Heinze lauded for service, zest

PALMER — Cheryll Heinze’s friends and family remember her fondly as a woman filled with love and energy.

“My first sort-of official act with Cheryll was sneaking an undocumented puppy across the line into Canada and down to Juneau,” her chief of staff from her legislative days, Mike “Fish” Pawlowski, said at a celebration of Heinze’s life Tuesday evening.

Heinze, 65, director of human resources and public relations at Matanuska Electric Association, was onboard a plane full of MEA officials that flipped over while landing on Beluga Lake in Homer July 10. She was the only fatality in the crash. MEA general manager Joe Griffith was the pilot.

On Monday, the National Transportation Safety Board released its preliminary report on the crash. Mostly it summed up with Griffith has said previously about the accident — that a wind gust pushed one wing up and flipped the plane over into the water. Griffith and others onboard were unsuccessful in pulling her out. Rescuers found Heinze strapped into her seat.

In addition to being a legislator and an executive, Heinze was a serious artist. Her paintings are on display all over the state. Her poetry graced the celebration’s program.

“McKinley raises her mighty arms/To pierce each flowing arc/How unabashed they flaunt their power/Like spirits laughing in the dark,” read one, titled “Aurora Borealis.”

Pawlowski — his nickname, Fish, was a gift from Heinze — said that his friend did good work for Alaskans during her one term as a state representative from Midtown Anchorage. He said that when money disappeared from independent living center budgets, she fought hard to cobble together replacement funding. The centers stayed open and her work helped numerous people she would never meet.

“She never understood the word ‘no’ and didn’t believe in it,” Pawlowski said. “Her service is the best that we can ever ask for from people.”

Rena Mary Rachentstein of Talkeetna said hers and Heinze’s families had one of those relationships familiar to a lot of Alaskans — the deepest of friendships formed when you land, all but alone, in the Last Frontier.

Heinze took Rachenstein’s children fishing and lost all of her husband Harold Heinze’s lures. They shot off fireworks together and shared meals and holidays.

“She and Harold were part of every tradition that our family had,” Rachenstein said. “Cherll was a blessing to everyone that she loved and the Rachensteins are so very grateful that she loved us.”

Rev. David Dahms emceed the celebration, but also worked with Heinze on breathing life into MEA’s charitable foundation.

“She was a woman who I came to know over these last two years who took on challenges with zest and enthusiasm. And that’s kind of putting it mildly,” Dahms said.

He recalled a meeting at which Heinze wondered if the charitable foundation still needed her. Maybe she should stop going to meetings?

“I about rose up at the end of the table and said, ‘forget that, girl!’” Dahms said. “She was just fun to be with.”

He urged attendees to take Heinze’s passing as inspiration to live life the way she did, to enjoy not just the result of one’s work, but the process of doing it; not just the destination, but “the party on the way.”

“Make our state, which she loved, a better, a more joyful and celebrating place,” Dahms said.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.