Community

VXAK, a unique collective rooted in Juneau, dropped their fifth skate film, V, earlier this month. With its signature VX aesthetic and iconic Alaskan backdrops, the project blends lo-fi street skating and raw visuals with a distinctly local voice. With a nod to DIY filmmaking and community-driven artistry, VXAK is redefining what it means to create and skate in the 49th state.

On July 2, we sat down with VXAK’s creator Stuart Wood alongside featured skaters Logan Terry and Anna Mahanor to talk about Alaska’s underground skate scene, how early 2000s nostalgia and midwest emo influence their creativity, and what it means to build community through their art across the state. 

“It was fun having that community back – you’re going to the spot with all the homies and everybody’s psyching you up, and then to watch the end product be this… beautifully curated music and piece of art is really cool,” Terry said of the experience. 

VXAK premiered their video Thursday, July 3 at the Crystal Saloon, catch the video on YouTube.

? Listen back to the full conversation below.

 

Listen here: 

Nearly all the staff of Juneau’s only print newspaper have left the publication for a new, web-based local news outlet. 

Large-scale changes for the Juneau Empire began last month, when former Managing Editor Mark Sabbatini resigned and launched the Juneau Independent. 

The Empire’s publisher did not respond to an interview request. The company posted a job opening for a local government reporter on Monday. Reporters from Carpenter Media Group’s other Alaska papers on the Kenai Peninsula have been publishing articles to the Empire’s website this week.

Erin Thompson, editor for the Empire’s sister newspapers on the Kenai Peninsula, now oversees the capital city’s paper. She said she was not authorized to speak on the matter.

In the meantime, the Juneau Independent has achieved state nonprofit status. Sabbatini said he is also working to get tax-exempt status, which he says will open the door for more grant funding. 

The Independent is now flush with new staff, including a managing editor, two contributing reporters, a student intern and a volunteer reporter. Sabbatini said he didn’t expect this level of interest, which is both a boon to the publication and a financial responsibility.

“[The] challenging and tricky part, which we’re now taking on, is, you know, having an actual paid staff and running this as an actual nonprofit corporation,” he said. “That takes more money and more effort.”

Sabbatini is working to make the Independent financially sustainable. He says running the publication as-is would cost about $200,000 a year. He says he started the venture with about $20,000 of seed money from four donors. Since launching, he says it has raised over $40,000 more from contributions.

Bruce Botelho is the Independent’s board president. He said he believes the Independent will be able to sustain itself.

 “I think there is a viable path, or actually would say several different paths, forward, and I think it will come from folks who are willing to donate to get this level of coverage in Juneau,” Botehlo said. 

But another board member is less sure about the Independent’s future. Larry Persily is a longtime Alaska journalist and owner of the Wrangell Sentinel. He framed the Independent’s challenge in an Alaska-themed metaphor.

“It’s certainly not an adult salmon. It’s a very young salmon leaving freshwater, going out in the ocean to grow up, and whether it lives and comes back, is uncertain,” he said.

For now, Juneau residents can find new articles on both publications’ websites and in the twice-weekly print edition of the Empire.

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

A new mobile crisis team has been operating in Juneau since November. Each team is comprised of a clinician from Bartlett Regional Hospital and an EMT from Capital City Fire/Rescue.

Meghan DeSloover and Sarah Zaglifa reflected on their role in filling some of the gaps in behavioral health care in Juneau. The first responders broke down how their unit helps get patients care on their own terms. 

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Sarah Zaglifa: So this is what goes in the crisis bag. We have a resource binder with everything you can imagine, treatment applications, resource lists, different assessment tools. Is in there, clean socks for someone who’s walking around in wet socks. That’s never a healthy thing, so I always keep a stash. I’m Sarah Zaglifa, and I’m a licensed clinical social worker on the mobile crisis team.

Meghan DeSloover: My name is Megan de Slover, and I am a community health specialist with Capital City Fire/Rescue and an EMT, and I work on the mobile crisis team.

I’ve been working with the fire department since 2018 just naturally, being a part of the mobile integrated health team, I have become a part of the mobile crisis team. We’ve done a number of trainings to prepare us for this, and so that’s how I’m here.

Sarah Zaglifa: So I got involved in mobile crisis way back in the 90s, believe it or not, I got my master’s degree way back then. I was living in San Francisco and part of the domestic violence task force there, and really immersed into crisis work at that point, and was married to the military. We relocated. Were stationed in Alaska, decided to settle here and wanted to commit to the community. I was working at Bartlett in the emergency department for four years. Then I worked in behavioral health and a little bit in oncology, and then when this program started getting up and running, I really wanted to get back to my crisis roots, because it’s the best job. Love it. 

Meghan DeSloover: I learned that we have a huge need in this community for assistance, and that there isn’t always money and there aren’t always avenues, and there aren’t always people to fill those roles. So I’ve just, I’ve been really thankful to be a part of this, because I feel like our role has been very helpful.

Sarah Zaglifa: I feel really inspired by Bartlett and other community partners like CCFR being very invested in the safety net of the community, and being part of the fiber of that safety net is really important. 

