Community

This is Tongass Voices, a series from KTOO sharing weekly perspectives from the homelands of the Áak’w Kwáan and beyond.

James Houck has shuttled tourists around town on his bike for seven years as the owner of Juneau Pedicab. It’s his retirement job, he says, and he loves running a tourism company that doesn’t emit carbon or use fossil fuels. 

Listen: 

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

James Houck: My name’s James P. Houck. I’m a retired Coast Guardsman who lives in his favorite place on Earth. I run a human-powered tourism business. We call them pedicabs, and we take passengers from the docks and the hotels around town, and we bring them into Juneau and show them the best of the best. That’s pretty easy to do in such a wonderful place. 

The great thing about being retired and having a pension is, while you’re busier than you’ve ever been in your life, you get to choose how you spend all those hours. 

I think it’s important for them to know that we are doing our level best to accommodate the number of people who want to come and visit, and that if we are saying that we’re at capacity, we are at capacity. This is a town that does not boast. It’s a town that does not hyperbolize. And we can feel it. 

And I don’t really think people have a feel for what their impact is when they pull in here, and I think the city of Juneau is doing a good job of trying to mitigate some of that. You know, we’re looking at electrifying these two docks so that the ships don’t run their generators all day long while they’re sitting here.

Well, it’s a giant game of dodgem, and we smile and we laugh and we sing and we never raise our voices at people. And so far, knock on wood, we have not impacted anyone. We haven’t run over anyone’s toes. We haven’t run into anything. And in eight years, that’s a phenomenal record. 

But in large crowds, how we get through is we ring our little bell and we sing songs like “Joy to the world, all the boys and girls.” When the people hear that kind of discord, they’re like, ‘What the heck? How could a person sing that badly and be so loud?’ And they get out of the way in a hurry.

And then when I find a spot in the crowd where it looks like I can get away with it, I pull over and I show off our rain chimes. So the rain is captured in the bowl and funneled into the tube, and about every quarter inch of real rain fills the tube all the way to the top. It gets top heavy, leans down to dump its water and then rings a gong on the rebound. This one is C sharp, the longest ones are F sharp, and the shortest ones are A sharp, forming the chord F sharp major.

Now back in 2017, the first day I operated, it probably rained an inch and a half, and I was cruising down this dock, and one of them went off. And I’d never seen them before. No one had told me about them. I nearly jumped off my pedicab into the weeds. 

I looked in the mirror and said, ‘James, you worked from the time you were 12 until you were 18, roofing houses, and then you never worked again until you were 44, because the Coast Guard treated you so well. Why would you pick a job where you had to work?’ And the next day, I put in an application with Kris McClure to run one of his pedicabs, and he called me up and he said, ‘Is this a joke?’ I said, ‘What’s funny about it?’ He says, ‘I have never heard of anyone with a master’s degree from Princeton wanting to run a pedicab.’ I said, ‘Well, I want to run a pedicab, and I will be out there every day if you give me a job.’ That’s when he told me he married a woman that didn’t like Juneau and he needed to get out. Three weeks later, I wrote him a check, and I had to figure it out from there.

I thought that I was going to be running short run taxi services, and my customers would say, ‘Hey, what’s this?’ I’d say, ‘Well, I can tell you about that, but I’d have to charge you for the time.’ They’d say, ‘Okay, do it. Tell me about it.’ So that’s how I got in the business of turning this into a tour company. 

So now, instead of running from the Franklin dock as fast as I can to get to the Red Dog Saloon, I ride two or 300 feet and I stop and I tell a story. I ride another two or 300 feet and I stop and I tell a story. I still burn over 4000 calories a day, and can eat whatever the heck I want, but I figured out a way to do it without a battery, without a motor, and be able to do it — I hope — until I’m in my 60s and 70s. So we’ll see. 

This is Tongass Voices, a series from KTOO sharing weekly perspectives from the homelands of the Áak’w Kwáan and beyond.

Every summer, the docks of downtown Juneau are packed with tourists. Among the visitors are people like Diosdado Valdez, who prepares the onboard entertainment for one of the cruise ship companies. Valdez has been coming to Juneau for over 30 years, and in that time, he’s found another family off the ship.

Listen: 

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Diosdado Valdez: Yeah, I am Diosdado, just Diosdado Valdez from the Philippines. Yeah, we are in a cruise ship in Juneau. And, you know, I love Juneau. I’ve been coming here since 1993. 

I have a very good friend. He was my friend at home. He asked me if I want to come to work with him, also. So I said, ‘why not?’ At first, I said, ‘only one contract.’ But then when I started, then I realized, this is the job I wanted. 

I am a production manager, and I’ve been working for this company for almost 32 years now. We are in charge of the show. If we have a comedian today, so that’s for the night. And on the daytime, there are daytime activities that we need to do. 

