Anchorage Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Forum Podcasts

Andrew Halcro currently hosts a blog on politics, life, and entertainment called With All Due Respect.  He served two terms as a Republican member of the Alaska House of Representatives from 1998 to 2002 and was a candidate for governor and mayor. He is currently Chairman of the Board of Avis Rent a Car of Alaska, one of the state's oldest and most successful family-owned businesses. He became president of the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce in 2012 and served as executive director of the Anchorage Community Development Authority from 2015 until 2021. 

Larry Persily has worked in journalism and public service in Alaska for more than 45 years, growing increasingly cynical. He currently owns the weekly newspaper in Wrangell, assists other Southeast weekly newspapers, and writes opinion columns for the Anchorage Daily News in the delusional hope that people will read them, rise, and tell their elected officials: "Tax me!"

Robert Alexander earned his Ph.D. in Music and Technology from the University of Michigan.  As a NASA Fellow, he collaborated with scientists at the Goddard Space Flight Center to transform our understanding of the sun and solar wind through auditory data analysis, leading to numerous publications in the field of space physics. By day, he is the co-founder and CEO of Auralab Technologies Inc., whose Breathscape app supports deep meditative states by transforming breath into music through biofeedback. By night, he infuses music with solar data and works with the NASA-funded HARP team to bring the captivating sounds of the Themis satellite to citizen scientists around the globe.

There were videos used throughout Robert's presentation, and he provided access to these via Dropbox. If you click on the Video Files (Dropbox) link below, you will be taken to Robert Alexander's Dropbox folder Movie_Files, and you will see a depiction of the video files arrayed in the order that he used them in his presentation. As you listen to his presentation, Robert "announces" the start of each individual video, and you can start the video on your computer to follow along. NOTE - You do NOT have to join Dropbox to use these videos!

Video Files -
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/oz40yytcgkkm7512b4m8w/h?rlkey=ety6pg0pzco31ik830ibegq10&dl=0

HARP Citizen Science Project -
https://listen.spacescience.org/aboutHARP.html

The Breathscape App:
http://breathscape.com/

Chris Rose is the founder and Executive Director of Renewable Energy Alaska Project (REAP), a non-profit coalition of diverse energy stakeholder organizations working to increase renewable energy development and promote energy efficiency across Alaska. Before establishing REAP in 2004, Mr. Rose had a private law practice for over a decade, including work in remote Northwest Arctic villages and mediation of various disputes around the state. He has written a monthly opinion column for Alaska's only statewide newspaper and served on various statewide boards, including the state's Renewable Energy Fund Advisory Committee. Since 2008, that Fund has granted over $300 million to 90 renewable energy projects that today are displacing the equivalent of 30 million gallons of diesel fuel each year. Since 1992, he has lived 65 miles northeast of Anchorage, where he and his partner grow flowers and apples.


Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/fpktnu3vgildj52idkzm4/ChrisRose.pdf?rlkey=4uhbmq4t88dbjy3rbw2bym1xj&dl=0

Kate Troll is an author, op-ed columnist, wilderness adventurer, and speaker on conservation and climate issues. She has over 22 years of experience in fisheries, coastal management, and climate and energy policy. She is the former Executive Director of United Fishermen of Alaska and Alaska Conservation Voters. She has been elected to local office twice. Her opinion pieces have been published in the Washington Post, the L.A. Times, and the Nation. She was a regular columnist for Alaska's only statewide paper for three years. In 2017, Kate published a creative nonfiction book that combined wilderness adventure stories with lessons and insights about sustainability and climate change. Her book, The Great Unconformity, Reflections on Hope in an Imperiled World, led to her being invited as faculty at the Chuckanut Writers Conference in Bellingham, Washington.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ynb77pmbma2mkza2d7fas/All-in-Due-Time.pdf?rlkey=202y7j62ma8n8lvtd920k0i71&dl=0

Dan ONeill was born and raised in San Francisco, graduated from the University of California at Berkeley, and moved to Alaska at age twenty-five.  He worked construction, studied poetry, built log cabins, hunted, fished, trapped, and ran dogs.  As a research associate at the oral history program, University of Alaska Fairbanks, he produced radio and television documentaries for public broadcasting. He wrote three books of nonfiction: The Firecracker Boys (for which he was named Alaska Historian of the Year), The Last Giant of Beringia, and A Land Gone Lonesome.  He wrote a political opinion column for the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner for several years.  In 2021, the University of Alaska Fairbanks awarded ONeill the honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree.

