Alaska Villages Outlaw Yeast, Sugar

[The Straight Story]

Alaska Villages Outlaw Yeast, Sugar

In most communities, you can buy yeast and sugar at the grocery store. But not in Alaska, says the Anchorage Daily News, where some villages have outlawed both alcohol and supplies to brew it at home. Conceived as a way to regulate alcoholism, a sheriff recently arrested a man after finding yeast in his home. The man says he was simply going to bake some bread. The Daily News says police are so used to the bread answer that they have a special line of questioning for those who claim to be bakers: “We’ll ask the questions, ‘How much yeast does it take to bake a loaf of bread,’ and you’ll get an answer like, ‘Oh, a cup’....I mean, it takes like a tablespoon, so that makes no sense.”

http://www.patspapers.com/story_stack/item/alaska_villages_outlaw_yeast_sugar/


Rural police target possession of home-brew ingredients
YESAST,SUGAR: Staples are illegal in villages where manufacturing is banned.

Owning yeast and sugar isn't enough to get you arrested in most places. But in some communities of rural Alaska, the high rate of alcohol abuse has caused voters to ban booze along with possession of the supplies to make it at home.

A recent case highlights a 2007 state law that makes it illegal for a person to possess yeast and sugar in a local option community if they intend to use the ingredients to make home-brew, a cloudy, intoxicating liquid often mixed with fruit juice. Villages have the option to ban booze as one way to combat to a longstanding epidemic of alcohol-related injuries and deaths in rural Alaska.

According to court records, a village public safety officer in Hooper Bay on the Bering Sea coast arrested Gerald Hunt, 42, June 30 for possession of homebrew ingredients.

Sgt. James Hoelscher went to Hunt's home for an unrelated matter, but once inside, he had reason to believe Hunt was hiding something. In a recent phone interview, Hoelscher wouldn't say what raised his suspicions, but it was enough that he applied for a search warrant.

http://www.adn.com/2011/07/18/1973815/home-brew-ingredients-catch-the.html

[FSogol]

1. Are yeast infections still legal?

:shrug:

[saras]

3. If you're willing to have one big enough to get drunk off of...

you've got even worse problems than alcoholism among native populations - which is pretty damn close to genocide. They're as genetically as ill-prepared for alcohol as they were immunologically prepared for smallpox.

[MedicalAdmin]

19. Genrally natives lack any significant quantities of

alcohol dehydrogenase which is the enzyme that breaks down alcohol. Without it drinking can be very dangerous as that toxin is not broken down and eliminated from the body through normal channels such as phase one and two liver detox pathways. The result is can be that the alcohol must be eliminated slowly through other organs of elimination such as the skin. This can often been seen as a form of flop sweat which is just the body trying to eliminate toxins at a rate that it hasn't the tools to accomplish.

It's also why many natives get more intoxicated for a longer time. It leads to higher rates of intoxication and addiction. Imagine, if you will that any drink you had didn't wear off for hours and hours rather than being out of your system within an hour or less. Now imagine what that would do to your health (the mother of all hangovers, etc.)

Luckily for me, those of celtic ancestry have buckets of alcohol dehydrogenase. Or perhaps it's not so lucky. On the downside I am genetically incapable of metabolizing THB so no weed for the AdminDude.


on edit - adding this link on ADH - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_dehydrogenase

[Maru Kitteh]

36. Oh Lawd. "Natives?"

First Nation Peoples, First Peoples, even Native Americans - not "natives."

[MedicalAdmin]

43. Spare me.

Call us what you will and I will do the same.

[Taverner]

2. Prohibition doesn't work

Thought they would have learned that by now...

[Drahthaardogs]

26. You ever been to a remote village?

Go to Kotzebue, it is a mess. Alcoholism, diabetes, just bad bad bad health conditions. Go across the inlet to Kiana, a dry village. Much much healthier town and people. In Alaska villages, prohibition DOES work. The council of elders know this and know it well.

[Taverner]

47. You cannot keep an addict away from his or her drug, unless they want to get away from their drug

I'm not saying there isn't a problem there - but would you rather them die from their alcoholism, or much earlier from wood alcohol poisoning?

[Aerows]

4. Clearly everyone in possession of bread yeast

and flour (or a flour mill) is guilty of making alcohol. The presence of sugar confirms it. Baking cookies, cakes and using straight flour (which requires baking powder) is clearly against the Constitution.

[TheWraith]

5. I hope these village lawmakers get sued into the ground.

This is so illegal I could wretch.

[Lance_Boyle]

6. They are the wretches. You could retch.

But I'm curious as to how it's illegal for a community to ban alcohol. There are dry counties in lots of States.

[Xithras]

12. There's nothing illegal about any of it.

With the sole exception of the freedoms guranteed in the Constitution, any government in the U.S. can ban anything within their jurisdiction, so long as they do so democratically.

As someone else pointed out, there are a lot of "dry" counties in the U.S. where alcohol is still illegal.

[bhikkhu]

35. The key is - its usually locally and democratically decided, by a ballot measure

That's what the "the high rate of alcohol abuse has caused voters to ban booze" part means.

