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Wrangell’s high school basketball boys won one and lost one in a match-up at Haines last weekend. The boys played a pair of close games against the Glacier Bears. In Friday’s game, the Wolves followed just behind through much of the first half, with Haines up by two at the start of the second quarter. By halftime Wrangell had eked out a 22-21 lead after a seven-point quarter from Trent Stokes and points contributed by Tyman Teat, Jacob Hammer and Sam Prysunka. Riley Blatchley dominated the court offensively for the next 16 minutes, sec...
Women of a local service organization celebrated 30 years of its teddy bear program this Valentine's Day. The Wrangell chapter of Beta Sigma Phi (ΒΣΦ) continued its February 14 tradition of a dance and auction at the American Legion, with proceeds from the event going to purchase the plush toys. These in turn get sent to Wrangell Medical Center, providing a buddy for pediatric patients in need of care. For many years, ΒΣΦ supported the program in association with the Wrangell Lions Club, which...
A planned-for merger between two regional healthcare providers has been put on hold for two months. Alaska Island Community Services was to merge with larger organization SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC) on February 1, but the consolidation will have to wait until April 1. The merger was formally announced last October, and heads of both organizations subsequently met with Wrangell officials in November and in January to explain the transition. AICS executive Mark Walker has said the move was needed due to growth in the orga...
Wrangell’s Planning and Zoning Commission approved a pair of conditional use applications for prospective bed and breakfast establishments at last Thursday’s evening meeting. For one of these, Linda Nore and Steve Thomassen want to operate “Mount Dewey Extended Stay,” a two-bedroom rental operated out of their home on Mt. Dewey Lane. They put in an application with the city on January 19 that would allow for the limited use, specifying no additional construction would be needed to make the transition. The request drew a number of neighbo...
At its 27th Annual Fundraiser Dinner on Saturday, the Wrangell Chamber of Commerce announced its honors list for 2017. There were five nominees for this year’s Wrangell Citizen of the Year: school board member and Wells Fargo Bank employee Aleisha Mollen; Sourdough Lodge proprietor Bruce Harding; Alaska Vistas operator Sylvia Ettefagh; Dr. Lynn Prysunka at Alaska Island Community Services; and Evergreen Elementary School secretary Renate Davies. Of the candidates, Prysunka was awarded this year’s honor, having served the community as a fam...
A new archiving station has been acquired by the local library, allowing the public access to digital scanning services free of charge. Irene Ingle Public Library was able to purchase its Knowledge Imaging Center largely through use of a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Librarian Margaret Villarma explained the versatile system makes digital archiving very simple, and is easy on original materials. Documents are placed open, facing upward, and a digital scanner overhead...
Wrangell's springtime birding festival was acknowledged for its mindfulness and dedication to conservation. The Stikine River Birding Festival received the 2017 Mindful Birding Award from the Mindful Birding Project, which promotes ethical birding and conservation efforts nationwide. The award comes with a $500 grant, which was applied for by the city's Convention and Visitors Bureau. "We wrote in and explained how we met their criteria," said Carol Rushmore, Wrangell's economic director....
In its first meeting of the new year, the governing board for Southeast Alaska Power Agency looked ahead to political reshufflings at the state and federal levels. Meeting in Petersburg February 8, members of the board learned from SEAPA executive officer Trey Acteson a change in administrations at the federal level could be useful to the agency’s future operations. For example, only two commissioners sitting on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission – which licenses hydropower projects – remain in place since the swearing in of Presi...
Wrangell’s Port Commission gave its go-ahead to a tidelands purchase proposed by the Stikine Inn’s owners. Bill Goodale, who jointly manages the dockside hotel with his wife, Cheryl Goodale, appeared at the February 2 meeting to explain his proposal. He wishes to purchase from the city 25,450 square feet of submerged tidelands and 2,000 square feet of uplands to the north and west of the hotel’s current property line, with the intent of expanding and adding to the building. “We’re hoping for 30 rooms, plus retail space on the lower floor,” G...
The Volunteer Fire Department will be sending six of its members to Seattle next month, to climb a lot of stairs and raise a lot of money for cancer research in the process. Held this year on March 12, the Scott Firefighter Stairclimb is an annual event put on by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Washington and Alaska. Founded in 1949, the society is the world's largest voluntary health organization dedicated to researching and treating various blood cancers. About 1,800 firefighters from...
A new trooper has been selected to take the vacant Wrangell assignment, Alaska Wildlife Troopers confirmed this week. “We’ve had that position filled,” said AWT Captain Steve Hall. In October the Wrangell post was vacated with the resignation of Trooper Fred Burk. Burk had been stationed in the area about a year, following a push by locals and their legislative representation to retain the position, which had been under threat of reduction due to budget cutbacks. No trooper had been stationed in Wrangell through the spring and summer of 2015,...
Wrangell High School said its goodbyes to its championship-winning basketball coach during a special ceremony last week. Boys coach Ray Stokes announced last month his plan to retire after the end of the season, bringing to an end 30 years with the school program. As it was the boys' last home game for the year, a group of colleagues, friends and former players arranged a special tribute before Friday's varsity game. "I had no idea it was going to be the extent it was," Stokes recounted...