Dan's slides can be found here as PDF - https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ceh1rugyc0q8kb0b88jfi/AnchUUsPwrPtPics1.pdf?rlkey=0w8vnekr63xfhxjh6u7u2x8wr&dl=0

Another good link - akhopecongress.org

Dr. Bill Cox is a board-certified diagnostic radiologist who practiced medicine for over three decades before retiring in 2015. He attended college and med school, did his residency in Michigan, and has worked in numerous hospitals and clinics since then throughout Alaska and several Western states.  He's also presented papers and lectures at numerous conferences throughout the world. Bill has traveled extensively, particularly throughout Alaska and Asia, and has met an incredible array of interesting people, from a Japanese medical student he met as a college student bumming through Europe and later climbed Fuji-san with an Athabaskan elder and chief, from Mongolians in the Gobi Desert, and a dumpster-diving street person in Anchorage, to the Dalai Lama. He has written about many of these encounters in his book, My Pursuit of the Axis of Evil and Other True Stories from Asia and Alaska, published earlier this year.

Alex Mar is a writer based in her hometown of New York City and in upstate New York. Her first book, Witches of America, was a New York Times Notable Book and Editors Pick in nonfiction. Her second nonfiction book, Seventy Times Seven, was recently published after five years of immersive research and writing and has been praised in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, New York Magazine, and The New York Times (Editors Choice), among others. Some of her journalism and essays have appeared in The Believer, Wired, New York Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, The Guardian, Elle, The Virginia Quarterly Review, The Oxford American, The Best American Magazine Writing, and the Ecco anthology Unspeakable Acts. Formerly an editor at Rolling Stone, she has been a guest correspondent for CBS, ABC, National Public Radio, and the BBC. She is also the director of the feature-length documentary American Mystic. Mar is a first-generation American of Cuban and Greek descent. https://alex-mar.com/

Dermot Cole has been a newspaper reporter, columnist, and author in Alaska for over 40 years. For two decades, he wrote a daily column for the Fairbanks Daily News Miner while penning several history books. More recently, he served as a political reporter and columnist at the Alaska Dispatch News. Since the paper was sold, he's continued working as a journalist through his political blog, Reporting from Alaska, where he's broken several exclusive and important stories regarding the Dunleavy administration.

David Reamer is an academic and public scholar interested in the intersections of social justice, history, and community construction. David is the co-author, with Dr. Ian Hartmann, of the book Black Lives in Alaska: An African American History of the Far Northwest, published last year by the University of Washington Press. His other publications include journal and magazine articles on topics ranging from Jewish Alaska history to baseball to waffles, and his Histories of Anchorage series appears weekly in the Anchorage Daily News. Current research topics include the presentation of history on social media and early LGBT+ history in Alaska.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/tgbbw3aar6ymq1s/FairviewPresentation.pdf?dl=0

Speaker notes for slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/1x6ymgzk9sagkui/FairviewPresentation_verbiage.pdf?dl=0

Jessica Downes is a Nurse Consultant working in the Section of Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion for the State of Alaska.  Jessie works in the Health Systems Collaboration unit and specifically focuses on conditions and programs designed to assist the healthcare system to identify, treat and prevent chronic diseases.  Jessie works to partner with individuals, the community, and with the clinical system to deliver chronic disease management and prevention programs to Alaskans through a variety of in-person and digital platforms.  Jessie has two boys, Jonathan and Lucas, who are two and four.  She and her husband love hiking, canoeing, camping, and spending time outdoors.  Jessie is also a bit of a Star Trek geek, and you may have noticed that she named her boys “John-Luke” in honor of her favorite character (Jean Luc).

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/gb32ffiya14ovxe/FreshStartIntroduction-GeneralConference.pdf?dl=0

Note that the Forum formally ends at the 1:09:17 mark. But there is some interesting chatter that takes place after that.

