Business

Alaska Native Corporations display a strong ethos of corporate responsibility, according to an anthropologist who studies the organizations.

Tom Thornton is a senior research fellow for Environmental Change and Management at Oxford University. He presented some of his current research yesterday (Tuesday) at Sealaska Heritage Institute’s annual Native American History Month lecture series.

Thornton says Native Corporations make especially interesting subjects for social scientists.

“The big reason is that they are very unique hybrid institutions,” he says. “They’re not like regular corporations, and obviously they are major cultural institutions as well.”

Thornton says the corporate responsibility ethos is evidenced by many of the corporations’ mission statements, which refer to “sustainability.”

“Probably like all corporations, not every Alaska Native Corporation lives up to its ideals and its mission statement. But the fact that they’re articulated with a certain set of values is quite interesting,” Thornton says. “Because we’re all looking for the right model of sustainable development, if that’s not an oxymoron or a non-sequitur. If there is sustainable development, it obviously has to incorporate some key cultural values into it. It can’t just be an economic model.”

Thornton’s current project is looking at how ANCs have transformed institutional relations between Native people, state governments, ecosystems, and economies.

Since the corporations were created by the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, they have adapted to changing cultural, economic and political circumstances. He points to Southeast Alaska, where Native people traditionally lived and survived by the ocean. But under ANCSA – where the settlement included land – virtually all Southeast Native Corporations have been or are involved in timber.

“You move from people who were fishermen to forests. There wasn’t a lot of experience at the beginning. This lack of experience led to mistakes, or people taking advantage, and this set a lot of particularly small corporations off to a bad start,” Thornton says. “They either harvested their timber too quickly, they didn’t get a good price for it, or they didn’t really consider their own values in terms of what they really wanted to do with their natural capital to support their cultural capital.”

In some cases Thornton says Native corporations have done well by moving away from natural resource industries, and into businesses like tourism. One example is Huna Totem Corporation’s Icy Strait Point tourist attraction in Hoonah.

“You have 130 people employed by Huna Totem Corporation in tourism. That would seem to be sustainable if you can get one ship per day in there throughout the summer,” he says.

But there’s still a strong desire on the part of ANC leaders to combine traditional ways of living with newer models. Thornton says one Hoonah fisherman suggested to him that they develop niche economies.

“In the summer, you have tourism, major industrial tourism, that is your form of sustainable development. But in the winter and spring, maybe people could still fish there,” he says.

Thornton’s research is still in the preliminary stages. He says it will eventually compare the development of Southeast Native corporations with those in the Bering Straits region.

Sealaska Heritage Institute’s Native American History Month events continue today (Wednesday) with a luncheon to recognize ANCSA at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall.

The lecture series resumes tomorrow (Thursday) with a talk by Tlingit and Haida Central Council President Edward Thomas on the relationships between tribes and corporations.

Sealaska Regional Native Corporation owns about 25-thousand acres of subsurface mining rights in an area being contested by the City and Borough of Juneau and Petersburg.

The area includes Hobart Bay, where Juneau’s Native Corporation Goldbelt owns 30-thousand surface acres.

Sealaska Vice President Rick Harris says the company will follow Goldbelt’s lead in commenting on the dispute.

“We’ll support them in whatever way is necessary to achieve a result that’s best for Goldbelt’s shareholders and also our shareholders,” says Harris.

Juneau plans to file a competing petition to Petersburg’s proposed borough boundaries, which includes land previously slated for annexation to the CBJ.

So far, Goldbelt hasn’t expressed a preference for which borough, if any, the corporation’s land should be in. Earlier this month, Goldbelt Vice President Derek Duncan sent a letter to the state’s Local Boundary Commission saying it would make a statement in the near future.

Harris says sand rock and gravel are quite prevalent in Hobart Bay, and that some precious metals are nearby.

“We don’t believe that it’s on our property,” Harris says. “We think that if there’s any precious metals, they’re actually to the north of our property.”

October 26th is the deadline to submit competing petitions and opposing briefs to the state’s Local Boundary Commission on Petersburg’s proposed borough.

The CBJ Assembly plans to introduce an ordinance Monday to make its petition official.

The chief executive of the Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium, or SEARHC, is stepping down.

Roald Helgesen is leaving SEARHC to become chief exectuive officer of the statewide Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium. He says his last day is in December, to ensure a smooth transition to a new CEO.

In a letter to the SEARHC, Helgesen says he believes he can use his skills even better at the tribal group. Headquartered in Anchorage, ANTHC was formed in 1997 to manage statewide Native health care, including the Alaska Native Medical Center, the state’s largest Native hospital.

Helgesen started at SEARHC answering phones in 1993 and made his way to vice president of administration before leaving in 2004 for work in the Lower 48. He returned in 2007 as president and CEO.

SEARHC operates Mt. Edgecumbe Hospital in Sitka as well as facilities in Juneau and 16 other communities throughout Southeast Alaska.

Helgesen announced his resignation Tuesday and was unavailable for comment, meeting with the board much of the day on a transition plan. The Southeast health group will conduct a nationwide search to replace him.

The national chain OfficeMax is coming to Juneau. The office supply company says it will serve all of Southeast Alaska.

OfficeMax plans to open a retail store in Nugget Mall early next year. It owns two stores in Anchorage and one in Fairbanks.

OfficeMax already has business contract customers throughout Southeast Alaska, according to company spokeswoman Nicole Miller.

