On April 14th , members of the Juneau Chamber of Commerce gathered at Elizabeth Peratrovich Hall to announce and celebrate the 2021 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient. This prestigious award has been given annually by the Juneau Chamber of Commerce since 1988 acknowledging the individuals who have dedicated years of their lives to make Juneau a great place to live and work. The recipients are selected by a group of past chamber presidents from a list of candidates nominated by the community.
This year the Lifetime Achievement Award went to Bruce Denton. Bruce is the owner of the Senate Mall, and Juneau Self Storage, President of the Glory Hall Board, and secretary for the Chamber of Commerce Board. He is also a contractor, four-time Iditarod racer, and proud father to four children, and 4 grandchildren. In the early 2000’s Bruce and his business partner purchased the Senate Mall, and became very concerned with the social conditions of Downtown Juneau. He arranged for Pat Race to make a video of the core downtown area documenting the problems, and began holding weekly showings at the Goldtown Nickelodeon. From this effort, the Downtown Improvement Group (DIG) was formed. Shortly after he joined the Glory Hall Board and then Housing First Board – two organizations focused on dealing with the homeless issues. Bruce believed we could do better to solve problems and with his help we have.
Bruce’s award was celebrated by several people in attendance who spoke about their relationships with Bruce over his many years of service. Mayor Beth Weldon, Assemblyman Wade Bryson, Chamber Executive Director Craig Dahl, and Bruce’s daughter, Heidi Hall. Ms. Hall wrapped up the luncheon with these words, "today we get to say ‘thank you’ to this man and give him this incredible honor for all he has accomplished for this community and our town of Juneau. Dad, I am proud of you and thank you for looking out for our town and I want to thank you to all those you have helped along the way.” Bruce took the podium for a short moment to say “Juneau is a really cool place, and it's fun to be part of it, and it's fun to be able to reach a point to be able to give back. I am pretty overwhelmed. Thank you very much."