Scott Kendall is an experienced litigator, appellate advocate, and strategic consultant. Among his specialties is campaign and election law, and he has represented candidates for local, statewide, and national office as well as industry coalitions, non-profits, ballot measure groups, and independent campaign expenditure organizations (known as super PACs). Scott was counsel to U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski's historic 2010 write-in campaign for reelection and also served as Campaign Coordinator for her 2016 reelection campaign. From 2016 to 2018, he served as Chief of Staff to Alaska Governor Bill Walker. Scott drafted a 2014 statewide ballot measure aimed at protecting the Bristol Bay salmon fishery and more recently authored, litigated, and advised the successful ballot measure campaign to improve Alaska's statewide election system, featuring a Top 4 open primary election along with Ranked Choice Voting in the general.  He earned his bachelor's degree from Western Washington University and his law degree from the University of Washington School of Law. Scott is a board member of STAR Alaska and serves as Vice Chair of the board of the Institute of the North.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/vazpuaqoffwp87i/2022ElectionsRecap.pdf?dl=0

Darrel Hess is the Ombudsman for the Municipality of Anchorage. He has called Anchorage home since 1965 and has lived in Fairview since 1987.  Darrels public service career started in April 2008 when he was hired by Mayor Mark Begich to work on community-based projects in the Office of Economic & Community Development. In September 2009, Mayor Dan Sullivan appointed Darrel as Anchorage's first Homeless Coordinator. In July 2012, the Anchorage Assembly confirmed Darrel as Anchorage Municipal Ombudsman, and he was reappointed in 2012, 2014, 2018, and 2020. The Municipal Ombudsman serves as an independent, impartial reviewer of constituent complaints and concerns and makes recommendations to the Assembly and Mayor regarding Municipal codes, policies, and procedures.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/3kqf0je1g4spm4j/2022Ombudsman%27sOffice.pdf?dl=0

Andrew Gray was elected to the Alaska State House of Representatives in 2022 to represent the UMED District in Anchorage. He serves on the Judiciary, Ways & Means, and Military & Veterans Affairs committees. During his first session in Juneau, he brought forward legislation related to housing and homelessness and carried Senate Bill 119 in the House, which requires the Department of Corrections to provide valid photo ID to all incarcerated people upon their release; the bill passed both chambers unanimously. He also co-chairs the Freshmen Caucus with Rep. Justin Ruffridge of Soldotna. Outside the Capitol, he is a physician assistant at Alaska Urgent Care and in the Alaska Army National Guard, with whom he deployed to Kosovo in 2019. He hosts two podcasts: East Anchorage Book Club and East Anchorage Matters, which feature interviews with Alaskans of political interest. He and his husband Jay and their 9-year-old son Waylon have been members of AUUF since 2017.

Justin Ruffridge was elected to the Alaska House of Representatives in 2022 to serve the Kenai/ Soldotna area. His parents, both educators, moved their family to Alaska in 1994, where they taught at a small Christian school. Justin graduated from high school in 2001 and Washington State University with a Doctor of Pharmacy degree in 2008.  He married his wife Jessie in 2004, and after graduation, they moved back to the Kenai Peninsula to help care for Jessies terminally ill mother. Justin began his pharmacy career at Soldotna Professional Pharmacy, and in the years since, he and a business partner acquired the Soldotna Pharmacy, the Juneau Drug Company in downtown Juneau, and the Alpine Apothecary Pharmacy in Girdwood. Justin was briefly on the Soldotna Planning and Zoning Commission before serving on the Soldotna City Council. He has advocated for those struggling to find housing and worked diligently on Covid prevention, mitigation, and treatment efforts during the pandemic. He enjoys coaching Little League.

Slides -https://www.dropbox.com/s/24mfv6r934h6cso/FreshmanSlides_Gray%26Ruffridge.pdf?dl=0

Eric Stroshane has twenty years of experience working in public, special, and academic libraries. He currently provides the American Library Associations Office for Intellectual Freedom challenge support, database maintenance, and assistance with publications as part of their efforts to combat censorship and defend the freedom to read. He is the news editor for the Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy, curates a weekly news compilation for Alas's Intellectual Freedom Blog, and is a former president of the Mountain Plains Library Association. He has delivered training and presentations on intellectual freedom issues for library directors, staff, board members, and the general public nationwide.  He holds a Masters degree in Library Science from Indiana University Bloomington, an MA in English from the University at Buffalo, and a BA in English from Pennsylvania State University. In his life beyond library walls, Eric is an electronic musician, mountain biker, kayaker, hiker, dog-lover, and yogi.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/uzifqxbgiaa6u2x/LibraryBooksUnderFire.pdf?dl=0