I have friends who moved to Alaska, and talked to them last summer about it. The community they live in is "dry", having voted to ban liquor sales to battle the alcoholism problem. It was a bit weird to hear that, but that's the way it is...it has its good points of course, but basically sounds like a hellhole to me.

[lpbk2713]

7. But the meth market is still booming in Wasilla.

[Brother Buzz]

8. There are naturally occurring airborne yeasts, are they going to outlaw them, too?

[mysuzuki2]

32. you can make beer and wine from air-borne yeasts

in fact, before the 19th century no one even knew yeast existed and naturally occuring yeasts were routinely, and obviously unknowingly, used in brewing. In fact, some Belgian type beers are still made using naturally-occuring yeasts and bacteria.

[Brother Buzz]

37. With unpredictable results

Wild yeasts can impart strange flavors.

[mysuzuki2]

38. true enough but

have you ever tried beer or wine made from bread yeast? Not so good either. My point is that if someone wants alcohol bad enough it's not that hard to make.

[XemaSab]

51. Fun fact:

Apparently prison inmates use their dirty socks as a source of yeast. :D

[JVS]

9. What a hellhole

[dembotoz]

10. how to make home brew--now that might be a reality show from alaska worth watching

maybe we could get gordon ramsey to be a judge.

[XemaSab]

11. If some native communities have decided that it's better to go dry

I fully support them.

[uppityperson]

17. Me too. As a person who lived in AK for a while, I very much support them.

[MedicalAdmin]

20. I used to live "up nort."

And there was one stretch of road leading into the rez whose ditches were littered with alcohol bottles and lysol bottles. It was euphemistically known as "happy valley."

Sad. I used to run with a dude named T. Yellowbird. Best long distance runner I ever met. He was like a machine and great guy. And then he started drinking....

[uppityperson]

22. fyi, "village" not "rez". Where in AK were you?

Alaska Natives previously had many small reserves scattered around Alaska; however, all but one (the Annette Island Reserve of Tsimshian) were repealed with the passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act in 1971.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annette_Island_Reserve

------------
I spent time in the interior and SE

[MedicalAdmin]

25. Canada - Yukon and northern alberta.

And it's Rez, short for reservation.

And there are no lack of first nation people and areas up in Canada still. Not that Canada has any better of a history of native relations than the US (except recently).

[uppityperson]

29. Ah, was wondering about the accent, Canadian makes sense.

thanks

[MedicalAdmin]

44. Anytime.

Next beers on me, ya hoser.

[Drahthaardogs]

27. There are no reservations in interior Alaska.

There is only one reservation and it is in the southeast, and I have never seen a native drink lysol.

[uppityperson]

30. Hi

I am noticing your posts here and wanted to say hello to someone who either lives in or has lived in or traveled around AK (more than cruise ship and train/bus into Denali). If you want to share where you are or anything, please do so, or else pm is ok too. I am in WA but spent a few yrs in AK here and there and do miss it. Parts of it.

[MedicalAdmin]

45. A few salient comments.

First there is more up north than just Alaska. I know yanks generally see the world through special increased myopia glasses ....

Second, it's been a few years but for a while Lysol used alcohol and other intoxicants in their propellant mix. It could be sprayed into water or soda and drank or huffed. Nasty shit and a serious problem back when I loved up there. admittedly, it's been more than a few years.

[uppityperson]

48. I think since the OP is about AK villages, we were assuming that was what the topic was

Hence the "myopia glasses".

[MedicalAdmin]

49. Good point.

I'll take mine off now.

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. I could give a recipe for bread

But I do get where this is comming from, nor do I expect it to work.

[Liberal_in_LA]

14. total violation of privacy.

[yellowcanine]

15. Oh crap. You can "make" yeast water with raisins

http://originalyeast.blogspot.com/2008/02/how-to-make-yeast-water.html

And sugared soda or fruit juice can quickly be turned into alcohol with a little of the yeast water.

Of course it is probably easier to just be smart about assembling and hiding the ingredients.

[The Straight Story]

16. (furiously taking notes....) Thanks

Now I have to run and uh, make something :)

[surrealAmerican]

28. The next step would be banning raisins ...

... and grapes. Alcohol is very easy to make from any number of things.

[xmas74]

40. One of my coworkers spent some time in prison.

He said you could easily make it without yeast and that he used to do so with leftover fruit in a sock.

[yellowcanine]

50. Dirty sock or clean sock?

[xmas74]

53. He didn't get into many details.

I'd hope clean sock but with him you never know. Maybe dirty helps with the fermenting process?

[uppityperson]

18. 34 communities in AK voted to ban possession, sale, importation, manufacturing...

"At last count, there were 34 communities in Alaska that had voted to ban the possession, sale, importation and manufacturing of alcohol, Thompson said.

State law says that local option also makes it a misdemeanor offense to possess yeast and sugar in pound quantities with intent to make alcohol."
ADN article

[Blue_In_AK]

21. Alcoholism is a terrible problem in the villages,

and with so little law enforcement out there, the villages have to do what they can to keep the booze out. The villagers themselves have voted to either keep their community dry, wet or damp, and when they have voted to keep them dry, it's with good reason.


