The Juneau Arts & Humanities Council Board of Trustees addresses our ongoing commitment to cultural safety and inclusion.
JUNEAU, ALASKA (May 7, 2025) — The Juneau Arts & Humanities Council (JAHC) has been thoughtfully working on our cultural safety guidelines (also known as DEI statements) since late 2023.
The JAHC is committed to ongoing learning and practice inspired by the strength and resilience of our leaders, staff, and beneficiaries, past and present, who come from every part of this Juneau community. Inclusive of all of the values that exist in Juneau, the JAHC board also seeks to incorporate the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian core cultural values of Haa Latseení, Our Strength of Mind, Body, and Spirit, and Wooch.Yáx, Social and Spiritual Balance, to guide our work. The JAHC would not be where we are today without our current work, and the work of those leaders who came before us.
In February, the JAHC was notified by a federal funder that it should consider removing its DEI statements to protect future funding. The board hosted a fully-attended emergency meeting in response, where a lengthy and thoughtful conversation happened amongst trustees and executive leadership. When it became evident that a unanimous motion to fully preserve the JAHC’s DEI statements was not feasible, the board considered a motion to rephrase and recommit our policies internally, quietly, and intentionally, while temporarily removing language from our website. At that time, a unanimous decision could not be made to approve a path forward, but the board did designate a committee to reconfigure this language in more effective, strategic, and culturally responsive ways.
This work, which has been ongoing under our Arts and Cultural Safety Committee, composed of several arts leaders in our community along with our trustees, will culminate in transformative ways for the JAHC to continue to serve Juneau in fostering a strong, prosperous, and inclusive environment where creativity and innovation thrive.
An attack on inclusive practices is happening real-time in America. This, in practice, is an attack on small arts & culture organizations like the JAHC. Threatening this funding threatens the JAHC’s existence and strategic direction. The board felt vulnerable with both potential outcomes of this decision: comply with federal pressure, or lose the funding we need to enact equitable concepts through our programs. The very purpose of these directives from a federal level is to create lateral conflict. We understand experiencing anger surrounding these decisions, but do not want this to pit the JAHC against the communities we serve. It is vital to work together in our next steps. The JAHC board aims to listen deeply, learn more, and use this experience as a catalyst for further conversations.
The board looks forward to plans in the coming months to engage in strategic visioning, strategic planning, and purposeful conversations with our community so that we may define a path forward which is complementary with the rich and complex arts community of Juneau.
We encourage you to communicate your thoughts and feelings to us at info@jahc.org so that we might build resonance with the public of Juneau in our next steps.
Sincerely,
JAHC Board of Trustees