Alaska Natives & law enforcement

Members of a graduating class of Village Public Safety Officer (VPSO) trainees. Click on the picture to learn more.

     Law enforcement is the only justice service in Alaska delivered at least in part through local agencies. However, municipal and borough police departments exist only in those communities with the economic resources to support them. As of 1999, Alaska had 41 municipal and 2 borough police departments. In predominately Native Bush Alaska, law enforcement services are provide chiefly by the Alaska Department of Public Safety (see Alaska state law enforcement), Village Public Safety Officers (VSPOs) under Alaska State Trooper oversight (see Alaska VPSO Program), and (for the Bristol Bay and North Slope Boroughs), borough police departments (see Alaska local law enforcement). Some rural villages rely upon locally hired Village Police Officers (VPOs); other villages have both a VPSO and one or more VPOs, who assist the VPSO in his or her duties.
     On October 25, 1999, the Native American Rights Fund filed suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief against the Alaska Department of Public Safety and the Alaska Police Standards Council "for failure to provide minimally adequate police protection to off-road Native villages and for discriminating against them in the provision of State law enforcement services." The suit was filed on behalf of the Alaska Inter-tribal Council, the Alaska Native Justice Center, the Native communities and villages of Akiachak, Aleknagik, Chinik (Golovin), Clark's Point, Gambell, Kina, Teller, Tuluksak, and White Mountain, and several individuals. The case will be heard in Dillingham Superior Court, Third Judicial District.
     The resources collected here have been chosen for their relevance to Alaska Natives. For further information on law enforcement in Alaska, see Law Enforcement.

See also:
Law enforcement > Alaska state law enforcement

Law enforcement > Alaska local law enforcement

Law enforcement > Alaska VPSO program

American Indians > American Indians & law enforcement

Canada > First Nations > Aboriginal policing

Alaska Department of Public Safety
The Alaska Department of Public Safety is responsible for law enforcement throughout Alaska through two major divisions: The Alaska State Troopers provide law enforcement services to areas without local law enforcement agencies. Most of these 200 cities and villages are Alaska Native villages whose local economy is not adequate to support a police force. The Alaska Division of Fish and Wildlife Protection enforce game laws on state-owned lands. DPS also administers the Village Public Safety Officer (VPSO) program, which provides funding for local villages to train and hire their own public safety officers to assist the Alaska State Troopers in handling public safety and law enforcement problems.

• Alaska State Trooper Post Locations: Map of post locations and contact information for each post.
• See Alaska state law enforcement for further information on the Alaska Department of Public Safety.
• See Alaska VPSO Program for further information on Village Public Safety Officers (VPSOs).
• Justice Center, University of Alaska Anchorage. (Feb 1979). "Village Police Training." Alaska Justice Forum 3(2): 1, 12.

Borough Police Departments
The North Slope Borough Police Department and the Bristol Bay Borough Police Department each serve boroughs with large Native populations.

• North Slope Borough Police Department: The second largest municipal law enforcement agency in Alaska (after Anchorage), providing law enforcement services to the predominately Inupiat Eskimo communities of Barrow (the borough seat), Kaktovik, Nuiqsut, Anaktuvuk Pass, Atqasuk, Wainwright, Point Lay, Point Hope and the oil industrial complex at Prudhoe Bay. NSBPD serves a population of about 12,600 over an area of 88,281 square miles, a region larger than all but ten of the fifty states of the U.S.
• Bristol Bay Borough Police Department: Borough-wide police department serving a population of about 1,300, of whom 33 percent are Native, in an area of 1,200 square miles; based in King Salmon.

Justice Center projects

Wood, Darryl S. and Gruenewald, Paul J. (Mar 2006). "Local Alcohol Prohibition, Police Presence and Serious Injury in Isolated Alaska Native Villages." Addiction 101: 393-403.

Turnover Among Alaska Village Public Safety Officers (VPSOs): An Examination of the Factors Associated with Attrition (JC 9901). Darryl S. Wood. National Institute of Justice. 1998-2000.

• Turnover Among Alaska Village Public Safety Officers: An Examination of the Factors Associated with Attrition. Prepared under Grant No. 98-IJ-CX-0035 from the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. Anchorage: Justice Center, University of Alaska Anchorage, March 2000.
• "Officer Turnover in the Village Public Safety Officer Program" by Darryl S. Wood. Alaska Justice Forum 17(2), Summer 2000.
• "Explanations of Employment Turnover among Alaska Village Public Safety Officers" by Darryl Wood. Journal of Criminal Justice 30: 197-215 (2002).

Alaska Department of Public Safety Project (JC 9506). John E. Angell. Alaska Department of Public Safety. 1995.

• Public Safety and Policing in Alaska Native Villages: Component Three of Alaska Public Safety Project. Report prepared for the Alaska Department of Public Safety. Anchorage: University of Alaska Anchorage, Justice Center, 1995.
• "Village Alaska: Community Characteristics and Public Safety". Alaska Justice Forum 12(4), Winter 1996.
• "Public Safety: Shared Responsibility". Alaska Justice Forum 13(1), Spring 1996.

Analysis of Citizen Opinions Concerning the North Slope Borough Department of Public Safety (NSBDPS) (JC 9406). John E. Angell. North Slope Department of Public Safety. 1993.

• North Slope Department of Public Safety Community Survey. Report prepared for the North Slope Borough Department of Public Safety. Anchorage: University of Alaska Anchorage, Justice Center, March 1994.
• See Alaska VPSO Program for articles and reports on the Village Public Safety Officer (VPSO) program.

Additional resources

• Policing Options Available to First Nations in Canada. By Yves Dubé. Solicitor General Canada, April 7, 1995.