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After four breakdowns of the state ferry Matanuska in a little over two months, the Department of Transportation is considering its options to ensure more reliable service as the heavier summer travel season approaches. "In light of the mechanical issues on the Matanuska, we are evaluating and considering alternatives to improve system reliability,” department spokesman Sam Dapcevich said April 29. The department provided no further information. “Will get back to you on this question,” Dapcevich said. The Alaska Marine Highway System’s five op...
Rich with oil dollars, the Alaska Legislature in 1980 abolished the state’s annual $10-per-person tax that went to help support schools. More 41 years later, with North Slope oil production at its lowest level since the giant Prudhoe Bay field went online, and the state facing chronic budget gaps, a House committee this week is holding hearings to bring back the tax. The proposed tax would bring in an estimated $65 million a year, less than 10% of annual state budget deficits in recent years, but it’s a start, said Anchorage Rep. Ivy Spo...
Watershed-protection advocates told Alaska lawmakers that the three transboundary rivers crossing from Canada into Southeast need more protection from the risks created by mining operations in British Columbia, including more data on water quality. Tracking and ensuring the health of the waterways and their salmon runs, including the Stikine River, requires more monitoring over a wider area for more years, research scientist Chris Sergeant testified at the House Fisheries Committee on April 27. “The good news … is they’re still thriving watersh...
A few volunteers and city parks and recreation staff have started the work, but the big push to clean up, restore and replant downtown garden beds -and generally spruce up Front Street - is this weekend. The work project stretches down Front Street from the Stikine Inn to Rayme's Bar, said Kate Thomas, parks director. "I am not going to turn down help, ever." Volunteers can sign up and pick up tools, supplies and assignments at the downtown pavilion 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday, and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m....
The last time Alaska changed the state tax on motor fuel, gasoline cost about 36 cents a gallon at a Lower 48 pump, the average home price in the United States was $24,000, and the average price of a new car was about $3,500. The motor fuel tax rate in Alaska in 1970 was 8 cents a gallon, about half the price of a cup of coffee. Gasoline now runs about $2.50 a gallon in the Lower 48, $3 in Anchorage, and closer to $4 a gallon in California. The average home price in the country is over...
The 58-year-old Matanuska has been at the dock in Ketchikan since Sunday morning, waiting for repairs, and is not expected to return to service until Saturday. It is the ship's fourth mechanical breakdown since February, stranding passengers and imposing costs and delays on travelers with few options. "The Matanuska is still in Ketchikan awaiting parts for repair of the starboard engine," the Alaska Marine Highway System reported in a website posting Tuesday afternoon. "It is anticipated the vessel will get underway northbound Saturday...
"Confidence in an economy matters," Dan Robinson, research chief at the state Department of Labor, told the House Ways and Means Committee earlier this month. "There is an economic cost of not solving these problems." He was talking with legislators about the state's job loss, population loss, economic loss and inability to agree on a fiscal plan to pay for public services long term. For most of the past 30 years, Alaska has taken from savings, prayed for high oil prices and rejoiced at any...
The community is under a face mask order for all indoor public spaces until 11:59 p.m. April 30, though the borough assembly removed any penalties from the ordinance. The April 8-16 outbreak of 16 COVID-19 cases in Wrangell prompted an emergency assembly meeting Saturday to consider the public health ordinance bringing back mandatory face masks for a couple of weeks. Assembly members, however, voted near unanimously to eliminate any penalties for failure to wear a face mask. Mayor Steve...
A quarter-century ago, Congress appropriated $110 million explicitly to help Southeast communities get through the loss of the timber industry, the region's big economic driver. This year, federal money is coming to the aid of the new dominant industry, tourism. However, Sitka Sen. Bert Stedman said, there is a key difference between the loss of the timber industry and today's struggles in the tourist industry: Tourism will come back one day. But it will take time. Federal pandemic relief funds...
I wrote my first news story 52 years ago last week for my college paper. That year and every year since, I was taught, reminded, practiced and adhered to Associated Press style and always identified elected officials by their political party. Put a D after their name, or an R. It was automatic, a blank space that reporters had to fill in. An elected official's name without a party affiliation was incomplete. It was as if the party initial told readers all they needed to know, and our reporting...
The annual Stikine River Birding Festival starts Friday and includes movies, a morning walk to identify birds, video presentations, virtual storytelling from the library, a session on how to build a bird feeder, a community cleanup and a nature trail scavenger hunt. Activities run through May 8. Organizers are spreading out the events this year, rather than squeezing everything into four days as was the schedule in 2019. The pandemic forced cancellation of last year's activities. "We have been m...
After no season last year, Wrangell started 2021 with hopes of as many as 20,000 tourists coming to town this summer aboard cruise ships of varying sizes, with capacity of between 40 and 700 passengers. With the loss of larger vessels, and some smaller ones, however, the maximum ship capacity into town has fallen to under 2,000 this summer. "The actual number of cruise visitors to Wrangell will likely be much smaller than capacity due to protocols and restrictions for COVID-19 safety...
