Challenges of contaminated site cleanup in rural Alaska

Contaminated sites in Alaska, FY 2017.
Source: Contaminated Sites Database,
Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation.

Alaska is ranked third in the U.S. for Formerly Used Defense Sites properties, most of which are in remote locations. Many of the sites were contaminated during World War II, or during the Cold War, when the long-term effects of chemicals were not understood. An article in the Summer 2018 Alaska Justice Forum looks at long term efforts to clean up these, and other contaminated sites in the state, and the disproportionate impact on rural Alaska Native communities.

Environmental justice in Summer 2018 Alaska Justice Forum

The 2018 summer edition of the Alaska Justice Forum looks at environmental and rural justice topics including ongoing challenges of cleaning up contaminated sites in Alaska.

Contaminated sites in Alaska, FY 2017, Contaminated Sites Database, Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation.

Alaska is ranked third in the U.S. for Formerly Used Defense Sites properties.  Most of these properties are in remote locations, placing a disproportionate impact on Alaska Native communities that depend upon environmental resources for their livelihood. This environmental justice issue is explored in terms of the costs of cleanup and long-term impacts upon people and the environment.

This year, Congress expanded eligibility and increased limits on Brownfields Program funds.  The Brownfields Program provides funds for assessment and cleanup of contaminants on property targeted for redevelopment.  Anchorage, Mat-Su and Kodiak are among current recipients of Brownfields grants in Alaska.

The Alaska Justice Information Center (AJiC) recently released its Fact Sheet, Parole and Probation in Alaska, 2002-2016. The Fact Sheet is included in the Alaska Justice Forum’s online edition.
2018 summer Alaska Justice Forum articles include:

• Environmental justice: Challenges of contaminated site cleanup in rural Alaska
• Long-term impacts of environmental contaminants are ‘generational game changer”
• Expanded Brownfields Program supports redevelopment in Alaska
• Parole and Probation in Alaska, 2002-2016, Alaska Justice Information Center (AJiC) Fact Sheet (online only)

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Sequential Intercept Model: Framework for a 'wicked' problem

The Sequential Intercept Model offers conceptual points at which a person with serious mental illness could be diverted from the criminal justice system and into community-based treatment. A recent book that looks at the success of programs along the intercept continuum is reviewed in the spring 2018 edition of the Alaska Justice Forum. In May, the Department of Corrections is sponsoring a two-day workshop presented by Policy Research Associates and the SAMHSA GAINS Center for Behavioral Health and Justice Transformation on the model and its reentry application.

Sexual Assault Kit Initiative: Alaska making progress

Victim-centered policies being developed by the Alaska Department of Public Safety (DPS) for processing unsubmitted and untested sexual assault kits collected by Alaska State Troopers are one part of the state’s efforts to tackle more than 3,000 untested kits. DPS received Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (SAKI) grants in 2016 and 2017 to address SAK's collected by Alaska State Troopers. Since DPS began work, the Alaska State Legislature passed SB55, a bill requiring a statewide SAK inventory, a plan to address untested kits statewide and a plan to prevent a future backlog. Read about progress being made on SAKI by DPS and how it could impact the more than 3,000 untested kits in Alaska in the spring 2018 Alaska Justice Forum.

Spring 2018 Alaska Justice Forum shows impact of VPSO involvement in sexual assault cases, Aleutian/Pribilof Island Alaska Victimization Survey results, Alaska Sexual Assault Kit Initiative and more

The 2018 spring edition of the Alaska Justice Forum includes articles dealing with Alaska’s high incidence of sexual violence including how VPSO-assistance in sex assault cases in western Alaska have high referral rates for prosecution.  An overview of results from the 2014–2015 Alaska Victimization Survey for the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands shows that 45% of adult women in the region have experienced intimate partner violence, sexual violence or both in their lifetime. In addition, an article on Alaska’s Sexual Assault Kit Initiative provides an update on progress addressing unsubmitted and untested sexual assault kits collected by Alaska State Troopers and development of victim-centered policies by a group of statewide stakeholders.

