Alaska Native Arts & Culture

With two days left in this year’s legislative session, a key member of the Alaska Senate is questioning a bill that would make 20 Alaska Native languages official state languages.

Supporters say House Bill 216 is an important recognition of the work scholars and advocates are doing to save Alaska’s endangered indigenous languages.

But Senate Majority Leader John Coghill, R-North Pole, says he’s not sure if those languages should be elevated to the same level as English under state law. In the Senate State Affairs Committee on Friday, Coghill pointed to a 1998 voter initiative making English the official state language.

“It [the bill] puts all these other languages right in the middle of what that initiative was under official language,” Coghill said. “And it would probably be better, if we’re really going to honor them, to say those should be the ceremonial languages used in Alaska.”

In 2007, the Alaska Supreme Court struck down part of the voter initiative that required English to be used for all government business.

After running into similar questions in the House, HB 216 was amended to include a section clarifying that it does not require the state and local governments to conduct business in languages other than English.

But Coghill said he’s uncomfortable changing a law passed by voters. He offered an amendment to the bill that would create a ceremonial languages section in state law.

“I think we should honor them. I just didn’t know if that was the right place to put this language,” Coghill said.

Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, D-Sitka, is prime sponsor of HB 216. At a Senate State Affairs Committee hearing on Thursday, Kreiss-Tomkins explained why the bill is important to Native language advocates.

“There’s a statewide movement to prevent the extinction of Alaska Native languages and promote the revitalization of Native languages, and this recognition quite simply means the world to a lot of people,” Kreiss-Tomkins said. “I’m not normally one for symbolic bills. But I think if a symbolic bill can create a sense of energy and momentum and excitement, then the bill in a certain sense achieves its purpose.”

House Bill 216 passed out of the State  Affairs Committee on Friday without Coghill’s amendment. The bill could appear on the Senate floor as early as Saturday, where Coghill could bring the amendment back up.

Sens. Fred Dyson, R-Eagle River, and Dennis Egan, D-Juneau, are co-sponsors of the bill in the Senate.

HB 216 passed the House on Wednesday on a 38-0 vote.

The House of Representatives approved House Bill 216 on a 38-0 vote, sending it to the Senate, where it’s scheduled to be heard on Thursday by the State Affairs Committee.
Supporters clapped from the gallery as lawmakers pounded their desks in approval after House Speaker Mike Chenault announced the bill had passed.

Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, D-Sitka, said in a House floor speech that even if the bill is largely symbolic, it’s still important to honor Native languages.

Eyak is one of the languages recognized in this bill. The last fluent speaker of Eyak passed away five short years ago,” said Kreiss-Tomkins, HB 216’s prime sponsor. “There are several other languages that are on the brink, have just a handful of fluent speakers left in Alaska.”

Kreiss-Tomkins said he hopes to someday learn Tlingit, one of three indigenous languages in Southeast Alaska.

Rep. Charisse Millett, an Anchorage Republican and co-sponsor of the legislation, said she regrets she never asked her Inupiaq grandmother to teach her the language.

“She told me stories of fish camps, and told me stories of moving from town to town to live a subsistence lifestyle, picking berries,” Millett said. “But I never learned the language.”

Millett said she hopes recognizing the state’s original languages will empower young people to overcome the shame her grandmother and mother felt about being Alaska Native.

“To engage in conversation, learn the language, the heritage of their elders. Learn the stories of what Alaska was, so they know how to make Alaska a better place,” she said.

The legislature’s only fluent speaker of an Alaska Native language is Rep. Benjamin Nageak, D-Barrow, who delivered about half of his remarks in Inupiaq. Nageak said the bill acknowledges indigenous languages have been spoken in Alaska since before European contact.

“Most of our languages are still alive, and we need to continue to make sure that those languages thrive and survive,” he said.

After some Republicans on the House State Affairs Committee received HB 216 skeptically last month, a section was added to clarify that it does not require governments to conduct business in languages other than English − currently the only official state language.

Richard Peterson of Kasaan is the new president of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.

He was elected and sworn in Friday during the central council’s tribal assembly in Juneau.

Peterson told delegates he will work with everyone he can.

I don’t feel like I’m alone,” Peterson said. “I know that I have everybody holding me up.  I know that I can accomplish what we need, because I won’t be I. It’ll be we.”

Peterson takes over from Ed Thomas, central council president for 27 of the past 30 years.

Peterson previously served as a vice president of the organization’s executive council. He is also president of the Tribal Council for the Organized Village of Kasaan, on eastern Prince of Wales Island.

Delegates chose Peterson over candidates Ozzie Sheakley and Harold Houston of Juneau. He was elected by an overwhelming majority on the first vote. Central council elections usually require two or more ballots.

“Richard Peterson has worked hard for this position,” said Bill Martin, Alaska Native Brotherhood Grand Camp President and former central council president. “He’s an honest man and he has the highest integrity. And those are the things that we look for.”

The Tlingit-Haida central council is Southeast Alaska’s largest tribal organization. It provides education, housing, financial assistance, foster care and other programs to tribal members. It began in 1935.

Four people are running for president of Southeast’s largest tribal organization.

Tlingit-Haida Central Council delegates will make the choice during this week’s tribal assembly in Juneau.

Current President Ed Thomas has been in office for most of the past 30 years. He says the leadership change is a major topic for the meeting.

