Lisa Phu

Gov. Bill Walker has appointed Juneau Assemblyman Loren Jones to the state’s new Marijuana Control Board.

The body is tasked with developing regulations covering aspects of marijuana cultivation, processing and commercial sale. Board members represent the public health and public safety sectors, the marijuana industry and rural Alaska.

A press release says Jones was appointed to the public health seat for his long history in the substance abuse and mental health fields. He has also served as the director of the Alaska Division of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, which is now part of the Division of Behavioral Health.

The rest of the five-person board is made up of men from Anchorage, Fairbanks, Bethel and Soldotna:

• Peter Mlynarik of Soldotna fills the public safety seat. Mlynarik has been the chief of police in Soldotna since 2012 and spent over 20 years with the Alaska State Troopers.
• Mark Springer from Bethel was appointed to the rural seat. He’s a Bethel City Council member and is active with the Alaska Municipal League.
• Bruce Schulte from Anchorage fills one of the industry seats. Schulte has been a spokesman for both the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol and the Coalition for Responsible Cannabis Legislation.
• Walker appointed Brandon Emmett from Fairbanks to the other seat representing the marijuana industry. He’s the executive director for the Coalition for Responsible Cannabis Legislation and is actively involved with a Fairbanks borough marijuana work group.

The Taku River is rising quickly due to a dam release of the Tulsequah Glacier.

Pilots in British Columbia reported seeing water from Lake No Lake located along the glacier beginning to drain.

“There’s a certain amount of water that builds up within these lakes, which is being held back by these glaciers, and once there’s a certain amount of pressure, it actually lifts up the glacier and water is able to start flowing underneath the glacier,” says Aaron Jacobs, hydrologist with the National Weather Service.

The glacier dam release produces a constant flow of water into the Tulsequah River, which is a tributary off the Taku.

As of 2 p.m., the river was at 38.3 feet and is expected to rise another 4.5 feet, just below minor flood stage, by late tomorrow morning.

Even though there’s no flood warning, vessels traveling on the Taku should be careful.

“It’s still going to be treacherous for people who are traversing up and down the Taku River especially on the start of the holiday weekend where there will be debris coming down the river, potentially some ice, and that can cause some havoc along the river if you’re not aware of it or you’re not paying attention,” Jacobs says.

Water temperature of the Taku River is also dropping.

Jacobs says once the lake is drained and the river crests, the Taku will drop to its normal level of about 38 feet by Thursday evening.

When the Supreme Court legalized same sex marriage nationwide last week, President Obama called the ruling “a consequence of the countless small acts of courage of millions of people across decades who stood up.”

Mildred Boesser stood 5 feet tall, and she was one of those people. On the day of the ruling, Boesser was on her deathbed at home in Juneau, surrounded by family.

“Friday she was still up and in the chair and talking and holding court and doing well,” says Sara Boesser, Mildred’s daughter. “But she was ready to go and she said, ‘Why am I still here? Why am I still here? I am ready.’ And then the Supreme Court ruling came through and she said, ‘That’s why I’m still here,’ and she was so happy.”

The wife of an Episcopalian minister, Mildred spent decades fighting for gay rights and marriage equality. Just last year, she testified to the legislature in support of a bill that would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

“For the record, I’m 88 years old. I’ve lived in Alaska since 1959. I’ve been married for 65 years to the same man and together we’ve raised four children. I’m also a Christian and my faith informs what I do,” Mildred said. “I can’t begin to tell you how saddened I am by the fact that in this great state I love so dearly, a person can be fired legally from a job, evicted from housing, denied credit or financing simply because of whom they happen to love.”

Mildred’s advocacy work stemmed from her daughter Sara.

Sara recounts her mother visiting her while she was a senior at the University of Washington in Seattle. It was the early 1970s.

“I was working at a bookstore called Madwomen Bookstore downtown and it had a lot of feminist and progressive and some lesbian books,” Sara says.

As they were leaving the store, Sara decided at that moment to tell her mother:

“At the crosswalk, light hit green and we started across the crosswalk. I said, ‘Mom, did you know that I’m a lesbian?’ She kind of kept going and she looked at me and said, ‘No, but I’m glad you told me, but that doesn’t change anything about what I feel for you.’ And we got across the crosswalk.”

Throughout the years, Mildred spoke up in the State Capitol Building, in city halls across Alaska and knocked on doors in support of gay rights. Sara says her mother never missed an opportunity to testify in the Capitol, even when Sara herself was discouraged.

“At some point it became too difficult for me to go back to those same legislators and tell them again that we are no threat. I couldn’t do it anymore,” Sara says. “And my mother still would. She wouldn’t even sometimes tell me she’d done it and then I read about it in the paper and think, ‘Wow, way to go Mildred.’”

Liz Dodd is a close family friend. She worked alongside Mildred in 1998 against the state constitutional amendment that defined marriage as between a man and a woman. Dodd says the hearings were antagonistic and she recalls times when lawmakers were rude.

“You would have this bank of legislators sitting around their little dais there and little Mildred at the table in front of them, soft spoken, just preaching love basically,” Dodd says.

Sara Boesser was honored to be Mildred’s daughter.

“People would stop me on the street always and say, ‘I love your mother. She’s my surrogate mother. She’s my grandmother. She’s a mother to us all.’ I was always very proud of her,” Sara says.

The respect was mutual, says Dodd. Dodd recounts her last conversation with Mildred.

“She started to talk about Sara and how Sara was her hero and how Sara inspired her and made her stronger,” Dodd says. “And she said, ‘I had brought this person into the world and then all through the years, I’ve watched her in absolute amazement at who she is.'”

After the Supreme Court ruling, Sara announced to her mother and father that she and her partner of four years are getting married.