I go home after each contract in the Philippines. I live in Mindanao, that is in Bukidnon. I work for six months, and then get to go home for two to three months, then back to work again. 

When I started here, there is this oriental restaurant there, and the owner of that became my friend. Every time I get to Juneau, I do the dishwashing because I want, I just like to be with them. And he loves that, too. And every time I come back to the ship, I get food. He gave me food because he owns the restaurant. Play billiard, and karaoke. You know, karaoke is the most fun. That’s all I want to have when I’m in Juneau, just to see my friends.

Tasha Elizarde: Can you tell me about the first friend that you made when you started working on the cruise ships?

She is a local. We just met like, walking on the street. They kept asking me to go with them on that tram. I said, ‘Can we do it next time?’ Until this time, we haven’t been there. Yes, for years now. I admit that maybe I’m lazy. 

Since then, until this time, we are friends. Her son is my godson. And I love coming back here because of the people in Juneau. Hospitable, nice, friendly. The Juneau family is my family.

Quinn Christopherson is an Alaska musician who gained nationwide recognition by winning NPR’s Tiny Desk contest in 2019.

He just returned from a tour with Portugal. The Man and performed at Juneau’s climate fair on a rainy day to a small group there. 

Listen:

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Quinn Christopherson: I’m Quinn Christopherson. I’m a musician born, raised and based in Anchorage, Alaska. Ahtna and Inupiaq, and I am excited to play Juneau.

Oh my gosh, nothing is too small for me in Alaska. This is, like, everything I want to play. You know, I’m Alaskan forever. 

And, yeah, I just came back from a huge tour, like playing like places, like Red Rocks and like, you know, really special places. But there’s never anything better than coming back to my home state and playing like a tiny event, like, to me, that’s so much more important and impactful than going out and playing, I don’t know — it’s crazy to say — for 1000s of people, but like, it’s way more intimate. 

And I think any artist will tell you, big or small, like, will tell you that it’s harder to play for 10 people than it is to play for like 5000 because it is so much more vulnerable.

I started playing music, you know, when I got a guitar. I guess when I was 21. It was kind of late.

But I always feel like I started writing my stories in middle school, like with poems and just kind of getting my feelings out, and the guitar was just the gateway to turn those into songs. 

I think there’s like a fine line between poetry and song, and yeah, I feel like some of my songs are poems, just barely a song. I just feel like whatever way I can tell the story, that’s what I’m gonna do, whether it’s like just saying it or speaking it, or, you know, singing it, I don’t know it still feels like a poem sometimes. 

 

Nearly a dozen residents testified in front of the Juneau Assembly Monday night calling for more accountability from local law enforcement in the wake of a deadly shooting earlier this month. 

Many testifiers, like Bonilyn Parker, asked the Assembly and Juneau Police Department for more transparency about what occurred when police shot and killed Steven Kissack downtown, and what’s being done to stop similar situations from happening again. 

“This event was traumatizing for everyone involved — Steven’s friends and family, the many eyewitnesses and the officers involved,” she said. 

Juneau police officials say they plan to release the body camera footage, but not until the investigation is complete.

In an interview, Deputy Chief of Police Krag Campbell said it would be shared with the public after the state Office of Special Prosecution gives a determination about whether the shooting was justified. 

“The timeline that we’re looking at is going to be no later than 30 days after the Office of Special Prosecutions has released their final report on the review of the shooting,” he said. 

Kissack was unhoused, and he and his dog, Juno, were familiar faces to those who live and work in the downtown area. Multiple videos of the midday shooting were captured by witnesses and have been shared on social media and by news outlets.

Since his death, there have been vigils, petitions and protests held by people sharing their sadness and anger about the handling of the situation. 

At the Monday night meeting, testifiers presented a community letter with more than 300 signatures from individuals and businesses calling the shooting “unacceptable” and asking the city and police to ensure it doesn’t happen again. 

Jessica Gray with the National Alliance on Mental Illness Juneau asked the Assembly to take action to increase support for mental health services for the local unhoused population. 

“We know the path forward isn’t going to be easy, but there has to be a systemic change to ensure that this tragedy does not happen again,” she said.

Fatal police shootings are not common in Juneau, but Anchorage police have shot five people since mid-May. Three of them died. 

Similar public outcry there prompted the Anchorage police department to enact a new body camera policy just two weeks ago. The new policy mandates the release of footage of police shootings within 45 days of the incident. 

JPD’s current policies do not outline a timeline for when body camera footage is released to the public. But, Campbell said the department plans to review and potentially revise its policies on body cameras in the next few months. 

The Office of Special Prosecutions has not provided an expected timeline for its investigation.

Correction: Anchorage police have shot five people since mid-May, but only three people have died.

Kake’s Dog Salmon Festival started 30 years ago as a way to celebrate the commercial fishing season. But this year’s festival on Saturday will be the last in the village of 500 people.  