Wrangell tallied nine COVID-19 cases between last Thursday and late Tuesday afternoon, as the community is dealing with a spike in infections. "Health officials have found evidence of community transmission of COVID-19 in Wrangell,"the city reported Tuesday. The latest case "is a household member/close contact"to another case reported earlier in the day, the city reported Tuesday afternoon. "The individual is a local resident and is in isolation." Three cases were reported by the city last...
The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan became law on March 11. Much of the federal money is directed to help states, cities, businesses and individuals recover from the economic damage of the pandemic. Aid for the beleaguered tourism, travel and hospitality industries - which suffered more that most with the near-total shutdown of events and vacations - was a major part of the congressional work. And yet, here it is a month later, and the governor's office has only now announced it will propose...
Legislators are trying again this year to tax "electronic smoking products"- e-cigarettes and vaping devices - the same as tobacco products. Bills to extend the state's tobacco tax to electronic smoking products died last March as lawmakers rushed to close down the session amid the start of the pandemic. Kodiak Sen. Gary Stevens and Juneau Rep. Sara Hannan are trying again this year. Their bills have each cleared their first committee and are both waiting for a hearing in their respective Financ...
Face masks are required in all indoor public spaces until 11:59 p.m. April 30 under an emergency ordinance approved unanimously by the borough assembly Saturday morning as the city responds to the COVID-19 breakout in town. The community tallied 16 cases April 8-16. “This is the highest number by double we’ve ever had active in Wrangell at any one time,” Borough Manager Lisa Von Bargen told the assembly. In addition to protecting public health, the outbreak is hurting the town’s economy, Von Bargen said. The SouthEast Alaska Regional Health...
State department operating budgets before the House Finance Committee this week for the fiscal year that starts July 1 include funding to restore the commercial fisheries position in Wrangell and also the Office of Children's Services caseworker job. The Legislature tried last year to fund both positions, but the money was vetoed by Gov. Mike Dunleavy. Wrangell lost its children's services worker several years ago to budget cuts. The Department of Fish and Game position was eliminated a year...
The steep drop in visitors to Alaska last year because of pandemic travel restrictions showed up in air, sea and land numbers - and resulting job losses - across the state. Overall, the state lost more than 22,000 jobs between February 2020 and February 2021, according to the Alaska Department of Labor. "Based on my forecast here, I do not anticipate a return to pre-pandemic employment levels until after 2022,"Mouhcine Guettabi, an associate professor of economics at the University of Alaska...
While Alaska legislators await federal rules for how the state can spend the almost $1.2 billion in federal pandemic relief funds headed this way, communities are waiting to see their allocations from a separate pot of federal aid - and ready to push the state to share some of its money. In addition to the general relief funding going to the state, Alaska communities will receive a share of a separate $231 million municipal allocation under the American Rescue Plan signed into law last month....
The Canadian border has been closed for more than a year and, judging from last week's news, it's not likely to reopen in the late-spring future or even the early-summer future. British Columbia recorded its highest number of daily cases last week. For the first time in the pandemic, British Columbia reported more than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases on two consecutive days. Last Friday's case count was a record high, surpassed the next day by an even higher count. The previous record was set just...
Back when the North Slope was pumping 2 million barrels of crude a day at its peak in 1988, and even for years after, oil provided upward of 90% of state general fund revenues in good years. But that was then, and now oil generates maybe 25% of the state's unrestricted dollars. The king of the budget hill is the Alaska Permanent Fund. The annual draw on the fund to help pay for public services and the dividend will provide about two-thirds of the state's unrestricted general revenues this year....
City officials reported three more COVID-19 cases late Wednesday afternoon, bringing to 12 the total number of new cases in town in the past seven days. "Wrangell is experiencing a COVID outbreak," said the statement issued by Wrangell's emergency operations center. "There is confirmation of community spread of the virus. We need everyone’s help to stop this outbreak." The three reported coronavirus cases Wednesday are local residents and are in isolation. The outbreak started last Thursday, with more cases reported Friday, Sunday, Monday and T...
State House and Senate committees continue to work on competing bills that would change the membership of the state ferry system advisory board. The Senate Transportation Committee on Tuesday heard the governor's bill, while the House State Affairs Committee considered legislation Tuesday offered by House Speaker Louise Stutes, of Kodiak. Gov. Mike Dunleavy's proposal would allow every governor to change out the board's membership, while Stutes' legislation attempts to protect almost half the...
The federal money that will flow into our state from the American Rescue Plan - the latest round of pandemic aid from Washington, D.C. - is the proverbial once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Alaskans to do good things with more than $2 billion. The total includes almost $1.2 billion that will go to the state, $357 million for schools, $230 million for local communities, a couple hundred million dollars more for housing assistance, tens of millions each for energy improvements to homes, the...
The 58-year-old Matanuska, the oldest operating vessel in the state ferry fleet, has had troubles operating the past two months. The Alaska Marine Highway System took it out of service last week to fix a mechanical problem, canceling port calls Saturday through Thursday this week and expecting that repairs would be completed and the ship ready to resume its weekly run out of Bellingham, Washington, this Friday. The 23-year-old Kennicott stepped in to provide service. The Matanuska expected to...