Q&A with AWARE’s 2026 Women of Distinction

Alice Taff, Christina Love, Maria Gladziszewski and Seikoonie Fran Houston are the four women nominated by community

AWARE’s 2026 Women of Distinction. (Photo courtesy of AWARE)

By Jasz Garrett

Juneau Independent

AWARE, a nonprofit organization providing shelter and supportive services for survivors of domestic or sexual violence, will host its 28th annual Women of Distinction event on March 7 at Centennial Hall. 

Alice Taff, “linguist for social justice,” Christina Love, “thought leader, systems architect, Indigenous storyteller and survivor,” Maria Gladziszewski, “public servant, lifelong learner,” and Fran Houston, the Áakʼw Ḵwáan tribal spokesperson, are this year’s honorees. 

The event features a no-host bar, catered dinner, silent and live auctions, and the opportunity for the honorees to share what inspires them. Proceeds benefit AWARE’s services to adult and child survivors of domestic and sexual violence. Tickets went on sale in January and are available online. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. and the dinner and program will start at 6:30 p.m on March 7.

The following interviews have been lightly edited for length and clarity. 

Q: Please give me a brief introduction of yourself and your impact on the community.

Alice Taff:

“My role is to support language continuity for languages that are under siege. So that includes Tlingit and Deg Xinag, the westernmost of the Dene or Athabascan languages in Alaska. And I’m involved with the other Southeast Alaskan languages too, through the conference, sharing our knowledge. I’ve helped support documentation of the languages and making the documentation accessible for people to learn and engage with others to learn their languages since 1975.”

“The documentation process is one that builds place for people to use the language in itself. The preparation of the video recording is what I like to do. Preparation of the video recording for online access is another opportunity for people to work with others on their language and then using those materials in group settings to get people together is another opportunity for language use. The background for me for doing this week is wellness for people to get beyond the trauma of language loss — to overcome that trauma through language continuity.” 

Christina Love:

“I serve on the U.S. Advisory Council on Human Trafficking and still work with Haven House, a nonprofit organization. For the council, we just released our report, so that’s live, and I’m super, super proud. So the council was created by Congress, and so we report to branches of Congress, but we’re separate from the government, which gave us some autonomy. So I’m really proud that we decided to go against some of the mandates, especially on language, and wanted it to be really centered around people who’ve been directly impacted and looking at the people who are living on the margins.” 

“The first report, a really big part of that is I wrote the section on Alaska, as well as the section on substance use and mental health coercion, which is a term that I’ve worked with other survivors to coin and talk about. It’s an area of both domestic violence and sexual assault and trafficking that isn’t talked about a lot. And it’s something here in Alaska that I’m really passionate about, and that’s ensuring that programs don’t dismiss or exclude people because they have mental health or substance use experiences. And another really big part of that is using language that is empowering and inclusive to people. We don’t use terms like substance abuse and that really coincides with helping educate people that the language is connected to ideology, and that leads to those stories being told about people who are often blamed for the ways that they are experiencing violence and then not allowed to access. So both of those reports and some of the other reports have really focused on the premise that the people who need services the most are least likely to get them. I work with programs, systems and services to better understand that cap — and then to bring that home, what that looks like for our shelters and programs and housing.” 

“As for Haven House, we’re still getting people housed. We’re still giving rides to people who are coming out of jail, sometimes at two, three o’clock in the morning with no shoes, and ensuring that they have a safe place to go and safe transportation. And connecting that also to trafficking, a lot of the people that we work with who’ve experienced pretty extreme violence came from them having a need, whether that was housing or transportation or childcare or food — that has been exploited. So every basic need that humans need, if that need isn’t being met, then it’s exploited in other ways. So the other part of that work is helping people access all the pathways of recovery, whether that’s harm reduction, inpatient, or 12-step. And then the community education part, so helping agencies and programs to better understand that these issues exist, and what that looks like for Juneau.”

Maria Gladziszewski:

“I was on the Juneau Planning Commission for 11 years. I was the chair of that for three. Then years passed and I ran for the Assembly. I was elected for three terms and Deputy Mayor for four years.

I was on the Perseverance Theatre board for a long time and the Juneau-Douglas Little Theatre board. I do theater. I’m an actor. I’m an outdoors person. My day job was working for Fish and Game.”

Seikoonie Fran Houston:

“I was born and raised in Juneau, the land of my ancestors, the Raven Moiety, Dog Salmon Clan. The tribal house I come from is Yaxté Hít (Big Dipper). My father is Chookaneidee.”

“My cultural involvement, I was at my mom’s side for many, many decades. I learned from not only from my mother, Rosa Miller, but I also learned from my grandmother, because that’s when I really got involved with the culture and going to meetings and to events. And I found it very interesting. I was at their side almost all the time.”

