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As discussed over several Economic Development Committee meetings, the City and Borough of Wrangell announced last Tuesday morning changes to existing COVID-19 relief programs, as well as a new program available to the public. As part of their response to the pandemic, the city has put together a variety of grant opportunities and other assistance programs to help businesses and community members get through these tough times. In a previous interview with the Wrangell Sentinel, Economic...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met Tuesday night to hold a public hearing on a Community Development Block Grant. In 2018, according to the meeting's agenda packet, the borough received a block grant for the purchase of a new fire truck. The grant was for $337,500, with the total estimated cost of the fire truck at $450,000. Per the requirements of the grant, two public hearings were held about the grant, one for the public to suggest projects and another to serve as a status report on the grant...
The Wrangell School Board held a special meeting on Wednesday, Sept. 9, to continue their discussion of a formal reprimand and improvement plan for the superintendent. Late last August, Superintendent Debbe Lancaster and several district staff members went on a trip to Juneau to purchase supplies to prepare the district for the upcoming school year. This was in violation of a district travel ban during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as done without board approval. The planned use of CARES Act...
During the Wrangell Borough Assembly on Tuesday evening, Sept. 8 they discussed a community risk assessment of Wrangell for COVID-19. This risk assessment was created by Wrangell's Emergency Operations Center, to help determine how at-risk the community might be to the pandemic. The assessment takes into account information like the 7-day and 14-day average case count in Wrangell, the amount of community spread of COVID-19, the average number of close contacts per case, and the number of large...
Beginning on June 1st, small businesses were able to apply for AK CARES Act relief funding, which is Federal funds intended to help support local businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, the Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development (DCCED) and AIDEA have had difficulties getting the money to applicants; of the $290 million in relief funds allocated by the Legislature in May, only a small percentage of those funds have been distributed to local businesses. In...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met Tuesday evening, Aug. 25. During this meeting, they reviewed an FY 2019 audit of the borough. This item was postponed from their meeting on Aug. 11, to wait for a representative from the auditing firm to be available to answer questions. According to the agenda packet, the fund balance for the city's governmental funds sits at $53.65 million, and approximately $54.31 million in the enterprise funds. Of these, unrestricted funds sit at about $9.16 million and $5....
The Wrangell School Board held a special meeting Monday, Aug. 24, to discuss recent travel and purchases made by the superintendent and school staff. Last week, Superintendent Debbe Lancaster and three other members of the school district traveled to Juneau for a shopping trip. This was to acquire some key items related to reopening the schools and COVID-19 mitigation, she said. There were several reasons this was a topic of discussion for the board, among them being a lack of communication...
The Wrangell School Board met Monday evening, Aug. 17. During the meeting, the board adopted a mandate requiring face masks be worn on district property. According to the mandate, masks must be worn while indoors, before entering buildings, before entering or leaving enclosed personal work areas, when walking to or from one's vehicle, or in other cases when social distancing of 6 feet cannot be maintained. There are some exceptions to the mandate. Masks will not be necessary, when social...
In March, when the COVID-19 pandemic first began to impact Alaska, many local businesses and organizations in Wrangell shut down. While many groups saw the time as an opportunity to wait and see how the pandemic would change things in the community, the Wrangell Salvation Army took the opportunity to renovate and upgrade. Now that they and other local groups are as close to business-as-usual as they can be in this time, the Salvation Army wanted to remind people struggling through the pandemic...
The implementation of the CARES Act, which are the funds provided by the federal government to states to combat COVID-19, is constantly evolving. Earlier this month, after three Alaska House Labor and Commerce Committee meetings and hours of public testimony, the Alaska Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development (DCCED) decided to make changes to their grant program. Thank you to everyone who gave public testimony input and helped shape these changes. The three main changes are: 1) businesses that received up to $5,000 in...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met Tuesday evening for a special meeting, to consider CARES Act funding for the school district. Wrangell, and many other communities, recently received special funds through the CARES Act to help respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Wrangell has used these funds, or plans to use them, for items like the purchase of a new ambulance, to cover wages for first responders, and to help pay for an alternate isolation site, among other planned expenses. As the Wrangell...
The Wrangell Convention and Visitor Bureau met last Thursday, to workshop their goals for a rebranding project. As part of a large to-do list recently approved by the borough assembly, the CVB is seeking to use CARES Act funding to improve Wrangell's brand and draw in more tourists. As this was just a workshop, no official action was taken. However, the bureau generally agreed that Wrangell's brand should be focused on Wrangell as a community. "I think our brand should be community-focused,"...
The City and Borough of Wrangell (City) will begin rolling out a series of programs of economic relief for businesses, non-profits and residents in Wrangell who have been impacted by the COVID-19 Pandemic. The City has designated up to $915,000 of the CARES Act funds received from the State to these assistance programs which are intended to provide economic relief in the areas of most need. Each program will require a separate application be completed by each business, non-profit or resident....
