Maniilaq's pet policy unleashes frustrations

June 10, 1993

By Michael Gerhardt
Arctic Sounder

Eviction notices have been ignored as a battle heats up over Maniilaq's pet policy.

Maniilaq Medical Center employees who live in the hospital housing compound and who own dogs were told in mid-April that they had until the end of May to remove their pets. If they did not, they would have to move from the compound, according to a letter from hospital administrator Frank Kramer.

As many as seven hospital employees are refusing to either get rid of their dogs or to leave the compound.

"As far as I know, all of the dogs are still there," said David Kohfield, an Anchorage lawyer who is representing a group of 14 or 15 pet owners who live on the compound. The other employees own pets other than dogs, according to Kohfield.

The eviction notices were sent out after employees refused to obey a pet policy put in place early this year by the Maniilaq Board of Directors. The policy originally called for the removal of all pets from the hospital compound, but was later changed to focus only on dogs.

If the policy is enforced and the employees are evicted, Kohfield said many of them will leave their jobs.

Several pet owners were contacted for comment, but said they preferred not to talk about the issue until ongoing negotiations between Kohfield and Maniilaq attorney Doug Pope are completed sometime later this month.

No further action will be taken against the employees who are refusing to leave until those negotiations are finished, according to Jan Harris, Maniilaq's interim-acting president. Harris said that after the attorneys are done talking, there will be further dialogue between the board and the pet owners.

"The board is shooting for two or three weeks down the road for further discussions to take place," Harris said.

"Our attorney is working with the pet owners' attorney to try to break the impasse and try to work out some reasonable way to bring this to a conclusion," she said.

Board members unanimously voted last November to ban animals from the compound. At that meeting, then-President Suzy Erlich voiced concerns about employees quitting rather than giving up their pets.

In January, employees were told they had two months to get rid of their pets. The action prompted a meeting of pet owners to decide how to deal with the policy.

Since then, several compromises have been offered by the pet owners, according to Kohfield. None of them received any support from the board, he said.

The board continues to believe that a "no pets" policy is in the organization's best interests, Harris said. Board members are concerned about liability problems, she said. A young boy was attacked in 1991 by a dog that was chained near the compound. A federal civil suit was filed against Maniilaq by the parents of the boy.

Since the January notice, the board decided to temporarily set aside the issue of pets other than dogs. If the move was an attempt to divide the employees between cat and dog owners, it did not work, Kohfield said. The 14 employees are sticking together over the issue, he said

"You've got a group of people who feel very, very strongly about their pets," Kohfield said.

Many of the families who live in the hospital compound were told they could have pets when they accepted jobs with Maniilaq, according to one employee.

"It wasn't written down, but they verbally told us we could bring pets. Everybody was told that," Craig Nordgen said in an interview last February. Nordgren is a hospital maintenance worker and cat owner.

Harris said the consent of past Maniilaq administrations was being taken into account.

"They (the attorneys) are looking at each specific, individual case," she said.

For employees who want to keep both their job and their pets, there are no easy solutions, Kohfield said. There are few housing alternatives in Kotzebue, and the ones that are available are too expensive.

"We're trying to keep this thing amicable and trying to avoid any serious confrontation over it," he said.

Harris said that during negotiations between the attorneys, the board's housing committee will work on an interim policy that will focus more on the responsibilities of pet owners. She said such a policy would only be used until the board decides to enforce its no pets policy.