“I’m no longer going to be president. I’m not running. I’m not a candidate. So getting the next person ready is going to be very important, as well as selecting his support team on the executive council,” Thomas says.

Two of the candidates live in Juneau: William “Ozzie” Sheakley and Harold Houston. Richard Peterson is from Kasaan and Jacob Cabuag is from Seattle.

Eleven people are also running for six vice-president seats. Three of the four presidential candidates also plan to run if they don’t win Thomas’ position.

The Tlingit-Haida Central Council provides education, housing, financial assistance, foster care and other programs to tribal members. It began in 1935.

Delegates from 18 communities are attending the tribal assembly, which runs from April 9th to 12th at Juneau’s Elizabeth Peratrovich Hall. Sessions will be broadcast online via the council’s website.

Before he leaves office, Thomas wants to make a delegate-selection policy change.

He says more and more tribal members are moving to urban areas. The number of seats per community is based on population. And that’s upset the delegate balance.

“If the trends continue, whereby we’re having more urban (delegates), I think we’re going to lose voices from our villages. And they’re the ones that are probably more dependent of what we do than some of the people in the urban areas,” he says.

Thomas says only tribal members with confirmed addresses should be counted. More of those with bad addresses lived in urban areas at the last point of contact.

The assembly’s agenda includes former Southeast Sen. Albert Kookesh as keynote speaker. Delegates will also hear from central council agencies, as well as regional and statewide Native organizations.

A bill that would symbolically make 20 Alaska Native languages official state languages is heading to the House floor for a vote.

The House State Affairs Committee on Tuesday unanimously passed House Bill 216 from Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, D-Sitka, less than a week after some Republicans on the panel raised concerns about the bill’s potential ramifications.

Tlingit elder Selina Everson teared up during public testimony.

“Our language is our very being. It’s our culture,” Everson said. “We were brought up with such respect to each other, to the Tlingit people, the Haida people, the Tsimshian people, the Yup’ik, the whole state of Alaska with all the different languages being spoken. It would be an honor to be recognized.”

While English is the only official language of Alaska, the state Supreme Court in 2007 struck down part of a 1998 voter initiative requiring it to be used for all government business.

Last week, Republican Reps. Doug Isaacson of North Pole, and Lynn Gattis and Wes Keller of Wasilla, raised concerns that HB 216 would be misinterpreted by future legislatures or the courts. They worried that could lead to unintended consequences, such as ballots or legislation having to be printed in every official language.

A new version of the bill adopted at Tuesday’s hearing makes clear that the official designation for Alaska Native languages is only symbolic. But Lance Twitchell, a Native languages professor at the University of Alaska Southeast, said the bill means more than that to supporters.

“This is more than symbolic. This is historic,” Twitchell said.

He went on to reference two bills the state affairs committee passed last week while Isaacson, Gattis and Keller struggled with the idea of making Alaska Native languages official languages.

“History will not remember you for specialized license plates and parking ticket processes,” Twitchell said. “History will remember you for this moment right here. What you say and do when we ask you to help us live, to find a brighter future for our languages, cultures and people.”

HB 216 must still be scheduled for a vote on the House floor. The bill has not been considered by the state Senate.

The Katie John lawsuit over subsistence fishing rights is finally over. The U.S. Supreme Court announced Monday it will not review a lower court’s decision to leave standing federal rules that provide a rural subsistence priority on 60% of Alaska’s inland waters.

Alaska Federation of Natives President Julie Kitka says it’s a victory for Natives and rural residents, who Kitka says rely on the subsistence harvest for their physical and cultural existence.

“We’re pleased with the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision today. This should end 19 years of litigation.”

She says she hopes it marks the beginning of a better relationship with state government, which, in the eyes of subsistence advocates, has aggressively fought harvest rights guaranteed in federal law.

When he announced the appeal last year, state Attorney General Michael Geraghty said the rules erode the principle that Alaskans, not the federal government, should manage their own fish and game. It was the primary reason Alaska fought to become a state. The AG’s spokeswoman, Cori Mills, said today the decision leaves in place a muddled system of dual federal-state management.

“It’s just going to continue to lead to litigation and further uncertainty to what we believe is the detriment of all Alaskans because the lines just won’t be clear,” she said.

At the heart of the long-running subsistence conflict is a disagreement between federal and state law.  A 1980 federal law says rural subsistence users in Alaska have priority rights to fish and hunt on public lands, while the state Constitution forbids discriminating between urban and rural residents. To provide the rural preference, the federal government took over fisheries management on federal land in 1999.

Heather Kendall-Miller, who represented Katie John as senior staff attorney for the Native American Rights Fund, says winning the case isn’t the end of the story, because there’s still no rural subsistence priority in areas where the state has jurisdiction.

“It’s not a complete victory for Alaska Native rural subsistence rights. That work remains to be done and probably will only be accomplished through legislation,” she said.

Ideally, Kendall-Miller says, Alaskans would amend the state Constitution for add a subsistence priority.

“The other alternative is to adopt federal legislation that would make the priority extend through all lands in Alaska,” she says.

The case began in the 1980s, when Athabaskan elder Katie John wanted to fish at a traditional fish camp on the Copper River, a spot the state had closed to fishing. John died last year at age 97. Her granddaughter, Kathryn Martin, says she’s been hearing from supporters all day on Facebook. Martin says she can imagine her grandmother’s reaction.

“She probably would’ve just (said) , ‘Finally! I’m done! No more! Good!’ “ Martin said.