Chilkat Valley News - Serving Haines and Klukwan, Alaska since 1966

Alaska State Trooper Director Colonel James Cockrell wrote Haines Mayor Jan Hill last week informing her of the state’s decision to move the Haines trooper position to Bethel.

Cockrell said his agency has experienced a $10 million budget reduction during the past two years and is facing a $1.4 million reduction this year along with the loss of another trooper position. Troopers have lost 32 trooper positions and closed posts in six Alaska locations since 2015.

The Haines trooper position was sent to Bethel to address an increase in felony crimes.

“It’s the AST’s position that the Haines Police Department will be the primary law enforcement agency within the Haines Borough boundaries and AST will no longer be able to provide primary law enforcement services within the Haines Borough,” Cockrell wrote in the March 1 letter.

A trooper hasn’t been on duty in Haines since December. That’s left residents and public officials wondering who will police areas outside of town limits.

Haines still has a state wildlife trooper who will respond to emergency situations outside of town. Trooper Trent Chwialkowski said the primary mission of public safety hasn’t changed despite the trooper position leaving the community. He said he’ll back up the local police as well.

“We have a rapport with each other, we work together, we share information,” Chwialkowski said. “We’re on the same page here. I think the expecation is I’d be backing them up if they needed my help and certainly the same thing if I needed them they’d be responding with me to a call as well.”

The Haines Police department is now seeking direction from the borough on when to respond to calls from outside the police service area.

“We certainly weren’t prepared for the Troopers to abandon that post,” Haines Borough Police Chief Heath Scott said.

Troopers in Juneau will take reports for non-emergencies. Scott said he declined to respond to a traffic accident up the highway. At the request of troopers, police took photos of the scene afterwards.

“I think we need to have a dialogue with the community,” Scott said. “We certainly need to have a dialogue with the leadership. What is the expectation going to be? How will the assembly weigh in on that?”

He also raised a question of providing service to townsite residents when they traveled up the highway. “If I went out the road, I would expect a response.”

In January, the Haines Borough Public Safety Commission recommended the borough assembly address policing outside the townsite.

Scott, who says his force is strechted too thin, is experiencing higher case and call loads. His department is also experiencing budget shortfalls, and Scott is asking for an additional police officer along with $63,000 to make up the deficit.

Based on Alaska State Trooper data, calls to HBPD are likely to increase.

In 2016, Alaska State Troopers in Haines received 215 calls for service, 46 of which were for criminal activity including theft, vandalism and sexual assault.