Sorted by date Results 26 - 30 of 30
ANCHORAGE (AP) - School officials in Alaska’s second-largest municipality implemented a new policy requiring masks at sporting events last week in response to coronavirus outbreaks at a half-dozen Matanuska-Susitna Borough district schools. Three large high schools in the district — Colony, Palmer, Wasilla — are among five facilities closed as of Feb. 12 because of the outbreaks, the Anchorage Daily News reported. It was unclear when they would reopen. Public health officials said some of the confirmed COVID-19 cases started with students mixin...
Without diplomatic intervention, large cruise ships aren’t coming to Alaska this year. Canada closed its waters to foreign ships with more than 250 passengers. That means Alaska’s big-ship cruise season for 2021 is effectively cancelled. Skagway officials unveiled their backup plan Feb. 10. “We can’t cry in our pillow that we’re not a cruise ship destination this year. We need to be excited about what we are,” said Skagway Mayor Andrew Cremata. He told the virtual town hall that 2021 will be about survival. He acknowledged the summer seas...
ANCHORAGE (AP) - Three rural Alaska communities have launched a pilot program intended to create more culturally sensitive protocols on how government and law enforcement should respond to cases with missing or slain Alaska Natives. The Curyung Native Council in Dillingham, the Native Village of Unalakleet and the Koyukuk Native Village have launched the program, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Alaska said in a statement. The three will work with state agencies to create a Tribal Community Response Plan that will determine law e...
ANCHORAGE (AP) - An Alaska skier who was injured by a bear when his group accidently disturbed the animal’s den was released from a Juneau hospital. The Chilkat Valley News reported 40-year-old Bart Pieciul was released Feb. 9 after sustaining injuries in the attack during a backcountry ski trip near Haines last Saturday. Pieciul had surgery on a broken arm and will need a second surgery to remove metal pins implanted by doctors. Pieciul and his ski partners, Graham Kraft and Jeff Moskowitz, were going up a mountainside above Chilkoot Lake w...
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) - U.S. Interior Department officials on Feb. 11 canceled a Trump administration directive that gave local and state officials power to block purchases of land and water for conservation. Acting Interior Secretary Scott de la Vega rescinded a November order from former Secretary David Bernhardt that had been criticized by both Republicans and Democrats, who said the Trump administration ignored their wishes when it changed a program that is paid for billions of dollars in conservation work over more than five decades. In...