Alaska Village Corporations from new association: entity helping entity.

• Author: Liles, Patricia
• Position: NATIVE BUSINESS

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In her five-year tenure as president and chief executive officer of The Kuskokwim Corp., Maver Carey has worked on both sides of a mentoring relationship--as part of an entity taking steps to enter a new business arena and as an experienced organization reaching out to help another.

That sort of sharing makes up a key part of a new organization being formed by Carey and about 150 other Alaskans representing dozens of Alaska Native village corporations, called Alaska Native Village Corporation Association.

"We want to try to make this organization meaningful even to small and large village corporations--more a sharing of knowledge.... I know that many other CEOs have gone through similar instances as I have and if we have knowledge to share, then we can all focus on much bigger issues," Carey said. "Many of us are working on the same issues, and if we shared what works, it would be a great way to do it. It makes sense, because we've all been sitting in our offices, not talking and sharing."

Following an initial strategic session last August and a founding meeting that resulted in selection of board members in November, ANVCA held its first board meeting in January. During that Jan. 30 meeting, initial board members voted to adopt articles of incorporation, by-laws, a mission statement and strategy goals for the fledgling organization.

Carey was selected as chair of the new organization, with Donne Fleagle representing MTNT Inc. in McGrath as vice chair, and Anne Thomas representing Chitina Native Corp. in Chitina as secretary/treasurer. Eight other village corporation representatives were selected during the November 2007 meeting as initial ANVCA board members.

The idea of forming an organization to represent Alaska village corporations isn't new to Native village corporation leaders. In fact, regional corporations participate in the Association of ANCSA Regional Corporation Presidents/CEOs, which publishes an annual report of data collected from the 13 Alaska Native regional corporations and a select number of village corporations.

"Village corporations are very diverse in comparison to regional corporations. While there several very large village corporations, there are a far greater number of smaller corporations," said Vicki Otte, executive director of the Association of ANCSA Regional Corporation Presidents/ CEOs. Otte also has served for 24 years on the board of directors for her village corporation, MTNT Inc., a...