I prepared court transcripts for years. I know the problems with crime, child physical and sexual abuse that are fueled by alcohol. It's not a pretty picture.


And on edit -- those of you who are outraged or making jokes about this, unless you've seen the problem up close, you have no idea what you're talking about.

This article might be of interest for people who are truly concerned about this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/14/us/14alaska.html

“Rural Alaska has some of the highest rates in the world for suicide,” said Ron Perkins, who came to Alaska three decades ago to work for the federal government’s health program for Native Alaskans and now is executive director of the Alaska Injury Prevention Center, a nonprofit organization. “I remember talking once to an elder in a village outside Kotzebue. He said, ‘I was 20 years old before I first heard of a suicide, and then it was a white man in Kotzebue.’ Now, if a native kid is 10 and hasn’t heard of a suicide, it’s rare.”

The suicide rate among Native Alaskans was three times that of nonnative Alaska residents and five times the national rate from 2003 to 2006, according to a study Mr. Perkins helped conduct.

<snip>

Alcohol or drugs were a factor in nearly three-fourths of the suicides among natives, the same as for nonnatives. And while about two-thirds of all suicides were from gunshot wounds, natives were twice as likely to hang themselves as were nonnatives, even though gun ownership is high among natives.

[uppityperson]

23. + a WHOLE lot

[Blue_In_AK]

24. Thanks, Uppity.

I knew you'd get it.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

33. I never knew how f-cked up Alaska was until I watched a few episodes of that Alaska State Patrol.

Jeez. What a mess.

State coppers searching airport passengers for smuggled booze. Boarded up shacks acting as village hall and jail cell.

I know it's a beautiful state and I would love to visit soon but jeez.

[Blue_In_AK]

41. We have infrastructure issues here that people down south

don't have a clue about. You have to remember that the vast majority of the state is off the road system. Get an atlas sometime and check out the "highways" in Alaska. There are about nine of them. Period. Some of them aren't even paved. There are no roads west of the Anchorage-Fairbanks corridor, and that's a huge part of the state. From the tip of the Aleutians to Ketchikan in the Panhandle is a distance roughly that of Los Angeles to Miami. Supplies out in the Bush are incredibly expensive -- $9 for a gallon of milk, $10 a gallon for gas, heating fuel is out the roof. And it gets COLD out there. A lot of the smaller villages out in the western part of the state rely on subsistenc and have been having a terrible time as the pollack trawlers take huge amounts of king salmon as bycatch. These are serious issues. Jobs are scarce, poverty is rampant, and alcohol can become a very, very bad problem.

The more progressive lawmakers here want to encourage green, self-sustaining technologies out there, wind and geothermal energy projects, for instance, spend some of the state's surplus oil revenues -- but our governor is of the Grover Norquist variety, totally owned by Big Oil. It's sad, when we've got all these resources, that he won't support them.

But Alaska IS beautiful, and you really should visit, if you get a chance. You can form your own opinions not based on TV, which tends to be sensationalist. I personally wouldn't live anywhere else in the US. I've tried it down there, and I didn't like it.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

42. The lack of roads does seem to be a huge problem.

I know it's "TV" but the show highlighted the problem of law enforcement. A day and a half trip to a remote village to effect an arrest of a drunk and disorderly spousal abuser threatening his wife and family with a rifle - that's a problem.

It just cracks me up to hear Palin talk about rugged individualism in one of the most socialistic states in The Union. Everyone receives checks from the government and the people have this crazy idea the state's resources (partially) belong to the people.

[Blue_In_AK]

46. I know. That really is a crazy idea, isn't it,

that the state's resources belong to the people? It's written right into our constitution. It's why our oil tax scheme is a lot different up here than in other states like North Dakota where leases have to be negotiated with individual mineral rights' owners. We have none of that here.

Sarah's really funny when she talks about that because one of the ways she boosted her popularity right before she was picked by McCain was by tacking on an additional $1200 to our already large permanent fund checks that year as an "energy rebate" because the cost of energy here was so high in 2007. A lot of us thought that three-quarters of a billion dollars could nave been more effectively spent by investing it into some sort of renewable energy sources for people, but this was a quick "fix" that helped to boost her popularity up to 80%. (Some people's affections are easily bought.)

[XemaSab]

52. I've seen that show too

The number of seriously drunk Native Alaskans on that show is shocking. :(

[Cleita]

31. Nanny state gone crazy.

Prohibiting alcohol or the means of making it won't solve the reason why people drink. That takes decent health care and social programs.

[deaniac21]

34. Yeast infections are still illeagal.

[jmowreader]

39. Eventually the natives are going to turn to pruno...

The problem I've got with this law is, since they can't prove intent (come on, who's going to tell the cops they intend to make homebrew from their yeast and sugar?) they are presuming anyone who has these two ingredients is going to do something illegal with them. No, we don't care that bread is six bucks a loaf in the store; the only thing ANYONE would want to do with yeast and sugar is sit around and make booze out of them. Guilty until proven innocent--that's the American Way!

BTW, Sarah Palin was governor in 2007.