Wrangell EMS's new ambulance arrived on the barge last week, June 29. The vehicle was purchased with CARES Act money in response to the COVID-19 virus. When the purchase of the new ambulance was first being discussed, Borough Manager Lisa Von Bargen said that EMS response could be a potential weak link in the city's response to the pandemic. With only two ambulances, it could be challenging for EMS to respond to emergencies. This new ambulance, it is hoped, will shore up that area of response....
Representative Don Young made a stop in Wrangell Monday, July 7, to meet with constituents and discuss issues that matter to voters while on a tour of Southeast Alaska. There are several issues Wrangell is facing that are common across multiple Southeast communities, he said. He also discussed problems facing Alaska, in general, and common issues across the entire United States. The ferry system is a common issue for many Southeast residents, Young said. His role, in Congress, relates to the...
The Wrangell Convention and Visitor Bureau met last Wednesday, July 1, to discuss their recently approved marketing plan and what their top priorities should be. The CVB has spent several meetings, recently, to put together a marketing plan for Wrangell, which could be funded through the CARES Act. This plan, requesting a total of $146,516, was approved by the borough assembly in their June 23 meeting. With their plans approved, the CVB needed to decide what to work on first, as there was a...
City officials organized an online town hall meeting last Thursday evening, June 18, to try and answer some community questions regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. The town hall also saw some special guests from the state level take part in the Q&A session: Chief Medical Officer Dr. Anne Zink and Dr. Joseph McLaughlin. Representative Dan Ortiz also participated in the web conference. As the doctors had a limited window of time to take part in the town hall meeting, city officials spent previous...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly held one of their last budget work sessions last Wednesday evening, June 17, to finalize next year's budget for the city. For FY 2021, Wrangell is looking at revenues of $4.48 million in the general fund, but expenses of $4.78 million. Much of the discussion in this workshop revolved around the general fund, and how to handle its deficit. The workshop lasted for about three and a half hours. In the end, the assembly directed city administration to move forward with...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met Tuesday evening, June 23. While the adoption of the FY 2021 budget was the primary topic of discussion, and is covered in another article, there were several other important items covered in the meeting. One such item was the resignation of Assembly Member Mya DeLong. DeLong submitted her letter of resignation on June 8, but it was only formally accepted by the assembly in this meeting. According to her letter of resignation, DeLong has served as a member of...
The Wrangell Convention and Visitor Bureau met last Wednesday afternoon, June 17, to finish up a proposed marketing plan to bring before the borough assembly. In the time of COVID-19, the bureau was hoping to receive funding from the city to address the impacts the pandemic has had on the visitor industry. According to their list of proposals, provided by Economic Development Director Carol Rushmore, the CVB is seeking a total of $146,516 for various projects. First of all, the CVB would like...
After multiple workshops, rewrites, and edits, the borough assembly met Tuesday evening to finally adopt a budget for FY 2021. This budget, overall, barely breaks even between revenues and expenses. However, despite recent concerns of a deficit in their general fund, the budget brought before the assembly this night actually had a general fund surplus. The general fund now has revenues of about $4.95 million, and expenses of roughly $4.91 million. After transfers, Borough Manager Lisa Von Bargen...
In one of their final budget workshops for FY 2021, the borough assembly gave guidance to city administration to do as much as they can to close Wrangell's general fund deficit. According to the agenda packet for the June 10 meeting the FY 2021 general fund was facing a deficit of $801,451. However, city administration is anticipating that roughly $350,000 in wages for the upcoming financial year will be eligible for reimbursement through the CARES Act, "due to time spent on COVID-19 by...
Work on establishing an alternative isolation site for COVID-19 patients reached an important milestone last week. During the June 9 assembly meeting, Borough Manager Lisa Von Bargen announced that a lease had been signed to use the old Sourdough Lodge to potentially house COVID-19 patients. The original plan was to use one of Trident Seafood's bunkhouses, but Von Bargen said that using the lodge would be a better deal. "The terms of that are $5,000 a month while there's nobody in there," she...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met last Wednesday evening, June 3, for a special meeting. City administration was wanting to enter a Memorandum of Understanding with SEARHC to provide COVID-19 testing for Sea Level Seafood employees. The total cost for the proposed memorandum, according to the meeting's agenda packet, comes out to $60,000. This amount provides some padding in case of emergency, the actual cost of the memorandum is anticipated to be $52,500. "In order to ensure an appropriate...
The Wrangell Convention and Visitor Bureau met last Tuesday afternoon, June 9, to workshop various marketing plans. The CVB was looking to put together a list of various ways they could promote Wrangell and its local businesses, to draw in tourists to present to the borough assembly in the near future. Economic Development Director Carol Rushmore said that, as many communities were struggling because of the COVID-19 pandemic, they could potentially use CARES Act funding to cover the costs of som...