The Justice Center recently developed a report for the Alaska Department of Public Safety showing that troopers in the Mat-Su Borough and part of the Valdez Cordova census area are chronically over-used, causing operational problems. The report is included in the spring Forum along with a book review that describes the Sequential Intercept Model. The model provides a framework for diverting a person with serious mental illness from the criminal justice system into community-based treatment.

The 2018 spring Alaska Justice Forum print and expanded web editions are now available and include:

• High referral rate for VPSO-assisted sex assault cases
• Alaska Victimization Survey: Aleutian/Pribilof Island
• Sexual Assault Kit Initiative: Alaska making progress
• Workload-based staffing model shows Troopers in B-Detachment chronically understaffed (web only)
• Sequential Intercept Model: Framework for a ‘wicked’ problem
• Myrstol is new Justice Center director 

The Alaska Justice Forum is a publication of the UAA Justice Center

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Cravez speaks at Women's History Month event

Pamela Cravez, editor of the Alaska Justice Forum and author of The Biggest Damned Hat: Tales from Alaska's Territorial Lawyers and Judges, provided a presentation on Alaska's early women lawyers with lawyer and historian Barbara Hood. Cravez and Hood had both been coordinators of Alaska's Joint State-Federal Gender Equality Task Force. Their presentation was sponsored by the ACLU of Alaska, Anchorage Bar Association's Young Lawyers Section and the Anchorage Association of Women Lawyers. More than 50 lawyers attended the presentation in honor of Women's History Month.

Pretrial risk assessment tool provides Alaska courts new information on defendants

Bail hearing at Anchorage Correctional Complex Court
with Judge Douglas H. Kossler presiding.

Beginning January 1, Alaska courts began receiving information from a pretrial risk assessment tool to assist in bail decisions. The goal is to improve public safety by reducing the number of defendants who fail to appear for trial or commit a new crime while out on bail. Read about it in the Winter 2018 Alaska Justice Forum.

Pretrial Division Director explains new risk assessment tool

Geri Fox, Director of the Alaska Department of Corrections’
Pretrial Enforcement Division, speaks with Alaska Justice Forum
Editor Pamela Cravez about the advantages and
limitations of Alaska’s new pretrial risk assessment tool.

January 1, Alaska courts began using a pretrial risk assessment tool to assist in bail decisions. The goal is to improve public safety by reducing the number of defendants who fail to appear for trial or commit a new crime while out on bail. Geri Fox, Director of the Alaska Department of Corrections’ Pretrial Enforcement Division, speaks with Alaska Justice Forum Editor Pamela Cravez about the advantages and limitations of Alaska’s new pretrial risk assessment tool.  See the video

Learn more about the development of Alaska's pretrial risk assessment tool and pretrial assessment tools used nationally in the Winter 2018 Alaska Justice Forum.

Alaska Justice Forum looks at evidence-based practices, including new pretrial risk assessment tool, and new 8-year recidivism rate study

The 2018 Winter edition of the Alaska Justice Forum looks at  evidence-based practices in Alaska’s criminal justice system including the development of a new pretrial risk assessment tool and benefit to cost analysis of adult criminal justice programs.

The benefit cost analysis is part of the Alaska Justice Information Center’s (AJiC) Alaska Results First Analysis. Alaska Results First has yielded wide ranging information about Alaska’s evidence-based programs as well as a groundbreaking eight-year recidivism rate study.

Also in the Winter 2018 edition you’ll find the most recent AJiC Fact Sheet presenting data on motor vehicle theft arrests reported in Alaska from 1986 to 2016.

Articles in the 2018 Winter edition include:

• Editor’s note: Alaska’s evidence-based investment
• Pretrial risk assessment tool developed for Alaska
• Advantages and limitations of new pretrial risk assessment tool, video with Geri Fox, Director of the Alaska Department of Corrections Pretrial Enforcement Division and Alaska Justice Forum Editor Pamela Cravez (web only)
• Benefit vs. cost of Alaska criminal justice programs
• Expanded view of recidivism in Alaska
• Alaska Justice Information Center Fact Sheet: Motor Vehicle Theft Arrests reported in Alaska from 1986-2016 (web only)

Subscribe to the Alaska Justice Forum and receive it quarterly.

