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Created by Congress in 2004 (Public Law 108-199), the Alaska Rural Justice and Law Enforcement Commission was charged with the task of studying four broad areas related to rural Alaska: law enforcement, judicial services, alcohol importation and interdiction, and domestic violence and child abuse. Meetings and public hearings were held from early October 2004 through June 2005, and the Commission also established four workgroups of professionals, experts, and officials working in fields related to these four topics, numbering 50 Alaskans in all. The workgroups met weekly from January 2005 through April 2005 and developed options that the Commission reviewed. In reviewing these options, which totaled over 100, the Commission also considered the many hours of public testimony offered in hearings held across the Alaska. The options it adopted were organized into one of the following nine general recommendations.
1. Engage in More Partnering and Collaboration
One of the most significant outcomes of the Commission’s work was engendering collaboration between a broad spectrum of stakeholders in trying to address the four issues before the Commission. Given the dearth of resources and the daunting nature of the problems it was charged to address, the Commission urges more collaboration between the various governments involved. It specifically recommends collaboration on developing a number of agreements that could better coordinate law enforcement and judicial services in rural Alaska.
2. Make Systemic Changes to Improve Rural Law Enforcement
Responding to its first charge, the Commission offers several recommendations to improve law enforcement in rural Alaska, including the development of a statewide, uniform, and tiered system of certification and training for police and public safety officers with a reasonable opportunity for advancement that could culminate in qualifications to seek full police certification by the Alaska Police Standards Council. It further recommends expansion of police and public safety training, changes in state law to help law enforcement reduce the importation of alcohol into dry rural Alaska villages, and a ban on written order sales of alcoholic beverages to dry or damp communities.
3. Enlarge the Use of Community-based Solutions
The Commission was impressed with the public testimony and evidence that demonstrated the importance (and success) of approaches responding to the immediate and cultural needs of the community that are locally driven. In this vein, the Commission recommends amending state statute to allow the Division of Juvenile Justice to delegate its authority to tribes to enable the sharing of resources with respect to tribal juvenile offenders, with other amendments to permit tribes to participate in juvenile proceedings and juvenile delinquency treatment. It further recommends expanded funding to help non-profit organizations and rural Alaska communities develop new programs at the local level to increase prevention intervention and treatment of domestic violence and child abuse. Noting that housing Alaska’s inmates in out-of-state facilities is a weak point in the State’s correctional system, the Commission asks the Department of Corrections to explore other options, including working with Native regional corporations, to keep inmates in Alaska. Also, to help reduce the amount of alcohol reaching dry communities, the Commission recommends the establishment of alcohol distribution centers, such as the one in Barrow, in damp hub communities, restricting alcohol sales to residents of those communities only.
4. Broaden the Use of Prevention Approaches
The Commission concluded that there are insufficient prevention approaches in rural Alaska. The Commission recommends expanding culturally appropriate programs to reduce the demand for alcohol in rural Alaska, starting with youth, linking youth with adults in healthy activities, and providing more information to schools for first-time misdemeanor alcohol/drug related offenders. Expansion should also include more education, prevention, and early intervention programs targeting domestic violence and child abuse in rural Alaska, as well as the development of new prevention curricula to be implemented in kindergarten through eighth grade, teaching respect, establishing interpersonal relationships, and including a component on healthy behavior and the importance of remaining drug free.
5. Broaden the Use of Therapeutic Approaches
Although there are a number of programs in rural Alaska that target the problems of substance abuse, domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, and sexual abuse, all of which are routinely tied to the consequences of substance abuse in rural Alaska, there is a great need to expand therapeutic approaches, as related in the following recommendations. Alcohol/drug abuse treatment programs should be expanded in rural Alaska, with a system of longer-term residential care in hub communities (including programs for women with children) matched with a network of aftercare services in rural villages. Substance abuse, mental health, and dual diagnosis treatment options for youth also need to be strengthened, as well as therapeutic courts, and group homes for children in need of aid who are not appropriate for or unable to access foster care. By changing regulations to allow close relatives caring for children in need of aid to receive the same level of financial reimbursement that non-relatives now receive the availability of care in rural Alaska could be greatly expanded.
6. Increase Employment of Rural Residents in Law Enforcement and Judicial Services
In the face of significant overrepresentation of Alaska Natives from rural communities who encounter legal problems with law enforcement and an even greater overrepresentation of Alaska Natives in the correctional system in Alaska, there is a great – and growing – need to recruit and employ Alaska Natives in these systems. Noting that modeling is important in rehabilitation, as is cultural identity, the Commission recommends the implementation of a focused recruitment effort to bring more Alaska Natives (and other rural Alaskans) into the correctional, law enforcement, and public safety workforce. It also recommends increasing the training and utilization of Village Public Safety Officers as probation officers in the villages and contracting with tribes to oversee community service work, which would increase the supervision of offenders on probation and parole in rural Alaska.
7. Build Additional Capacity
The Commission reviewed a multitude of indicators that pointed to the relative lack of infrastructure to support police and public safety functions in rural Alaska, which in turn has a detrimental effect on recruitment and retention of officers. Specifically, the Commission recommends improvements and expansion in housing for police and public safety officers; increased availability of appropriate intra-community transportation; more law enforcement offices and holding facilities in rural Alaska; and improved law enforcement equipment. There are also recommendations for improved and expanded training, and the development of a standardized statewide data system to document and monitor law enforcement investigations in rural Alaska.
8. Increase Access to Judicial Services
The Commission found that residents of rural Alaska do not have access to sufficient civil legal assistance to redress legal problems related to domestic violence and child abuse and recommends enhanced funding to respond to this need. It also recommends the increased use of tribal courts, and training and technical assistance to judges and support staff in the Alaska Court System and in tribal courts to inform and instruct participants in both systems to be aware of and value the cultural differences in rural Alaska.
9. Expand the Use of New Technologies
Alaska enjoys the most sophisticated telehealth system in the world, the Alaska Federal Health Care Access Network (AFCHAN), but in the hundreds of rural Alaska villages that are incorporated into the AFCHAN, other organizations do not have access to the already-in-place broadband capabilities that are available in their community. To remedy this situation and improve communication within the law enforcement and judicial systems in rural Alaska, the Commission recommends changing current regulations to allow rural police, public safety officers, and court officers to utilize this bandwidth. The Commission also recommends that the Department of Corrections explore the use of new electronic monitoring technology, utilizing the Global Positioning System, for rural Alaskan probationers, and that the Alcohol Beverage Control Board develop a statewide database for all alcohol written orders for the new community distribution centers.
Finally, noting the importance of consistent monitoring and evaluation of the implementation of its recommendations, the Commissioners ask that Congress extend their appointments or authorize the creation of a successor commission to oversee implementation, continue the dialog among justice stakeholders that has been nurtured by the Commission, conduct additional research, monitor the recommended pilot projects, and evaluate the impact of these new and expanded activities into the future.
