ANCHORAGE – Friday, Governor Bill Walker named retired U.S. Army Colonel Laurel Hummel as The Adjutant General of the Alaska National Guard and Commissioner of the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs. He also named retired U.S. Air Force Colonel Robert Doehl as Deputy Commissioner of the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.

Col. Hummel will be the first woman to head up the Alaska National Guard. She is a 1982 West Point graduate; a member of the third graduating class to include women in the academy’s history.

“I am honored to welcome Colonel Hummel as a member of my Cabinet,” said Governor Walker. “She rose through the ranks on merit during a time when it wasn’t easy for women to serve in the U.S. military. Her experience and perspective will serve Alaska and the men and women of the Alaska National Guard very well.”

Colonel Hummel served 30 years of active duty in military intelligence, where she held a variety of leadership and staff positions, including chief of operations intelligence and director of the joint intelligence support element at Alaskan command. Hummel also worked as a tenured professor in the U.S. Military Academy’s department of geography and environmental engineering at West Point. For her doctoral dissertation, Colonel Hummel researched the impacts of military investment in Alaska during the Cold War.

Robert Doehl, Governor Walker’s pick for Deputy Commissioner of DMVA, brings more than 30 years of military experience to the job. He retired from the Alaska Air National Guard in 2012 as a colonel. He has also served as an attorney in the Department of Law. Most recently, Doehl was the Special Assistant for Military and Veterans Affairs for Senator Mark Begich.

“This marks the beginning of a new, prosperous chapter for the Alaska National Guard,” Governor Walker said. “I am confident that both Colonel Hummel and Colonel Doehl will provide the stability and leadership needed to rebuild the public’s trust in our Guard program, and find closure to the problems that have loomed over us in recent years.”

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