“As far as involvement around Juneau, there’s been quite a few things that we’ve been involved with. I continue with what they have been doing up to date. As of now, I’m still continuing with that. There was one that we did accomplish, and that was Indian Point and that took many, many decades to save that area. With those many years of fighting to not have anything built on Indian Point, it’s now considered a historical site with the help of many other people. Sealaska Heritage was one of them and other organizations. We’re happy now that it’s safe.”

“I’ve been to many meetings and that’s to save what’s around Berners Bay. And that hasn’t really come to a closure. I know in my grandmother’s time, she put in many years of protecting Berners Bay, the same as my mother. Now that they’re both gone, I’m continuing — it’s not complete.”

“That is one of the last beautiful places that we have that we have to protect.”

Q: What was your reaction when you were notified you had been nominated as a 2026 Woman of Distinction? 

Alice Taff:

“I said, ‘me?’ My reaction was one of great surprise.”

Christina Love:

“I thought it was a crisis call. I thought they had somebody that they needed help with. So I called them right back and I was very, very surprised — pleasantly surprised. It’s been a very, very long and beautiful and emotional journey with AWARE. Incredibly grateful.” 

“It’s even more beautiful that it was my partner who nominated me. It’s possible that, if you’ve experienced these things, that on the other side is a healthy, loving, safe relationship.”

Maria Gladziszewski:

“I was shocked and thought, ‘Why me?’ I could think of 20 other people before me. But also, Mandy (Cole) is on the planning commission and I was on the planning commission, and she sometimes calls me to talk about that stuff. So I thought she was calling about that.”

Seikoonie Fran Houston:

“I had a really hard time trying to react to that. It’s a great honor. A great honor. My first word that came out of my mouth was, ‘Whoa.’” 

Q: How did each of you step into these roles of public service? What made you want to give back to the community? 

Alice Taff:

“When I became aware of what was happening with languages — small language communities that were at risk. I thought, ‘Well, I can do something about this.’ So I just started meddling with various communities and getting tooled up to be able to work with language and various ways of documentation. Started doing that work, finding funding to do projects and getting people involved in that.”

Christina Love:

“I was really angry at programs that I sought services from and in some ways, they made life harder for me that wasn’t here in Juneau. I don’t think that people often have a language for how defeated you feel every time you fill out a housing application or employment application or treatment application and it’s so hard to access those services. And so AWARE was the first place that I started as a volunteer and met really wonderful staff, and they encouraged me to work there. And I’m very, very, very grateful.”

“Mandy Cole would say that I grew AWARE and AWARE grew me. I’m very grateful for the access to so much incredible education that allowed me to not only understand the violence that I had experienced and and relieve some of that burden of thinking that you’re a bad person, or that you’re a broken person, or that there’s something wrong with you — to really understand that some things were missing for me and some of those things had been missing for a while, and then to carry that forward, so people don’t have to feel shame for the ways that they are surviving the violence, whether that’s using substances or struggling with mental health or self harm. Or maybe they lack motivation to get in the shower or to get on the bus.”

“To normalize those things felt really important, to carry that education forward, and then to give back to agencies and this community that gave me so much. It felt like such a miracle that I was able to access the things that I need. And I didn’t want it to feel like that for other people. I wanted it to be a very clear and easy and well-lit path for anybody and everybody out of poverty, or out of homelessness, or out of debt, or out of addiction, or out of violence, or out of incarceration.”

Maria Gladziszewski:

“It’s been a lifelong thing for me. How I specifically got into the city of Juneau is a friend was on the planning commission and said I should apply. It’s really individuals that get other individuals. My reaction to him was, ‘Why would they appoint me to the planning commission? I don’t even know what that is.’ It starts by people inviting you. My public service role in official positions started that way. It was always around for various other reasons. So I try to continue that and really look at people and say, ‘No, you — really, you could do it.’”

Seikoonie Fran Houston:

“Being with my grandmother and mother, I had the interest, and I saw what they were doing, and not only what they’re doing as far as the community, but being with the kids and many, many meetings and events. I just found it very, very interesting. I couldn’t understand what some of the people were saying, because some of them were speaking in Tlingit language, but I also liked what they have accomplished and they made a difference too. I remember even at one time, my mom was being acknowledged during the Fourth of July parade. A lot of hard work went into what they were doing, and I’m very energetic anyway, so just being with them — it was something different that really got me involved.”

“My mother had put a dance group together (Mount Juneau Tlingit Dancers) and I was at her side. We had a dance group put together, maybe a little before Celebration started back in 1982. We had a dance group all the way up to her last performance, which was 2018.

