Sorted by date Results 963 - 987 of 1297
Next year’s lunch program was the hottest item on the menu for Wrangell School Board’s final meeting before the summer on Monday. Previously at its May meeting the board voted to withdraw from its contract with NANA Management Services, which had supplied food and cafeteria services for the district last year. On Monday members elected to withdraw from the National School Lunch Program as well, releasing the district from its requirements to pursue its own supplemental lunch program. The plan put forward by school superintendent Patrick May...
In only their second year with the program, the girls of Wrangell’s Athletic Amateur Union team gave a fine showing at the Alaska Basketball Academy Girls Team Camp at Palmer’s Colony High School last week. “We made it to semifinals,” said Kaylyn Easterly, one of seven of the team’s 16 players able to make the trip. Wrangell was one of 41 teams at the event, which were separated into high school, college and professional divisions. Building largely on Stikine Middle School’s basketball program, Easterly pointed out her team was one of the youn...
Despite dimming income over the past fiscal year, board members for Southeast Alaska Power Agency were informed the future is still a bright one. At its June 18 meeting in Ketchikan, CEO Trey Acteson reported SEAPA remains financially strong and well-positioned leading into the next fiscal year. Sales revenues through last month were $1.3 million below budget, or about 12 percent. While weather volatility has played a hand in the shortfall, a consistent drop from anticipated power consumption by Ketchikan through the 2015 fiscal year has also...
At its last meeting for the summer, Wrangell’s Parks and Recreation Advisory Board approved a new fee assistance schedule for using public facilities. Parks and Recreation Department director Kate Thomas explained the new assistance schedule would allow applicants up to a 100-percent discount for a specific activity each quarter, depending on income level and household size. For example, a three-person household making $26,120 or less could receive a 50-percent discount on an activity or 75-percent off from a pass. Guidelines follow the s...
At its regular Assembly meeting Tuesday, Wrangell's City and Borough Assembly approved a spending plan for improvements at Shoemaker Bay Harbor. Designed by PND Engineers, funding for the $10.7 million project would require $5 million to come from an Alaska Department of Transportation matching grant. The deadline to file an application is on August 1, prompting a special meeting of the Port Commission on May 26 to get things moving. Under the plan the commission put forward, part of the funds for a match would come from the Harbor Department,...
Results are in for 63rd annual King Salmon Derby, held in Wrangell from May 9 to June 7. Chad Smith will take home the $6,000 prize for the 42.7 pound salmon he caught off Ham Island on May 24. He also bagged the $2,500 Memorial Weekend prize in the process. Just behind him, Tim Dodson took second place with a 40-pounder caught off the Nose on May 20. Along with the $4,000, he won the $500 prize for week two, and the $250 Art Clark Pioneer Prize for largest fish entered by a senior. Kevin Roope...
In a pair of meetings Monday morning and Tuesday evening, Wrangell Medical Center will move ahead with shifting its billing services to an outside company. The hospital's board of trustees and the Wrangell City and Borough Assembly each approved a contract with TruBridge LLC, based out of Mobile, Ala. Once finalized, hospital staff anticipates the transition will take effect by August. TruBridge is a business and consulting services company and subsidiary of CPSI, which provides the hospital's accounting software. WMC interim CEO Marla Sanger e...
A Wrangell running club raised $1,800 in a hastily organized 5K last week, held in part to mark National Running Day on June 3 but also to assist a local family in need. "It was impromptu," said the Southeast Beasts' director, Lucy Robinson. Creating an event on Facebook only the day before, she was surprised to see around 50 participants at the community center the next evening, ready to go. Runners, joggers and walkers of all ages had come out in support of the Appleman family, which lost its...
A new display was set out in the lobby of the Nolan Center last week, featuring the artwork of the late Marlieta Wallace, a Wrangell artist. The exhibit features some of the Mardina dolls Wallace made during the 1980s, created by the hundreds in her home. Constructed from a variety of leathers, furs, feathers, felts and beads, 16 of the dolls are on display in a case outside the Wrangell Museum gift shop. The larger dolls are unique, part of Wallace's Grand'Mere doll series. Each of these came...
A skull found by a hunter near the Stikine River almost three years ago has yet to be interred. Wrangell resident Vena Stough discovered the skull while at Government Slough on Oct. 5, 2012, and brought it to the local police department. From there it made its way to United States Forest Service offices in Petersburg for further analysis. “What we try to do is figure out if it’s Native American ancestry,” explained Jane Smith, an archaeologist for the USFS for 23 years. The repatriation process is governed by the Native American Graves Prote...
The next steps have been taken on an agreement between the University of Alaska Southeast and Wrangell Public School District, with the establishment of an office for the university's technical preparation program. The tech prep program is offered for college credit through the university, and courses are taught by approved instructors using UAS syllabi. Enrolled students earn high school credits needed for graduation as well, and school superintendent Patrick Mayer explained the program will...
The Wrangell School Board elected to offer Kendall Benson the position as the new secondary schools principal during its May 19 meeting. He will replace outgoing principal Colter Barnes who served one year in the position. Barnes will be headed to Southeast Island School District to serve as an itinerant principal and greenhouse manager. Benson begins August 1 and brings with him three decades of education experience. His most recent post was as principal of Cedar Middle School in Cedar City,...
