Blyss Cruz

Hi, I’m Blyss Cruz, the owner of Cruz Law. I work with my clients, both individuals and small business owners, to develop their estate plans with an emphasis on family protection, wealth preservation, and values-based planning. I became a Personal Family Lawyer® because I wanted to focus on helping families and small business owners enhance their lives today and secure their legacies for tomorrow through proactive estate planning.

A primary focus of my practice is ensuring the protection of my clients’ minor children in the case of an emergency or death. As a parent of two children myself, worrying about what would happen to them if something happened to me and my husband has always been something that frightens me to my core. By creating a Kids Protection Plan® for my clients with minor children, I am able to help provide parents the peace of mind that comes from knowing their children will be cared for by those they trust, and that their children won’t be taken into legal custody even for an hour.

I have lived in Alaska nearly all of my life and have spent the last fifteen years in Anchorage. During that time, I worked in special credits dealing with troubled loans and bank-owned properties at Northrim Bank while earning my MBA and raising our kids with my husband. After leaving the banking industry, I went to work for nearly ten years at the Municipality of Anchorage as the manager of tax enforcement and delinquent court-ordered fine collection. During my time at the Municipality, my staff and I implemented two new tax programs: the Marijuana Retail Sales Tax and the Motor Fuel Excise Tax, which generate nearly $20 million in annual Municipal revenue, which helps fund critical city departments such as police and fire.

But going to law school had always been my dream. So, when I discovered Mitchell Hamline School of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota, the first–and only–law school in the United States to offer an American Bar Association-approved Juris Doctor program with equal portions of instruction online and on-campus, I decided to turn that dream into a reality. The hybrid program permitted me to continue living and working in Anchorage while completing my law degree. While at Mitchell Hamline, a classmate and I won the Moot Court Appellate Advocacy Competition, and I was an assistant editor of the Mitchell Hamline Law Review. I also became certified in Trauma-Informed Advocacy. I graduated cum laude and became a member of the Alaska Bar in 2019.

After graduation, I served as a judicial law clerk at the Anchorage Superior Court to the Honorable Kevin M. Saxby from 2019 – 2020, and to the Honorable Thomas A. Matthews from 2020 – 2021, prior to forming my own law practice and becoming a Personal Family Lawyer®. My background is well-suited for this practice area, as it is comprised of legal knowledge, as well as my twenty-five years of experience as a financial professional in banking and special credits, and a decade of public service in the Finance Department of the Municipality of Anchorage. I also understands the unique challenges involved with owning and operating a business, aside from my law practice, as I assist my husband with running a successful general contracting business in Anchorage.