Sealaska shareholders will learn Saturday which of nine candidates will fill four seats on the Southeast regional Native corporation’s board of directors. They’ll also find out whether a term-limits measure will go into place.
Most of Sealaska’s 22,000 shareholders who will vote already have. Results will be announced during Sealaska’s annual meeting, Saturday at the Ketchikan High School gymnasium.
The board usually endorses a full slate of incumbents. But this year, the panel rejected one, attorney Patrick Anderson. He’s running again independently, as are well-known artists, business people, nonprofit administrators and a former high-level staffer.
The other independents are term-limits author and carver Mick Beasley, carver Doug Chilton, financial adviser Brad Fluetsch, Bartlett Regional Hospital Controller Karen Taug and former Sealaska Corporate Secretary Nicole Hallingstad, now operations director for the National Congress of American Indians.
The three board-endorsed members are Inside Passage Electric Cooperative CEO Jodi Mitchell, National Congress of American Indians Executive Director Jackie Johnson Pata and Tlingit and Haida Business Corp. CEO Richard Rinehart.
The term-limits measure would make incumbent board members step down after three, three-year terms. They would not be allowed to run again.
It’s supported by critics who say Sealaska has lost too much money and needs top-level changes. It’s opposed by the board, which says the corporation would lose important knowledge and history.
Similar term limit measures have failed in past years.
Read Sealaska’s full proxy ballot, including term-limits pros and cons and candidate statements.
