Anchorage Daily News

A new report on a state council charged with preventing suicide says the group is worth keeping but identified troubling trends that lawmakers may want to consider when deciding the council's future.

The Statewide Suicide Prevention Council is scheduled to dissolve unless the Legislature votes next year to save it.

For one thing, the four lawmakers who sit on the council almost never show up for meetings, the audit found. One lawmaker said no one told him he'd been appointed.

Other council seats sat empty for years, including one reserved for someone from rural Alaska, where suicide rates are highest.

The state Division of Legislative Audit conducted the review, which became public Dec. 10, at about the same time Alaska State Troopers began seeing a string of suicides in Northwest Alaska.

While the audit found no direct evidence that council activities affected state suicide rates for better or worse, it credited the group with aiding prevention efforts around the state.

The audit, called a sunset report because the council will automatically disappear unless legislators vote to keep it, recommended lawmakers renew the council for another four years.

"I'm hopeful that they can improve things and we can get a handle on the suicide problems not just in the northwest, but in other areas of the state," said Sen. Johnny Ellis, D-Anchorage.

Ellis supports renewing the volunteer council.

He's also a member, which came as a surprise at first.

No one told him for more than a year after he was named that he'd been appointed, Ellis said.

"It was some big bureaucratic mix-up or miscommunication some time ago, and I wish them well," he said.

EMPTY SEATS

Ellis said he stayed on the council after being told it was hard to find volunteers for the required legislator slots. The other three current legislative members are Sen. Kim Elton of Juneau, Kotzebue Rep. Reggie Joule and Rep. Woodie Salmon of Beaver.

The legislators attended only about 15 percent of meetings between 2005 and 2008, according to the auditor's report.

Elton said he sometimes goes to the meetings when they're in Juneau but that he keeps up to date on council issues by e-mail.

"The value to the legislator is being in the information loop as much as kind of being in the meetings," he said.

The council, which advises the governor and Legislature on suicide prevention and is responsible for developing a statewide prevention plan, has 15 members who meet four times a year around the state. All are appointed by the governor except the legislative members, who are chosen by legislative leaders.

On average, members attended only 54 percent of meetings over the previous four years. As a result, the audit report says, the Legislature should consider making membership requirements less specific so more people who want to participate can qualify, making it easier to reach a quorum at meetings.

Currently, at least one council member must live in rural Alaska -- in a town or village that can't be reached by ferry or car. Until Monday, that post had been open for three of the past four years, according to the audit.

"It's also been, frankly, pretty hard to find a rural member," said Bill Hogan, commissioner of Health and Social Services, citing travel time from remote villages to council meetings as one of the main hurdles.

Another seat on the council, which had a budget of about $120,000 this year, is reserved for someone who has had a suicide in the family. It had been empty since November 2005, the auditor's report says.

Four seats were vacant last week when the Daily News called the governor's office for comment. Hogan said appointments were on the way, and on Monday Gov. Sarah Palin announced three posts had been filled:

• Barbara Franks of Anchorage was appointed to the seat held by someone with a suicide in the family.

• William Martin of Juneau, whose term had expired, was reappointed to a seat representing the Alaska Federation of Natives.

• James Sippary of Toksook Bay was selected to the seat reserved for someone from rural Alaska.

'WE HAVE TO TRY SOMETHING'

The Legislature created the Suicide Prevention Council in 2001, hoping it would find ways to reduce Alaska's terrible suicide rates and boost existing programs around the state.

That year, the suicide rate was 16.3 deaths per 100,000.

The rate spiked in 2004, then dipped in recent years. It crept up to 21.6 deaths per 100,000 people last year, which is roughly twice the national average, according to the report.

A string of suicides this month, including two in the northwest village of Selawik, swung attention back to the perennial problem.

Trying to make a dent in the numbers can be frustrating considering the wide-ranging factors at play, from combating alcohol abuse to finding the people most at risk, state health officials said this week.

"It can be things like whether or not there's a halfway decent economy in some villages or hub communities. If people have a job, if they feel as if they're contributing to the community ... if people, frankly, feel like (they) have hope, and there's something to look forward to," Hogan said.

Much of what the council does is study and plan -- with more studying and planning on the horizon.

New ideas about what to do in towns and villages seem hard to come by.

This year, the Legislature gave the Division of Behavioral Health $200,000 for suicide prevention planning. The agency asked nine high-risk regions to apply for grants to create their own prevention plans. Four regions -- Nome, Kotzebue, Dillingham and Bethel -- responded, said project coordinator James Gallanos.

The Health Department also got a $1.5 million federal grant, spread over three years, to create regional suicide prevention teams that will try to reduce rates among young people.

Health officials said there are no easy fixes and the council alone can't be expected to prevent suicides.

Asked if there's evidence that prevention efforts by the council, the state or other advocacy groups is actually reducing rates, lawmakers said there's no way to know.

Ellis said he'd like to think so.

"We have to try something."

Find Kyle Hopkins online at adn.com/contact/khopkins or call him at 257-4334.

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