“The last day that she was alive, she said, ‘I’m sorry I’m going to miss your wedding.’ I said, ‘Oh, don’t worry mom. You’re my first invitee and you’re going to be there with us, don’t you worry,'” Sara says.

Mildred Boesser passed away at age 90 on June 29, 2015. She is survived by her husband Mark, her four daughters and countless others who considered Mildred their mother.

The University of Alaska Southeast campus in Juneau goes completely smoke-free on Wednesday.

UAS will join thousands of colleges nationwide with similar policies banning tobacco use by students, staff and visitors.

No more cigarette, e-cigarette or hookah breaks between classes; the ban applies to all tobacco products. Anyone looking for a nicotine fix will have to leave campus to get it.

The ban is part of a university-wide policy approved in December by the Board of Regents.

The University of Alaska is not alone in adopting a tobacco-free policy. Institutions of higher learning have been banning tobacco on their campuses for years.

UAS Vice Chancellor of Administration Michael Ciri has been following the issue. He says the university is entering the discussion somewhat late.

“But I don’t necessarily think that is a bad thing,” Ciri says. “We were able to learn a lot from other universities that drafted smoke-free policies and, I think, have a better policy for that.”

The regents’ decision to make all University of Alaska campuses tobacco free was primarily to reduce employee healthcare costs.

“When there’s smoking-related illnesses, that is a real, actual cost borne by the University of Alaska. If we pay for fewer employee-related health issues, that provides an immediate savings to the institution,” Ciri says.

The smoking ban will apply to all university property and buildings. Ciri says UAS Facilities Services has been surveying campus to create a simple graphical map.

“We need to be very clear about, OK, actually the property line is right there because if I were a smoker and I am willing to comply with the letter of the law, what I would want to know is, specifically, where’s your property line? Because I’ll stand right on the other side of it,” Ciri says.

Some students have already voiced concern about the university’s enforcement plan, or lack thereof. Like graduating senior Trevor Luedke:

“I think it’s going to be impossible to enforce.”

Administrators admit that enforcement will depend on “the consideration and cooperation of both users and non-users of tobacco.”

In other words, Ciri says, no one will be tasked with enforcing the new policy.

“There’s not going to be a smoking czar or the smoking police going around with little seltzer bottles, hitting people,” Ciri says laughing.

However, Ciri points out that the smoking ban is just one of many conduct policies students are asked to observe. The expectation is that people are going to be courteous.

A Juneau neighborhood association has taken its fight against a transitional home for just-released female inmates to court.

The Tall Timbers Neighborhood Association filed an appeal against the Juneau Planning Commission and Haven House in Superior Court June 19.

In the appeal notice, the neighborhood association contends the planning commission made a mistake in granting Haven House a permit to be located on Malissa Drive in the Mendenhall Valley. Before taking the matter to the court, Tall Timbers had appealed to the Juneau Assembly in May and lost.

June Degnan is board chair of Haven House, a faith-based nonprofit.

“They’re exercising their legal right so if that’s the game they’re willing to play, then I’m willing to continue to defend women and do the right thing as is my board,” Degnan says.

Haven House provides a structured living situation for women transitioning out of prison. It opened in April and has two residents.

Court appeal aside, city officials are in the process of changing city code to clarify what transitional housing is and where it can go.

City Attorney Amy Mead says the ordinance amendment could make the Tall Timbers’ argument moot, even if it won the appeal.

“It would not require Haven House to leave because if this ordinance passes then Haven House is properly in a D5 with a conditional use permit, per this ordinance,” Mead says.

Tall Timbers’ lawyer could not be reached for comment by deadline.

The ordinance change was introduced during Monday night’s Juneau Assembly meeting and is scheduled for a public hearing July 20.

In a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court on Friday declared same-sex marriage legal in all 50 states. That means the status quo will remain in Alaska, where same-sex marriage was legalized in October.

But for Juneau raised performing artist Seneca Harper, the decision changes how he will feel while traveling in the Lower 48. He married his partner last year in Washington.

“It’s going to be nice to be able to visit more conservative areas of the country and say , ‘Oh I’m sorry, oh actually, I’m not sorry at all,’ and to unapologetically exist as who I am with my husband and hold his hand that has a ring on it and be proud of that,” Harper says.

Joshua Decker is the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Alaska. The ACLU led the first marriage equality case back in 1970 and they were plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case. He says the decision affirms that same-sex relationships need to be respected everywhere in the nation.

“We think when you look back on today in the future, today’s U.S. Supreme Court decision is going to be right up there with Brown v. the Board of Ed when the U.S. Supreme Court struck down segregation in the schools,” Decker says.

Former Lt. Gov. and state lawmaker Loren Leman says including Friday’s decision as a win for the civil rights movement is demeaning to minority groups, like black people and Alaska Natives, who he says, really needed civil rights protections.

As a senator, Leman led the 1998 effort to amend the Alaska Constitution to define marriage as between a man and a woman.

“I believe it was so important for Alaska to protect its definition of marriage, which was in statute, but to protect it in constitution,” Leman says. “Marriage has always throughout history been a union of a man and a woman and to change the definition to something else is a diminishment of the institution of marriage.”

In 1998, almost 70 percent of Alaska voters agreed with Leman. Pollsters found public opinion swinging for the first time in favor of same-sex marriage in 2014.

Juneau Republican Rep. Cathy Muñoz sponsored a bill last session that would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. She sees marriage equality as a step forward.

“It recognizes a basic right and I think that’s important. It’s progress,” Muñoz says. “I know that a number of people in our community will benefit and as a matter of fact, I look forward to attending a wedding in August and now that this decision has happened, I think they can have much more to celebrate.”

But there’s more work to do. Muñoz’s anti-discrimination bill wasn’t heard this year, but she hopes it’ll get a fair chance in the 2016 legislative session.