By KLAS STOLPE
Sentinel Staff Writer
Concerns about Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s proposed budget, and the effects it could have on various state-funded programs, have prompted discussion in Sitka among constituencies of those programs, from the Pioneers Home to the ferry system.
However, less thought has been given to how a cut from one area could affect another, says UAS Sitka Campus Director Leslie Gordon.
“Organizations, businesses and non-profits operating in the community of Sitka are interconnected in many ways,” Gordon said. “For instance, the Sheldon Jackson Museum is utilized by our schools for education on Alaska history and Northwest Coast and Alaska arts programs. UAS and K-12 partner to offer dual enrollment courses for high school students to receive college credit while still in high school. Health care facilities and social service organizations depend on Medicaid payments for ongoing services as well as the local bus system and ferries for patient transportation. The villages rely on public radio for emergency notifications. The list goes on and on.”
The Sheldon Jackson Museum. (Sentinel File Photo)
To highlight this interconnectedness, UAS Sitka Campus is hosting a town hall-style event, and dessert potluck, entitled “Sitka Connected: Our Interwoven Community,” from 7-9 p.m. Thursday, April 11, in Room 229 at UAS. This event will explore the value of local organizations and the impact of the governor’s proposed budget cuts.
Several panels made up of local organizations will discuss what they bring to the community and how each affects the local population. Panels will be featured in social services, arts and non-profits, health care and education.
Speakers will come from Sitkans Against Family Violence, Center for Community, Youth Advocates of Sitka, Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association, Sitka Conservation Society, public broadcasting, Sheldon Jackson Museum, Brave Heart Volunteers, Sitka Community Hospital, Sitka Counseling, Southeast Alaska Independent Living, the Sitka School District, Mt. Edgecumbe High School, UAS, and Wooch.een Pre-school, among others.
Each panelist will have about 2 minutes to talk, and each panel will take questions from the public, Gordon said. When the panels have finished, there will be a chance to discuss what can be done to support the community.
“Everyone in Sitka has their own story on our interconnectivity and effects of budget cuts,” Gordon said. “From the selling of the new aquatic center, increased rates at the Pioneer Home, privatizing the ferry system, losing the $1 million a year from the fish tax for our harbors, and to education.”
Dunleavy’s proposed cuts in education funding would cause severe problems for the Sitka school district, where officials are facing decisions on laying off teachers, eliminating programs and increasing classroom size.
“This is where I fly my K-12 colors,” Keet Gooshi Heen elementary teacher Rebecca Himschoot said.
Himschoot, appointed by Gov. Bill Walker to the State Board of Education in 2016, was replaced by Dunleavy even though her term on the board was to end in 2021.
“Alaska’s constitution requires adequacy in the K-12 system, but only states a university should exist,” she said. “For that reason I feel like the branch campuses across the state could close and we would still fulfill our constitutional obligation. However, there are economic impacts from lost jobs, of course, and impact to the dual enrollment classes Sitka High School kids are enrolling in at increasing numbers… not to mention the many ways the community engages with the university locally.”
While the possibility of closing campuses has been mentioned as a result of Dunleavy’s funding cuts to the University of Alaska system, the University Board of Regents has not yet made decisions on that possibility.
Even so, local advocates point to the valuable programs the Sitka campus of University of Alaska Southeast provides to Sitka, and which may be threatened under the Dunleavy budget: associate of arts and associate of science degrees; Training for Certified Nurse Assistants and medical assistants and nurses; fisheries; occupational endorsements such as welding and construction; dual enrollment and college readiness Sitka Start; art studio; and distance education, as well as employment for a 44-person staff.
“The severity of the current proposed budget cuts threatens to pit people against each other,” Gordon said. “By default, some people think that supporting K-12 means you don’t support the ferry, or if you support the university you don’t support the fish tax. But that’s not what we want. It can’t be like the Hunger Games where we all have to fend for ourselves. We are a community, and we have to be strong together.”
Gordon cited the work of a monthly meeting called “Wooch.een” (“working together” in Tlingit) at Sitka Community Hospital. This group, headed by the hospital’s director of health promotions, Doug Osborn, involved organizations by highlighting what they do and how they work together, such as Youth Advocates working with Sitka Counseling to provide an LBGTQ group.
“Cuts this drastic to this many organizations would mean a loss of our population,” Gordon said. “Then the cost of living could increase. People have said Sitka will just turn into a Disneyland in the summer, it will fold up its sidewalks in the winter because no one can afford to live here.”
