Government Printing, Alaska Style

After working in Alaska government print shops for 32 years, Harold Pence is about to retire.

By Kristen E. Monte

In 1972, Harold Pence began working on his first press, an A.B.Dick 360. More than 30 years later, and on the brink of his retirement, he still feels that printing is in his blood.

Pence, Duplicating Services manager of the State of Alaska's Legislative Printshop, was born and raised in Illinois. After graduating high school in 1967, though, he was looking for a change, so he moved with his mother to Douglas, Alaska, a small island across the channel from Juneau. He has been there ever since.

"From my living room window I can watch tour boats arriving in Juneau, whales and seals swimming after salmon and bears digging for roots and berries along the mountainside," says Pence.

Upon arriving in the Juneau area, Pence got a job as a mail carrier with the United States Postal Service, but soon decided it wasn't for him. So he enrolled in a vocational school. It was here that Pence discovered his love of printing. His first job was as a part-time, hourly employee with Alaska's Department of Labor print shop.

"I started in the collating end of printing," says Pence. "I ran collating and finishing equipment, a Pitney Bowes foot-operated collator, Baum folder and Interlake staplers."

In 1974 he was made a permanent, full-time press operator. Two years later, when the in-plant was consolidated with the Department of Administration's print shop, Pence was made assistant supervisor. In 1983, he took over as manager and stayed with the shop until his resignation in September 1989.

"I resigned because of a difference in philosophy with the director," explains Pence. "There were a lot of personnel changes, and my employees were the lowest paid but were doing three times the amount of work as the Legislative and Federal Printshops. I wanted their salary increased."

Pence says he was offered a raise, to keep him quiet, but he was fighting for his employees. When their pay increases were refused he decided it was time to move on.

"I said 'I can't operate under these circumstances,' and I effectively resigned from my position," says Pence.

It was this resolve that helped him land his next job, a few months later, with the State of Alaska's Legislative Printshop. In 1996, he moved into the full-time position of manager.

"When I first came into the print shop, it was just involved with legislative branch work," says Pence. "But the volume of work increased quite a bit."

One reason for this increase can be directly attributed to Pence. When state employees found out he moved to the Legislative Printshop, they started moving their work there from the Department of Administration Printshop, because they noticed the decrease in quality and turnaround after his resignation.

Since the closure of the Department of Administration Printshop, Pence has seen a dramatic increase in the volume of work and revenue to his in-plant. Revenue started out at around $40,000 and is now averaging $125,000 per year, with page volume at one million copies annually.

The print shop handles strictly black-and-white work because color is not necessary in its daily operation. Adding color was considered at one point, but they did not want to be in competition with commercial or quick copy shops, according to Pence. The shop has five Ricoh Aficio 1105s, with three of them networked. State agencies' jobs are sent directly to the Printshop and are then assigned by Pence to the appropriate machine.

The print shop employs three full-time and 12 part-time workers when legislators are in session and two part-time employees during the interim. The largest portion of work comes from Legislative materials such as journals, bills and newsletters and slip laws during the interim.

Slip laws—the first official publication of bills that have been signed into law—are printed during the interim. Each is published separately in unbound single-sheet or booklet form.

"It depends on how many laws are passed to slip laws at the end of the session," says Pence. "But we are doing 200 slip laws currently."

Pence has been a National State Publishing Association (NSPA) member on and off for the past 12 years and has learned how to handle issues such as employee moral, vendor reliability and keeping the operation from being outsourced.

"Two things I will miss most are the friendships I have made and working with the discussion groups, but hopefully with my retirement, I will be able to attend future conferences," says Pence.

Pence has kept his in-plant up to date by adding an A.B.Dick 2340 digital platemaker and updating the bindery with a 50-station C.P. Bourg tower collator and a 22-station C.P. Bourg horizontal collator. The Print-shop recently installed a Xerox 2101 digital copier with Fiery network.

"The Xerox 2101 was the last replacement from a five-year plan I had implemented," explains Pence. "We won't need to upgrade for at least another two years."

Unfortunately for the Legislative Printshop, Pence won't be around for the next set of upgrades. Pence, 55, is retiring at the end of the year, but isn't giving up his love for printing.

"I might look for something part time, working for a private printer or a quick copy shop," he says. "I've already received a couple of offers because of my experience."

Pence plans to keep busy by fishing, for salmon, halibut and trout, golfing, enjoying his new timeshare in Hawaii and caring for his 91-year-old stepfather. One thing he will certainly not miss from his years in government printing is the politics.

"Politics are involved all the time, it can be a real disadvantage to our operation," says Pence. "If you can keep the politics out of the shop, it makes our work a lot easier."