Alaska Native and tribal affairs: governance, ANCSA regional corporations, subsistence rights, language, and cultural preservation. Spans roughly 20% of Alaska's population and every major policy domain the state touches.
Tribal and state leaders toured four remote Interior villages by boat to hear directly about housing, healthcare, and infrastructure needs that often get overlooked from a distance.
Alaska's spring subsistence bird harvest is older than the U.S. — and a 1916 treaty effectively banned it until 1997. This week's update continues a hunt Native communities never gave up.
Rain and cooler air are headed for Interior Alaska this weekend — a real break for fire crews who've spent weeks protecting cabins, fish camps, and allotments.
Sullivan's sweeping bycatch bill targets trawl salmon catch — a real and raw grievance, even as federal science pins Alaska's river collapses mostly on a warming ocean.
Tanana Chiefs Conference recognized three new Community Health Aides for Tetlin, Dot Lake, and the Upper Tanana — often the closest thing to a doctor for miles.
House passed legislation allowing Alaska Native artists to sell walrus-ivory handicrafts nationwide, overriding state bans that had criminalized traditional art protected under federal marine-mammal law.
Southcentral Foundation hosts a free two-day Traditional Foods Gathering July 27 and 28 in Anchorage, treating Alaska Native harvests as medicine and health, not just culture.
Nalukataq celebrations honoring bowhead whale hunts move across five northern Alaska communities from mid-June through early July, distributing whale meat and muktuk to mark the tradition.
Tlingit beader Renee Culp presents a lecture Tuesday in Juneau on a clan robe depicting an ancestor's battle with a giant octopus, a piece that will become sacred Tlingit property.
Moose hide tanning, fiddle dancing, CPR, and naloxone — TCC's youth summit taught Interior kids their traditions and how to save a life, all in one weekend.
Interior Alaska Native youth, ages 12 to 24, closed a four-day leadership summit near Fairbanks by naming six priorities to guide their communities in the year ahead.
NOAA confirmed the Seward whale was a 61-foot pregnant fin whale found on a cruise ship's bow. A necropsy is underway, and federal law enforcement is investigating.
Sealaska Heritage Institute opened Celebration 2026 in Juneau on Wednesday with traditional canoe arrivals from eight Southeast Alaska communities and speeches centered on cultural resilience and overcoming external and internal challenges.
by Melinda Communities.Newsadded 3w ago2 min readAI
Alaska Supreme Court upheld termination of parental rights for two Native children, clarifying courts must meet criminal-level proof and show active efforts to preserve families under federal Indian Child Welfare Act rules.
Alaska Native artists can apply through July 15 for a First Peoples Fund fellowship that provides grant money, business training, and mentoring to help independent artists build sustainable livelihoods.
Two Alaska Native corporations have summer scholarship deadlines — part of how ANCSA's land-settlement corporations quietly fund the education of the generations that followed.
Trump administration stalls new 8(a) applications for Alaska Native corporations amid fraud review. • 2024 lawsuit challenges whether special contracting treatment for Alaska Native firms is constitutional. • Program generated 13.5 billion dollars in revenue in 2022 and employs roughly 50,000 people worldwide.
by Alaska Newsadded 3w ago2 min readAI
The Petroleum Club of Anchorage, 3301 C Street, Anchorage
Ten Alaska Native cultural objects held at a Maine museum must be claimed by July 4, 2026, or transfer to Alaska tribes may proceed under federal repatriation law.
Democrat Mary Peltola released a Senate campaign fisheries platform calling for a ban on factory trawling and tribal seats on the North Pacific Fishery Management Council. • Peltola, a former U.S. representative and fishing boat captain, cited declining salmon returns as urgency for the reforms. • The platform also proposes freezing the Federal Subsistence Board's current composition and expanding electronic monitoring for bycatch.
Doyon and Tanana Chiefs Conference warned that shipping disruptions are raising fuel costs in Interior Alaska, urging villages to order early during the brief barge season before rivers freeze.
Alaska Supreme Court ruled in Jace B. case that state caseworkers must meet a higher active-efforts standard under federal Indian Child Welfare Act when confirming a newborn's tribal status before any move to terminate parental rights.
Alaska Native leaders demanded Tribal co-management of salmon at a national Indigenous conference, citing food security and cultural crises from collapsed runs on Arctic, Yukon, and Kuskokwim rivers. • Subsistence communities have gone years without harvesting salmon while bearing the burden of conservation restrictions. • Current federal and state frameworks exclude Tribes from binding decision authority despite their sovereignty and stewardship responsibilities.
Chitina dipnet fishery opens for a full week starting Monday, June 15, despite sonar counts running about 5,600 salmon below projection for early June.
Federal wildlife officials renamed the Upper Copper River subsistence bird-harvest region as Ahtna Territory and aligned spring and summer harvest dates to match local Indigenous Knowledge.
Alaska Federation of Natives marks 60 years with a convention centered on the 1971 land-claims settlement that created the organization and the political voice of Alaska Native communities today.
Huna Totem Corporation, the Alaska Native village corporation for Hoonah, is expanding its cruise business by adding its own vessels to a fleet that already operates ports across Southeast Alaska.
by Alaska News6h ago1 min readAI
