3.8% were for the other 3 panhandle districts, and 0.3% (5 votes) for the 4 districts south of Anchorage.
So when people voted early at the regional office, they had the ballot for their house district, but for some reason their presidential votes went into a regionwide pool. Perhaps they used paper ballots, and then gave voters separate ballots for their house race, senate race (in 1/2 the districts), judicial districts, and statewide races.
Note there is a similar pattern for the other 3 regions. Region 2 is districts 13-32 in the Anchorage area and to the north. Most of the early votes were in the Anchorage districts. Region 3 is districts 6-12 in the interior, with most early votes in the Fairbanks districts. Region 4 is districts 37-40 on the west and north coasts. Only 94 regional votes were cast in Nome, and 90 of these were from the district that included Nome.
The totals that I used represent between 84% and 99.9% of the votes cast by district.
For the 2006 election, the early votes were broken out by district, so the elections division must have responded to complaints.