Editor's note: The following is an excerpt from a longer article by Cordelia Qiġnaaq Kellie, which can be found on the website Nalliq, meaning "to travel side by side," an online repository of stories and poetry about indigenous issues. www.nalliq.com.
The North Slope is a beautiful and complex place, composed of some of the most generous and loving people I know. However, like the rest of Alaska, there are challenges as well. It was these issues that the Attorney General of the United States sought to hear, and a small group of young Alaska Native leaders were invited to share experiences of how we have been exposed to these challenges in an authentic and unscripted way.
The hosts opened the meeting on June 10 in the Cook Inlet Tribal Council conference room and the first youth began to share her story, of sexual abuse and domestic violence, speaking to the attorney general, DOJ officials, media, and other Native leadership. The next echoed similar circumstances, personalized with the challenges in his community. The attorney general listened intently as we heard these raw, personal accounts of overcoming homelessness and poverty, racial discrimination, and striving to thrive while battling immense abuse, violence and trauma. Eight stories of tremendous adversity yielded eight accounts of overcoming the darkest aspects of our state, before it was my turn to share.
I spoke of how we never used to know suicide. We never used to know displacement. Some think that these issues exist because of who we are as Alaska Natives, and that is not the truth. We never used to be this way. This is not normal. Our great hope is in how this has happened to us so recently, within the realm of living memory. My great vision for our people is that in 100 years we will look back and think about how in the entire timeline of our peoples, all of this was that one weird thing that happened to us that one time.
I also told her how when I got to Barrow after working in the Legislature this spring, my good friend told me, "All charges for crimes less than a felony have been dropped for a year." I asked how that could be possible. "I'm not sure, but it's been this way since the DA's office here shut down last summer," he said.
At every opportunity, I talked and asked about crime and justice issues here. One friend told me of how she woke up to someone unbuttoning and unzipping her pants. She chased him out of her house, called the cops and nothing was done.
I had heard enough to be direct about getting additional information, so I met with a senior representative of the North Slope Borough Police Department. I asked about what I was hearing and he shared that he was seeing bail, fines, sweet deals and yes, dropped charges because of the case loads and budget cuts.
As my information increased, so did my indignation. I placed a call to the office of the Fairbanks District Attorney where I told a senior representative that I had heard that cases were not being prosecuted for a year. He said, "That is completely untrue." But with the senior representative hoping to dispel inaccurate notions, it was the truth that was more frustrating than fiction.
Because of the fiscal crisis and financial constraints, they can only take the cases they can afford to prosecute. They have to take the "best cases," as in, the airtight ones, because if there is any case that requires additional resources, they have to be conscious of how they expend their funds. And as he told me, if there is a crime that happens on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta and they have to fly in witnesses, they were going to ask themselves, "Can we afford to prosecute?"
I shared this story with the United States attorney general and told the room that this speaks to the very heart of inequity in our state.
I understand that the Fairbanks DA's office is doing its best. But if its best still means the state cannot afford to prosecute cases, then the best is not good enough. This is not working for the Fairbanks DA's office. It is not working for the North Slope Borough. And having a friend's pants unzipped, with no just outcome – this is not working for me. That the justice system has to consider whether it can afford to prosecute is an outrage.
There are 10,000 residents in the North Slope Borough. Where else in the United States would 10,000 citizens receive this rate of protection? Some think, "You choose to live in rural Alaska; what do you expect?" and think rural Alaska is a drain on Alaska's resources; however, 90 percent of Alaska's revenue actually originates in rural Alaska.
Having worked this spring in Juneau for a state senator on the Finance Committee, I understand why and how the state is making cuts. But if Alaska's residents suffer at the hands of the justice system due to the fiscal crisis, let us equally suffer.
Equity is the least that rural Alaska deserves. Rural Alaska does not want special treatment; rural Alaska asks for equal treatment. How base, that justice in our state is so tied to budget and income. Because, no matter where you are, justice should not belong only to those who can afford it.
Cordelia Qiġnaaq Kellie is an Alaska Native community and rural advocate, writer, publisher of the website Nalliq and UAF graduate student with a policy focus in the Rural Development MA program. Raised in Wasilla, she is of Iñupiaq and Scottish heritage and her family is from Wainwright and Washington.
The views expressed here are the writer's own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary@alaskadispatch.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@alaskadispatch.com or click here to submit via any web browser.