Organizers are planning to change the festival going forward to better reflect the community as it is now. They plan to rename the event and emphasize Lingít heritage. 

Juneau artist Chloey Cavanaugh has been working with Kelli Jackson with the Kake Tribal Corporation on making this last year of the original festival special. 

Listen:

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Chloey Cavanaugh: I am Chloe Kavanaugh. My Lingít name is Tláakw Sháa.

My connection to Kake is it’s my grandfather’s home community. He grew up in Kake, and I was back a few months ago.

So Kelli’s been just really amazing to collaborate with, and kind of dream big about what the future of Dog Salmon Fest looks like. So it’s kind of just started off as us talking at a cabin and being like, “Okay, what can we do for the last year of Dog Salmon Fest?”

I think it mostly started off as a celebration of the fishing season and a time to share that success with the community and celebrate and compete with other communities on different canoe events, of races, of food competitions, and this way to kind of celebrate the fishing season together.

I think there’s an immense amount of kindness in the community that makes it really, really special. The community is so invested in the subsistence there, and to see that wherever you go, just people enjoying the landscape is just, yeah, it makes it a really special place.

At least, like, my understanding about Kake, and what I’ve learned over the years and gone through videotapes that my grandfathers left me is it just it took a really big hit with religion and the community, and a lot of knowledge and access to culture being lost, although that subsistence is really, really there. There was also a lot of damage done, and the relationship between the military and Kake, and bad pipes being put in the schools, and a lot of harm done to the community.

And I think there’s a lot of healing happening in Kake right now with not only culture, but healing centers. Joel Jackson’s putting in a healing center, and there’s a lot of work around, now, this phase of recognizing the harm that’s been done, and the community’s push to recognize how we move forward and working together to make that happen. So I think it’s kind of this beautiful moment to recognize where we’ve been and recognize how to move forward, and the community’s huge role in making that happen and that healing process.

I think it’s one of those things where the community is so invested, and it’s just about finding the connections outside of Kake and people that are willing to invest in the community. And it’s so strange how we’re so close in distance in a lot of ways, but because of a lack of a road system, we also are so disconnected in those ways. So I think in a lot of the ways that we see Juneau thriving — with education, with arts, with investment in youth — is something that Kake is really, has been really good at, and is wanting to expand on.

For the first time in years, a catamaran will bring people to Kake for the festival from Juneau, with about 100 spots. Attendees can also stay at the former cannery bunkhouse for $25 a night. Bookings are through Kake Tribal Corporation.

This is Tongass Voices, a series from KTOO sharing weekly perspectives from the homelands of the Áak’w Kwáan and beyond.

Xixtc’ i see Ruby Hughes won the Sewing Division of the Juried Arts show at Celebration earlier this year with her piece “Raven Transforms into Marilyn.” That’s right, Marilyn Monroe.

The button robe features a raven lined with crystals, with a likeness of the blonde bombshell on its chest, and a diamond-like rhinestone in its mouth. As Hughes explains, her inspiration for the piece was decades and generations in the making.

Listen:

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Xixtc’ i see Ruby Hughes: So at my salon, which I opened in 1986 — so way back then, someone gave me a really nice lithographic postcard of Marilyn Monroe. And I put it up on this window, along with several others — it was just kind of like a little collage of things I was collecting. 

For some reason I remember when Marilyn died, and I was really sad about it, and I thought she lived out in this little cabin that was right before you took a turn to Fritz Cove Road. Don’t ask me. 

Yvonne Krumrey: How old were you? 

Xixtc’ i see Ruby Hughes: Oh, gosh, three. You know that I had quite an imagination.

So, yeah, my name is Ruby Hughes. My Lingít name is Xixtc’ i see, which is “daughter of the frog.” And the clan I belong to is the Raven Coho, and we are from Dry Bay, which is just about 50 miles south of Yakutat.

And so the two white frogs in my Raven, on the shoulders represent my name and the seaweed designs represent the location of where I’m from, and each clan has ownership of different designs, so you can tell where they were from, and that’s what Lingít art is about. It says where you’re from, and who you’re from, and what, what your name is, and and what you own, what you don’t own, where you’ve been, where you’re going. 

So I got the inspiration for my Raven from a project I was going to do for a vest, and I decided once that I made the design and I enlarged it a little bit, you know what? This would look good on a blanket. 

And then I was playing around with the inside of the body, and decided to put a female face, like humanoid and, and then I thought, well, it means, kind of represent somebody, you know, and, and I first thought about my mother, and then I thought, well, you know that I, I kind of was playing around with it, and I did Marilyn Monroe, just because I was etching, and I went, ‘you know what, that would look really cool, I think the blonde hair.’ 

And then I kind of started thinking about transformation, the power of transformation, and the power that Raven had when he transformed into a woman, because there’s several stories about that that I really liked. So that was what inspired me to do the female image in the middle.