Dr. Jharrett Bryantt is the Superintendent of the Anchorage School District.  Prior to joining ASD in the summer of 2022, Dr. Bryantt was an executive officer at the Houston Independent School District, leading efforts to attract, retain, evaluate, and competitively compensate talent for the nation’s 7th largest school district. In 2019 Forbes Magazine’s named him as one of 30 education leaders to watch, and in 2021 it listed him as one of 50 champions for advancing communities of color. He holds doctoral and master’s degrees in educational leadership and policy from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Science from Yale University. He serves on the Junior Achievement of Alaska board and the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce board of directors. He is a core member of United Way of Anchorage’s Cradle to Career initiative. Dr. Bryantt was born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, and is proud to call Anchorage his home.    https://www.asdk12.org/superintendent

Dr. Arleigh Reynolds is a veterinarian, professor of clinical nutrition, Senior Scientist and Director of the One Health Initiative at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Associate Dean of UAFs College of Natural Science and Mathematics, and a World Champion sled dog racer.  He has published prolifically and holds a doctor of veterinary medicine degree and a Ph.D. in veterinary medicine from Cornell University.  He specialized in researching the relationship between nutrition and performance in sport dogs. He served as the associate dean of UAF's Department of Veterinary Medicine, before being appointed Director of One Health in 2018.  Now he is working on the future of global health, through One Health's holistic, integrated, multidisciplinary approach to studying, understanding, and managing issues related to environmental, human, and animal health.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/2o9llmn712337wv/ArleighReynoldsPPT_5-28-2023.pdf?dl=0

Links -
https://www.uaf.edu//onehealth/
https://waywework.com/podcasts-and-events/dr-arleigh-reynolds-on-creating-a-career-of-passion-purpose-and-impact
https://www.alaska.edu/orgcharts/uaf/vc-research/dir.-one-heath-arleigh-re/
https://www.uaf.edu/vmed/about/steering-committee/reynolds-arleigh/index.php

Alyse Galvin represents House District 14—Spenard, Rogers Park, and Midtown—in the 33rd Alaska Legislature, where she serves on the House Finance Committee. Alyse was elected to the state House of Representatives as an independent. Also, she was an independent candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2018 and 2020, running with the endorsement of the Alaska Democratic Party against Rep. Don Young in his final two races. Alyse is a third-generation Alaskan who grew up in a family that battled addiction, mental illness, and abuse, but she broke that cycle. She served Alaska under Republican and Independent governors. She led a non-partisan grassroots movement to restore education funding and improve our public schools, helping grow that organization from 40 to 4,000 strong. She has owned two small businesses and was a manager of a major hotel in Anchorage. Alyse is a graduate of the University of California San Diego. She and her husband Pat are proud parents of four.

Slides - https://www.dropbox.com/s/x2rg3pmw3r3u5b1/230521-AUUF%20Presentation-New%20Revenue.pdf?dl=0

Cathleen McLaughlin has worked in law and advocacy for 35 years. In 2014, she became the Director of the Partners Reentry Center, a community-based center that provided pre- and post-release reentry services to vulnerable individuals who would otherwise release from incarceration to homelessness. This experience inspired her to open Restorative and Reentry Services in 2016 to provide guidance to communities around the United States seeking to create their own community-based reentry programs. In April 2020, RRS was hired to manage the emergency homeless shelter at the Sullivan Arena for the operator, Beans Cafe. During the height of the pandemic, it was the largest congregate shelter in the US. The Municipality hired RSS in March to provide oversight of the Sullivan Arena emergency shelter and the two remaining hotels housing otherwise homeless individuals in preparation for their expected closing and is also advising about homeless policy after the closure of these facilities. Cathleen received both her law degree and her MBA from Willamette University in Salem, Oregon. She also holds a bachelor's degree in History/Political Science from the University of Montana.

Jared Huffman is a member of the United States Congress, representing California's 2nd Congressional District, which stretches from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Oregon border. First elected in 2012, he serves on the Natural Resources and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committees. Jared founded the Congressional Freethought Caucus to promote sound public policy based on reason, science, and moral values while protecting the secular character of government and championing the value of freedom of thought worldwide. Before serving in Congress, Jared represented the
North Bay for six years in the California Assembly. Before that, he worked as a Senior Attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) after a successful stint as a public interest attorney.  Jared graduated magna cum laude from U.C. Santa Barbara, where he was a three-time NCAA All-American volleyball player. He played for the USA Volleyball Team, ranked #1 in the world, before graduating cum laude from Boston College Law School. Jared lives in San Rafael with his wife, Susan, a teacher, and their two children, Abby and Nathan.

For more, see - https://huffman.house.gov/meet-Jared

Washington Post article = https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2017/11/09/this-lawmaker-is-skeptical-that-god-exists-now-hes-finally-decided-to-tell-people/