In its last home games of the 2016-17 season, Wrangell High School took on a pair of losses against visiting Metlakatla. In Friday evening's games, the junior varsity boys opened with a win over the Chiefs. The Wrangell boys recovered from a 12-point deficit in the second quarter, closing that to nine by the half at 15-22. The JV Wolves then took the offensive, racking up 12 points per quarter while holding Metlakatla to only eight the whole half. The game wrapped up in a 39-30 victory for...
Wrangell’s girls began a long slog of a weekend with a pair of losses at Metlakatla over the weekend. Playing Friday, the Miss Chiefs opened with a 17-7 lead in the first quarter, building from there. The hosts scored in the double digits every quarter, playing most strongly during the third with 19 scored to Wrangell’s five. The game finished in a 32-61 loss for the Lady Wolves. The team was playing short-handed, with four girls left at home due to injuries. Kaylyn Easterly led her team for points with 17 overall, and making five of six fre...
Wrangell's girls were swept during their Homecoming weekend games against Petersburg, following a set of wins over Craig the previous week. After much back and forth, Wrangell's varsity team took the lead early on in Friday's game, leading at the half 16-13. Tied at 23 by the end of the third, the Lady Vikings rallied hard in the fourth quarter, finishing with a 43-34 win. Leading offensively, Maddy Harding scored 14 points in the game, with four of her baskets being three-pointers. Kaylyn...
Wrangell is being represented at the West Coast's biggest annual boat show, which began in Seattle on Friday. Held this year at CenturyLink Field's convention center and at South Lake Union, the annual Seattle Boat Show draws thousands of visitors for a 10-day celebration of all things nautical. This includes craft and gear – with 1,000s of vessels and three acres of accessories to peruse – seminars and activities, and also opportunities to work and travel. A booth boosting Wrangell's ava...
Wrangell Medical Center’s cash reserves are looking healthy again, after receipt of a substantial Medicare repayment last month. The hospital had been underpaid by the federal health insurer by about $488,000 the previous fiscal year, and the adjustment was received along with a scheduled $210,000 payment by January 20. The influx benefitted the hospital’s reserve accounts, with cash-on-hand just topping the $1,000,000 mark by the month’s end. Previously, at the year’s end it had $577,000 on hand, equivalent to 19.6 days of operating expenses....
A Wrangell resident was among the travelers detained following a selective travel ban issued by the White House last week. Sylvia Ettefagh was returning from a 10-day vacation in Costa Rica with her husband, John, and friends the Stroms on Saturday. The group was at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on its way to connecting with an Alaska Airlines flight to Seattle. At customs, Ettefagh attempted to enter the Global Entry section of the Trusted Traveler program. The expedited screening is offered by US Customs and Border Protection for...
As the Alaska State Legislature continues with the new session, members in both the House and Senate have put forward ideas to fix the state’s ongoing budget woes. Sitka Sen. Burt Stedman (R-District R) submitted his own contribution to that discussion, filing Senate Bill 21 on January 18. “It’s a percent of market value bill for the permanent fund which would have a five-year average market value payout of four percent. Of that four percent, a minimum of half of it or two and a quarter percent would have to go to dividends,” he explain...
Wrangell's girls were swept during their Homecoming weekend games against Petersburg, following a set of wins over Craig the previous week. After much back and forth, Wrangell's varsity team took the lead early on in Friday's game, leading at the half 16-13. Tied at 23 by the end of the third, the Lady Vikings rallied hard in the fourth quarter, finishing with a 43-34 win. Leading offensively, Maddy Harding scored 14 points in the game, with four of her baskets being three-pointers. Kaylyn...
Hosting the Vikings over the high school's homecoming weekend, Wrangell's Wolves ended up taking two on the nose after a pair of winning weekends. Friday night, the Wolves fought to overcome a steep deficit early in the game, with Petersburg leading 25-9 at the start of the second. A tenacious offense on the part of the visiting team and a number of missed shots kept Wrangell behind at the half, 20-38. The Vikings also got the bulk of its free throws for the game up to that point, with 10 of 13...
A new sample site shows more butter clams carry the risk of paralytic shellfish poisoning for consumers, according to a report released last week. Since last year Wrangell Cooperative Association's Indian Environmental General Assistance Program (IGAP) staff have been collecting samples of various bivalves from the beaches around Shoemaker Bay on a weekly basis. It added a new site further south to its monitoring, near Pats Landing. It was here that the butter clam samples showed unsafe...
Joining millions of other women and men estimated to have marched worldwide on Saturday, 20 residents of Wrangell held a Women's March of their own downtown on February 21. The Women's March on Washington was a daylong event emphasizing that "women's rights are human rights," following the swearing-in of President Donald Trump the previous day. The group which organized the event cited the divisive rhetoric of the past election cycle as the underlying cause of the march. "The march wasn't about...
Taking up the mantle left by the Lions Club after it closed its Wrangell chapter last summer, the Garnet Grit Betties roller derby team is continuing its aluminum collection program. For two decades the club had raised money for itself through the program, as aluminum is one of the few recyclable materials which can turn a profit for collectors. Reprocessing the material is considerably more efficient than producing it from bauxite ore, a savings which makes it more profitable than iron scrap...
Trident Seafoods will be welcoming a new manager for its Wrangell plant during the summer's production run. Nick Ohmer was named as the company's selection in a media brief last week. A lifelong resident of Southeast Alaska, in an interview Ohmer said he would be bringing to the job his local knowledge and personal connections with Wrangell's fishermen. Ohmer grew up in Petersburg, and even before fishing alongside those from the neighboring community he grew up with many of them through basketb...