I think the best part about this position and where I’ve learned the most is how important it is to meet the patient – literally and figuratively – where they’re at. Your assessment is so much more rich and respectful when you’re on their turf and you are their guest versus the natural change in dynamics when you’re in an emergency department or in more clinical setting, 

I feel really proud of how our team as co-responders can just sit with someone and just be with them and whatever It is they’re in with no agenda, with no pressure.

Meghan DeSloover: We don’t fix everything for everybody. Certainly that’s not even the goal, because it would be impossible. But just people feeling like, oh, I have someone else to reach out to. 

Sarah Zaglifa: I feel like crisis is an invisible illness. Behavioral health is an invisible illness. It’s not outward. So a lot of people, I think, can easily hide some of these things and not identify it as a crisis. And we come judgment-free to just see where we can go with what we have. 

There’s plenty of times we go on a call thinking it’s about one thing, finding out the root is actually something very different, and we can work on that root. Or maybe the person’s not ready to open up to complete strangers, and so we can offer other types of support, and then maybe follow up with them. Or now, now they know us, and when they call, we’re not starting from square one. 

Juneau Animal Rescue has too many cats.

JAR can comfortably house 40 cats and the rescue is well over capacity, according to Executive Director Rick Driscoll. 

“We’ve got a lot of cats, and we need people to adopt them,” he said. “And we’re at cat-pacity — which I hate that word, but it’s catchy.”

Many cats are being temporarily placed with fosters, but Driscoll said he’s hoping people will adopt them. 

He said cats tend to give birth in the warmer months, and the rescue ends up trying to adopt out the many cats they end up with each summer. There’s been an overflow of cats each summer Driscoll has been with JAR. 

JAR is raising money for a new facility that would meet its needs. Until then, Driscoll said people can help prevent the influx of animals by sterilizing their pets. 

“It’s a great opportunity to remind the community that you know spaying and neutering your pet is not only important to prevent overpopulation,” he said. “But it also has a lot of medical benefits associated with it.”

JAR offers low-cost spay and neuter services for those who qualify. 

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

A Juneau bookstore turns 50 this year. Earlier this month, it was voted one of the nation’s top 10 best independent bookstores by USA Today. 

Olga Sofia Lijó Seráns took over Hearthside Books in 2022, but she got into the book business as a librarian in Juneau nearly two decades ago after arriving from Northern Spain.  

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Olga Sofia Lijó Seráns: I love Waiting for the Weather. Eric Forrer’s memoir. It just has so much information about Alaska without being ponderous. Actually, it’s pretty funny. So it’s a great way to just have a very good look at Alaska without thinking that you are studying on it. 

My name is long. It’s Olga Sophia Lijó Seráns, and I am the owner of Hearthside Books and Toys. I was approached about buying Hearthside Books around three years ago, about this time of the year, by somebody else who thought that I could be a good match, because Hearthside  had been for sale for a while, and well, nobody in this town wanted it to close. 

I’m not sure why people thought about me. I have my guesses. I’m a book person. I’ve been always very active in the community. Since I arrived in Juneau in 2007, I got my master’s in library science. I already had two degrees in similar subjects, and then I became a public librarian, and then I became librarian for the Legislative Affairs agency. 

So between that and the fact that I’m always around books, I guess it was not very strange that somebody would have thought about me. 

What brought me to Juneau in the first place was love. My then love interest invited me for a holiday in 2006 and that was it. He was definitely a love interest, but Juneau just closed the deal. 

The big surprise was bestsellers and having to be on top of those changes almost daily. So it makes it a little bit terrifying, because you’re always having to be thinking about what’s coming next and what’s going to be people’s next interest. But on the other hand, it’s also exhilarating, a lot of fun. Will that set of books that were really, really hot two weeks ago arrive in time for being still of interest when they get here?

Hearthside is turning 50 on September 19. It was open in September 19, 1975. So I wasn’t thinking about what that would mean when I initially bought the store. But it has become more and more obvious that people in Juneau consider Hearthside a legacy. 

When you have three generations of the same family coming to you and saying, “You know, my mom used to bring me to Hearthside as a kid, and now I’m bringing my own kids here too.” It kind of makes you realize how important an independent bookstore is still in a community like Juneau. 

The editor of Juneau Empire is leaving the paper. Mark Sabbatini has edited the paper since 2023 and announced his departure in a Facebook post.

Sabbatini said he submitted his resignation letter three weeks ago over disagreements with the publisher, Carpenter Media Group, which bought the paper last year. His last day with the Empire was supposed to be Tuesday. But he said he was fired today.

“I kept it quiet until word leaked out today on social media that I was departing, and at that point, I announced my departure on the Empire’s Facebook page, and a few hours later, I was informed that, well, basically they fired me,” he said.

He said the disagreements stem from his view that Carpenter Media is focused on cutting costs and publishing sensational content that gets the most web clicks rather than focusing on important issues that affect the community. 

Just before Sabbatini became the editor, the paper decreased its publishing frequency from five issues per week to two. 

Sabbatini said he plans to launch a new, nonprofit online newspaper called the Juneau Independent at the end of this week. 

“I think there should be a locally based, locally owned, locally focused, full-fledged newspaper, which is exactly what the Juneau Independent is going to strive to be,” he said.

According to Sabbatini, the publisher does not plan to replace him. The paper will now be edited remotely from the Peninsula Clarion office in Kenai. 

Carpenter Media Group did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.