“We see this as a natural desire to expand our products and services to this area of the state,” Miller says. “We do have some customers from the region that do go up and get service out of our Anchorage stores, so we look forward to expanding our services to this region and this new store is going to help us do just that.”

The Juneau store will employ about 25 associates and sell office supplies, office furniture, technology products, and have an in-store printing service.

The 17,000 square foot OfficeMax will be located at the south end of Nugget Mall, next to the new 11,000 square foot PETCO. Both will have separate outside entrances, with no interior mall access.

CBJ Community Development Plan Reviewer John Young says OfficeMax received its CBJ building permit Wednesday for commercial renovation and tenant improvements. PETCO has already started renovating its Nugget Mall space.

OfficeMax has about 1,000 retail stores across the U.S. and operates stores in Mexico on a joint-venture.

It also has a catalog business and contract services in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zeeland.

OfficeMax is a publically traded company on the New York Stock Exchange.

To most people it probably seems like an odd arrangement, but it’s fairly typical in the health care industry. Bartlett Regional Hospital is owned by the City and Borough of Juneau and governed by a board of directors appointed by the CBJ Assembly. The board hires a professional management company – Quorum Health Resources – to run the day-to-day operations of the hospital.

“The board I think can rely on us to make sure that those aspects of the operations are being addressed. Allowing them to focus on the strategic decisions of how do we better meet the needs of the local community,” says Bill Donatelli, Quorum’s Vice President of Western Operations.

As the nation’s largest hospital management company, Quorum works with about 150 facilities nationwide. Contracts vary, but usually a local board will hire a Chief Executive and Chief Financial Officer who are also employed by Quorum. Donatelli says the legal term is “borrowed employee.”

“We assume some responsibility for their performance as our employee, so it gives the board added protection in terms of making sure the job gets done,” Donatelli says.

But in its next contract, the Bartlett board wants its CEO and CFO to be independent from the management company.

“We want ensure that Bartlett Hospital’s interests are the primary interests, and that there’s no confusion about whether the management company’s interests are in any way taking precedence,” says Board President Kristen Bomengen.

Bomengen says the desire to have more control shouldn’t be seen as a sign of dissatisfaction with Quorum, and it’s too soon to say if the board will seek to change Bartlett’s leadership team.

“We’re going to take up the contract negotiations first, and it will become more apparent to us just what direction to follow once we’ve completed that,” Bomengen says.

One of Quorum’s selling points in its pitch to the board was the stability of senior management during the 23 years the company has worked with Bartlett. CFO Garth Hamblin has worked at the hospital nearly 25 years; and while CEO Shawn Morrow just came to Juneau in 2007, he’s only the second CEO during Quorum’s tenure. For his part, Morrow says he’s not too worried about the board’s decision to exercise more control.

“You can’t be a successful CEO if you’re looking at the job through the eyes of self-preservation. It just doesn’t work,” Morrow says.

He says he intends to stay in Juneau as long as the board wants him here. Morrow admits to being impressed with the board’s process for soliciting management contract bids.

“What I’ve learned over the years is just let the process work. And if the process is a good one like ours was, whatever the conclusion, whatever the decision, you can live with it, because it’s been thought through from the standpoint of what is in the best interest of the hospital,” says Morrow.

If negotiations with Quorum aren’t successful the board has a second choice – PeaceHealth. But officials from that company explicitly said Bartlett would get a lower level of service if the board chose to hire its own executives. Quorum’s Donatelli says the company will try to work with the hospital regardless of the arrangement.

“I think the hospital has done a great job of serving the local community, I think we’ve done a great job supporting the local board in making those decisions that have allowed them to serve the local community and provide quality health care here,” Donatelli says. “And we’re proud of that and want to continue that relationship.”

Bomengen says the decision to stay with Quorum came down to other services offered by the company. The hospital’s management contract also covers purchasing supplies, which are discounted through Quorum’s hospital network. It also covers physician recruitment, and leadership training, strategic planning and consulting services for managers and board members.

“So there’s a range of management services that are particular to the health care industry that we are able to benefit from and that we would otherwise have to seek individual consultants for if we did not have a management services contract,” says Bomengen.

Quorum is currently paid between 350- and 400-thousand dollars a year depending on the Consumer Price Index. That’s separate from the CEO and CFO salaries. The company is seeking a similar amount in its new contract.

Bartlett Regional Hospital is a self-sustaining enterprise fund of the City and Borough of Juneau. It makes money by charging patient fees.

It’ll soon be easier to find where you’re going at Bartlett Regional Hospital.

This week, the board of directors for Juneau’s community-owned hospital approved funding for three new signs. Two will point visitors to the emergency room and the third will identify the main entrance.

During renovations over the past few years, the emergency room has sometimes been used as the main entrance, and BRH Community Relations Director Jim Strader says some patients and their families are understandably confused. Strader serves on an employee committee that’s been looking at signage for over a year and recommended the three new markers.

“Hospitals all over the country, they’re complex buildings,” says Strader. “It’s very difficult to navigate, even if you know your way around the building. And the fact that Bartlett, just like many other hospitals have undergone construction and changes in the layout and things like that, it’s something that hospitals are continuing to try to improve that process just to make it a little easier for people to find out where they’re going.”

Two of the new signs will be located on the side of the building as you drive up to Bartlett via Hospital Drive. The third will be on the Bartlett House building as you make the left turn to go to the emergency room.

The board approved about 19-thousand dollars for the project. It’s not known when the signs will be installed, but Strader hopes it’s before the end of the year.