The Alaska Justice Forum is a publication of the UAA Justice Center.

Cravez speaks at Tundra Vision and Justice Alaska about territorial lawyers

Pamela Cravez, editor of the Alaska Justice Forum, was featured speaker at the Tundra Vision Lecture Series this week. She told stories from her recent book, The Biggest Damned Hat: Tales for Alaska's Territorial Lawyers and Judges at the community history event.

Next week, Cravez will be a guest on Alaska Public Radio's Justice Alaska, a call-in radio show featuring topics on Alaska's justice system. The show will be broadcast on KSKA 91.1 FM at 2 p.m., Wednesday, December 20.

Crime rates and criminal justice reform among articles in Fall 2017 Alaska Justice Forum

Crime rates and criminal justice reform, police staffing, and Crisis Intervention Teams are featured in the Fall 2017 Alaska Justice Forum.

• "Crime Rates and Alaska Criminal Justice Reform" by Brad A. Myrstol and Pamela Cravez 
• "How Do You Determine the Right Size of a Police Department? Don’t Look to Crime Rates" by Troy C. Payne 
• "Crisis Intervention Teams Assist Law Enforcement" by Pamela Cravez
• "When Mental Illness Becomes a Police Matter"

Hospitals apply for more psychiatric beds, Alaska Justice Forum article supports need

Information from "Alaska's Lack of Psychiatric Beds and Consequences," Alaska Justice Forum, Summer 2017, was used in a recent Certificate of Need (CON) hearing to support a request for additional psychiatric beds.

In May 1968, at the time of this photo, API had 225 beds. It has 80 now.
Christine M. McClain papers, Archives and Special Collections,
 Consortium Library,UAA. Jim Balog, photographer

Alaska Regional Hospital and Mat-Su Regional Medical Center both presented cases and supported each other's requests for expanding behavioral health units to the CON board on August 16 in Anchorage. Mat-Su Regional is applying for 36 beds for behavioral health and substance use disorder patients. Alaska Regional Hospital is seeking 24 psychiatric beds, 12 of which would be secure.

"We are desperately in need of more resources," Alaska Regional CEO Julie Taylor told the CON board.  She presented historical information, taken from the Justice Forum article, that API used to have over 200 beds when it began operating in the 1960's. It now has 80 -  with only 50 reserved for adults. The rest are for adolescents, forensic cases and people with dementia and other disabilities who have no other options for placement.

Taylor also presented a chart that appeared in the Forum showing how the de-institutionalization movement of the 1960's and 70's shifted the population of adults with mental illness from medical institutions to jail.

The lack of beds is particularly worrisome as the state takes moves to reduce the number of people with mental illness who are in jail, Taylor said. "We need to be ready with the resources," she said.

Mat-Su Regional will serve both behavioral health and substance use disorder patients. Alaska Regional plans to focus on behavioral health.

Both requests received strong support from service providers, consumers of mental health and substance abuse disorder services, and family members.

A second CON hearing will be held at Mat-Su College on August 31 at 4:30 p.m.

Abuse of older women, lack of psychiatric beds, among articles in summer 2017 Alaska Justice Forum

Newly redesigned Alaska Justice Forum print and expanded web 2017 summer editions are now available. Articles include:

Print and web editions of Alaska Justice Forum

• Abuse Faced by Older Alaskan Women - by Andre Rosay
• L.Diane Casto and Andre Rosay Talk About Elder Abuse - video
• Consequences of Alaska's Lack of Psychiatric Beds - by Pamela Cravez
• Community Solutions to Liquor Store Problem - by Sharon Chamard (web edition exclusive)
• Justice Center Director Farewell - by Andre Rosay (web edition exclusive)
• New Alaska Justice Forum Editor Note - by Pamela Cravez

The Alaska Justice Forum is returning to quarterly publication. To make this possible, the Forum is limiting mailed delivery of the print edition and enhancing its web presence with expanded and updated print edition stories as well as articles and content exclusive to the web. Sign up to get delivery of the Alaska Justice Forum.