“2017 is when she made the decision for me to step in and fill her shoes. When my grandmother couldn’t do it anymore, then my mother stepped in. Because my grandmother was a matriarch for the Áakʼw Ḵwáan people. My mother was an Áakʼw Ḵwáan tribal spokesperson. When my mother couldn’t do it anymore, then she assigned me to step in.”

“I am filling their moccasins and some of these things are not complete. It’s a big responsibility and I’m following what I learned from them to protect what’s needed.”

“My mother did say that my life would not be my own. I believe it now.”

Q: The AWARE press release states you “actively transform” the way that we approach recovery, safeguard culture and uphold the standards of public service. Can you provide an example or examples of a moment when you did so?

Alice Taff:

“Right now what I’m thinking about is the way we need to approach any of the work that we’re doing because of governmental changes, specifically for funding to the kinds of things that we’re interested in. We’ll have to look more inside the community for support and doing the work ourselves amongst ourselves.”

Christina Love:

“It has been my greatest joy to take all the things that I held shame about and show my kids, or my community, or any circles of influence that all of those things can be used to better yourself or your community. And to authentically say that, ‘I have been incarcerated or been an IV drug user,’ or whatever it might be, and not hold shame about that and show people that people can change, and that people are worthy of time and services. Every single person who’s experiencing homelessness has the ability to do everything that I’ve done and greater. There’s no exception for me. The only difference is that organizations, like AWARE, took a chance on me and employed me. All these other agencies helped me with housing and employment and education. Even starting my business, all that came from community. I am a testament to both prevention and intervention.”

“I get to be somebody that says, ‘Thank you, Juneau, and this is what’s possible.’” 

Maria Gladziszewski:

“I was on the Assembly for nine years and two of them were COVID. There’s a lot of things that I helped work on that are still happening. The service during COVID was really hard. I think during that time, specifically, we worked together pretty well. We knew that it was important to be as unified as possible, considering complete unknowns. We would make a decision on Monday based on the information we knew on Monday, and then by the following Wednesday things were different. The advice was different. Then two weeks later, people were like, ‘Well, what did you do that for?’ Well, two weeks ago, that’s what we knew. It was evolving and you had to evolve. Actually, the community was super supportive early on and people were very united. We did new innovative things.”

“We wound up doing Facebook Live for quite some time, until we all figured out what Zoom was and moved to those technologies. I think the decisions we made certainly have helped make the community healthier. There’s also super downsides. Kids were out of school for so long. I mean, the whole thing was balancing less bad and more bad.”

Seikoonie Fran Houston:

“Two schools got Tlingit names. Juneau-Douglas High School, which was back in 2019. We had meetings with other individuals and we talked about the three names that were chosen, and then explained each name. So the decision was JD High getting the name of Yadaa.at Kalé. The translation is ‘beautiful adorned face.’ There’s a story about Mount Juneau. The real short version is when they come around Douglas Island and they’re heading here to downtown Juneau — that’s the first mountain they see and they know they’re in the right place. That was the landmark.”

“The other school was Riverside Elementary School in 2022. I played a real big part on that one too on choosing a Tlingit name — Kax̲dig̲oowu Héen. The translation on that one is ‘going back to clear water,’ and I have also heard people saying, ‘it’s where two rivers meet.’”

“At UAS, I believe this will be year eight, UAS wanted to know if we had a chant that we can sing and we had one. We’ve been using it since so you don’t hear the normal graduate march. They come in to a Tlingit song. And it’s very energetic. The first time we did that, I had goosebumps like you wouldn’t believe. I know the dancers, they love it.”

“The other big involvement throughout Juneau was notified by the City and Borough. They wanted to make up interpretive signs and right now, you see them all over downtown Juneau. It was a very long process. It took over two years to put that together. It’s real hard to try to put down something that happened hundreds of years ago, and put it down into a small sign. But we made it. And that’s starting from the tram, which comes all the way through town, up to the Capitol building, the area of Willoughby, the museum, the Juneau Indian Village. That was really, really hard to put together. We did all this by Zoom and that was during the time of COVID. We met almost every week with the city, getting the history. We were taking what was in the museum and trying to break it down. Through all of this, we were always called to do the land acknowledgement.”

“I love being with kids. What they’re learning now was never even thought of when I was a child. But now they’re learning how to sing, how to speak in Lingít. I’ve seen them learn how to skin a seal. I’ve seen the involvement of everybody who is out there and working with these kids. I wish I was a kid so I could be learning all this myself. This has been a long time coming. You’re talking about over 50, 60 years ago — it was never even thought of. With the help of the elders, it made it possible. Now they’re learning.”

“Those were the highlights that I came up with during the time that I’ve been the Áakʼw Ḵwáan tribal spokesperson.”

• Contact Jasz Garrett at jasz@juneauindependent.com or (907) 723-9356.