As of Tuesday, the Alaska Legislature meeting in a special session in Anchorage had still not passed a budget for the new fiscal year, which begins July 1. On Sunday, the Senate Finance Committee rejected a compromise budget passed by the House the previous day, which included some small concessions to the minority such as reversing cuts to the ferry system and per-student funding. A conference committee between the two chambers was being organized to negotiate an amended budget as legislators posture around various funding priorities....
As dry conditions pervaded May and continue into June, the City of Wrangell has issued a public notice requesting that residents conserve water after its two reservoirs dipped below the usual levels. Residents and businesses are asked to begin reducing their water consumption until normal levels are restored. Wrangell received only 0.6 inches of precipitation for the month of May, down from a historical average of of 4.58 inches. Other communities in Southeast have also noted record dry months,...
The New Old Time Chautauqua is still set to stop through on its summer tour of Southeast Alaska later this month. Founded in 1981 by a group of performers, health care practitioners and educators, the Chautauqua revives a brand of entertainment widely popular in the rural United States until the Great Depression. As a movement, the Chautauqua emphasizes community building through education and entertainment. Sixty performers will stop into Southeast communities between June 21 and July 13 for...
A delegation of Royal Canadian Mounted Police visited Wrangell last month in search of one of their colleagues, a constable killed in a boating accident near the island over a century ago. Constable Spencer Heathcote was a member of RCMP's Yukon District, Stikine Detachment, and was on patrol with two other constables when he died on Dec. 26, 1901. On patrol, the constables' boat was swamped in a gale when crossing over to Wrangell Island, and Heathcote perished along with Constable Norman Campbell. Though nearly succumbing to hypothermia, the...
The Fourth of July Festival season began Sunday with the kickoff for this year's Royalty Court contest. The Wrangell Chamber of Commerce (CoC) sponsored a gathering at the Stikine Inn, introducing this year's two candidates, Kimberly Cooper and the Athletic Amateur Union basketball team. The competition has had teams run for Queen in the past, but CoC director Cyni Waddington explained this year's AAU team will set a first for size: 16 girls in the program will work together to sell tickets and...
Wrangell's City and Borough Assembly has approved its budget for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1. The budget was previously issued as a draft at a public workshop on April 28 and has since been subjected to two hearings. The state of Alaska's finances still casts a shadow of uncertainty over Wrangell's projections. As of Tuesday the Legislature had reconvened in Anchorage for special session but had not yet settled on a final budget. Which items will ultimately face cuts is still in the air as the state tackles its $3.5 billion...
Borough Assembly members were presented the final form of Wrangell's waterfront master plan before their Tuesday evening meeting. The plan is the product of progressive public discussions and meetings in January, February and March. The core concept is to fill the 2.5-acre area located between the barge and boat yards parallel to Campbell Drive, which the Harbor Department obtained a permit to develop from the Army Corps of Engineers in 2007. Beyond that, the master plan looks ahead at developin...
Flags adorn the graves of a group of unknown veterans interred at the Wrangell Cemetery this Memorial Day. American Legionnaires Einar Haaseth and Jimmy Bell put out around 150 flags at veterans' gravesites over the holiday weekend, meant to commemorate United States military personnel who have fallen in the line of duty....
The Wrangell Medical Center Foundation raised at least $32,000 for charity during its 8th annual prime rib dinner and auction, and the 8th annual Brian Gilbert Memorial Tournament last weekend. “We did a little better overall this year than we did last year,” explained Kris Reed, WMC development coordinator. “With sponsorships, it will be a little higher than that.” Most of the tickets to the dinner were pre-sold, with the rest sold at the door. “We had pretty much a full house,” she said. Earlier in the day, 39 golfers took part in the tour...
Anglers of all ages took to the water over the Memorial Day weekend, hoping to land a salmon fit for the special first prize awarded during Wrangell’s 63rd Annual King Salmon Derby. Chad Smith won the $2,500 weekend prize with a 42.7-pound specimen, and propelled himself to first place in the derby bracket. Ending June 7, this year’s first-place fish earns its captor a $6,000 prize. Thirty-seven fish were weighed in between Friday and Monday, though it is likely many more were caught. Derby par...
The financial situation for Wrangell Medical Center has improved in recent months, but its new chief financial officer told the hospital’s board of trustees at its May 20 meeting that there is still much left to do. Doran Hammett presented the hospital’s budget for next year, which on the revenue side builds from projected income for the 2015 fiscal year. Net revenue after write offs, charity and bad debt are anticipated to total at just over $10 million, better than the previous year, yet still be below a high of $10.7 million for 2012. Ham...
Wrangell’s Planning and Zoning Commission held a brief meeting midday May 20 after establishing a quorum, taking on monthly business rescheduled from May 14. Commissioners approved preliminary plat review for vacation of the remaining 15 feet of Cedar Street between Lot 4, Block 25, and Lot 2A, Block 31. The request was filed by Tony and Sue Guggenbickler and addresses an encroachment issue with a neighboring property held by Alaska Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC). “The vacation was approved a couple of years ago,” explained Carol Rushmore,...
After five months of repair, the Wrangell community pool reopened to the public May 20, just in time for the onset of summery weather. An open house celebrating the repairs was held that evening, with residents finally able to take a dip for the first time this year. Wrangell's pool was built in 1986 as part of improvements to the adjoining middle school. Following detection of a leak last year and the pool's Dec. 18 closure, Jensen Yorba Lott was contracted to perform the first-ever comprehensive condition survey of the pool and community...