Cravez elected secretary of NAMI Anchorage board

Pamela Cravez, Alaska Justice Forum editor and Justice Center research associate, was elected secretary of the NAMI (National Allliance on Mental Illness) Anchorage board at the annual membership meeting in May. Cravez has served on the NAMI Anchorage board since 2016. NAMI Anchorage, one of four NAMI Alaska affiliates, provides education and support for families and individuals experiencing mental illness. Juneau, Fairbanks, and Barrow also have NAMI Alaska affiliates.

Senior Voice highlights Rosay research on abuse of older Alaskan women

The July issue of Senior Voice features  research conducted by Dr. Andre Rosay, Justice Center director, on the prevalence of psychological and physical abuse among Alaskan women aged 60 and older.  According to Dr. Rosay's research, one in nine Alaska women aged 60 and older experienced psychological or physical abuse in the past year.  Results are based upon the Alaska Victimization Survey (AVS), an annual survey conducted from 2010 through 2015 by the Justice Center and funded by the Alaska Council on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. Dr. Rosay is the principal investigator for the survey.

Dr. Rosay used data from both a state survey (AVS) and national survey (National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey), and found Alaska rates for psychological and physical abuse higher than the national rates.

A more comprehensive article on Dr. Rosay's research appears in the Summer edition of the Alaska Justice Forum, published later this month. Sign up to receive the summer edition of the Forum at http://eepurl.com/cDlViD.

Cravez speaks at Alaska Bar Convention and Genealogy Society about territorial lawyers

Pamela Cravez, Justice research associate and editor of the Alaska Justice Forum, gave a lunch-time talk at the 2017 Alaska Bar Association Annual Convention in Juneau, May 11, on her recently published book, The Biggest Damned Hat, Tales from Alaska's Territorial Lawyers and Judges. Lawyers and judges at the convention knew many of the territorial lawyers interviewed for the book. Cravez also spoke at the May meeting of the Anchorage Genealogy Society.

Tales from territorial lawyers featured at UAA Bookstore Thursday, April 13

Thursday, April 13 from 5:00 pm-7:00 pm at the UAA Campus Bookstore

Pamela Cravez, Alaska Justice Forum editor, presents her new book, The Biggest Dammed Hat.

The Biggest Damned Hat presents a fascinating collection of stories ranging from the gold rush to the 1950s.  Based upon legal research, oral histories, and interviews of more than 50 lawyers who came to Alaska prior to 1959, it provides new stories and perspectives on Alaska history from gold rush times to statehood.  It is published by University of Alaska Press.

There is free parking for this event in the South Lot, Sports Complex NW Lot, West Campus Central Lot, and Sports Campus West Lot

Tales from territorial lawyers and judges in new book

University of Alaska Press released The Biggest Damned Hat: Tales from Alaska's Territorial Lawyers and Judges by Pamela Cravez, editor of the Alaska Justice Forum and research associate at the Justice Center.

Built on interviews and oral histories from more than fifty lawyers who worked in Alaska before 1959, and buttressed by research into legal history, The Biggest Damned Hat provides new perspectives on Alaska history from gold rush times to statehood. Clubby, passionate and powerful, territorial lawyers developed their own brand of civil and criminal law in the face of uneven and, at times, unscrupulous federally appointed judges. Bringing to life a time long past—when some of the best lawyers had little formal legal education—The Biggest Damned Hat fills in a crucial part of Alaska’s history.

Pamela Cravez joins Justice Center

Pamela Cravez joins the Justice Center as editor of the Alaska Justice Forum and Research Associate. Ms. Cravez received her J.D. from Catholic University Law School and an M.F.A. in creative nonfiction from the University of Alaska Anchorage. She has worked as a public defender, communications director, reporter, writer, editor and researcher. Her book, The Biggest Damned Hat: Tales from Territorial Alaska’s Lawyers and Judges, will be released by the University of Alaska Press  April 2017.