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The Skagway borough assembly has unanimously approved spending almost $3.2 million for a temporary solution to protect cruise ships, their passengers and the dock itself from frequent rockslides. Several slides have come down this year, hitting the railroad dock and forcing the closure of the forward berth, costing the community lost tourism business. Even while using the forward berth, ships had to tender their passengers to shore using small boats from the other side of the vessel to avoid putting people the dock. This year’s slides r...
With voter approval of a $3.5 million bond issue, the Wrangell School District wasted no time in moving ahead with its plan to go after a state grant as it works to fully fund needed repairs at its buildings. But before the district starts any work, it first must determine exactly what needs fixing so it can set priorities and assemble cost estimates. To that end, the school board voted Oct. 11 to appropriate up to $385,900 from the district’s major maintenance fund to pay for condition surveys of all three buildings. The fund has a current b...
Regardless whether you like harp music, it’s soothing, relaxing, even peaceful. Which leads me to apologize for continuing to harp on Alaska’s Permanent Fund dividend politics, which are anything but musical. They’re more akin to the wordless scream of a heavy-metal song, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. But they sure get the audience fired up. Unless you believe in $100-plus oil prices or heavy taxes or large-scale budget cuts, the state treasury cannot afford endless years of $2,500 or $3,000 dividends, especially not the $4,00...
Since 2016, no issue has divided Alaska state lawmakers more than the issue of the Permanent Fund dividend. The annual struggle over the amount given to state residents has repeatedly driven the Legislature into impasses that have brought the state to the brink of a government shutdown. Ahead of this year’s governor election, independent candidate Bill Walker, Democratic candidate Les Gara and Republicans Mike Dunleavy and Charlie Pierce have each outlined different approaches to solving the impasse, which voters have said is a top issue of c...
ANCHORAGE (AP) — Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy has indicated that he will vote in favor of calling a convention to consider amending the state constitution. Candidates for governor at an Alaska Resource Development Council forum on Oct. 11 were asked during if they would be voting for a constitutional convention in next month's general election. Candidates responded by raising “yes” or “no” signs. Dunleavy and Republican Charlie Pierce raised “yes” signs. Former Gov. Bill Walker, an independent, and Les Gara, a Democrat, raised “no” signs. A...
The stakes in Alaska are high in the search for a solution to the problem of bycatch, the unintended at-sea harvest of non-target species, such as hundreds of thousands of salmon a year, by commercial fishermen that are going after pollock or other fish. A special task force is nearing the end of a year-long process to find solutions that satisfy competing interests to the problem of bycatch. Many of the mostly Indigenous residents of western Alaska who depend on now-faltering salmon runs in the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers have said strict rules...
JUNEAU (AP) — Ben Stevens, a former Alaska Senate president and son of the late U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, has died. He was 63. The state troopers said they responded to a report last Thursday evening of a hiker — later identified as Stevens — having a medical emergency on the Lost Lake Trail near Seward. The troopers’ statement said a medical service team reached the scene around 6:40 p.m. and that lifesaving measures were unsuccessful. A Republican women’s group posted on Facebook that Stevens died of a heart attack after collapsing on the trail...
Two Russians who said they fled their country to avoid military service have requested asylum in the U.S. after beaching their boat on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea, Alaska U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s office said last Thursday. Karina Borger, a Murkowski spokesperson, by email said the office has been in communication with the U.S. Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection and that “the Russian nationals reported that they fled one of the coastal communities on the east coast of Russia to avoid compulsory military service.” Spoke...
JUNEAU (AP) — Acting state Revenue Commissioner Deven Mitchell has been chosen as the new chief executive of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. The announcement was made Oct. 3. The corporation said in a statement that the selection “is contingent on the successful negotiation of a salary and benefits package” and that a start date has not yet been set. Mitchell has called Alaska’s nest-egg oil wealth fund the state’s “trump card” as a renewable source of revenue, the Anchorage Daily News reported. His message to the board was that he would not...
Prison reform advocates are calling on Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s administration to order an independent review of the state Department of Corrections. The department recently reported its 15th death this year of a person in custody death. William Hensley III, 34, died Oct. 2at Goose Creek Correctional Center in Wasilla after a month in custody. With this death, Corrections matches the highest number of in-custody deaths the department has seen in the past decade. In 2015, 15 people died in Corrections custody. “These are people and they’re dying...
JUNEAU — The Alaska Permanent Fund’s board of trustees used a “deficient” performance evaluation process to justify firing CEO Angela Rodell, who said her removal was “political retribution” for opposing Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s budget plan to overdraw the fund, but an eight-month independent investigation found no credible evidence that Dunleavy was involved in Rodell’s ouster. Rodell, who served as the corporation’s CEO from 2015 until 2021 and led it to years of strong returns, was abruptly fired during a board meeting last December. There w...
Wrangell has received $291,566 that it was owed by the state but never expected to receive, and could hold it as a cushion to soften the debt payments on bonds to repair school buildings and the Public Safety Building. Borough Finance Director Mason Villarma said last week he would recommend to the assembly that it move the money into the debt service fund, keeping it there if needed to help with payments on the proposed bonds, easing the pressure on property tax payers. Wrangell voters are being asked in the Oct. 4 municipal election to...
Alaska officials are asking the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide 100% of the funds necessary for Western Alaska communities to recover from damages inflicted by Typhoon Merbok. That would match the 100% funding that was committed to help Puerto Rico recover from Hurricane Fiona in President Joe Biden’s federal disaster declaration. Typically, FEMA covers 75% of disaster-relief costs, leaving the remainder to be matched by state, local or tribal governments. For Western Alaska, “we feel that that’s just not acceptable, parti...
In a Sept. 21 candidate forum hosted in Fairbanks by the Alaska Chamber of Commerce, Democratic governor candidate Les Gara and independent candidate Bill Walker said that if elected they would seek new state revenue to pay for a variety of projects and reverse years of cuts to state services. Both men are seeking to unseat incumbent Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who has advocated cuts to public services and opposes any new taxes unless approved by a statewide vote of the public. Also competing in the Nov. 8 general election is Republican...
ANCHORAGE (AP) — A former Alaska attorney general has been indicted by a state grand jury on three felony counts of sexual abuse of a minor, a special prosecutor announced Sept. 21. The allegations against Clyde “Ed” Sniffen involve an Anchorage West High School student while Sniffen was in a position of authority in 1991, according to a statement released by the attorney general’s office on behalf of Gregg Olson, the special prosecutor. Sniffen was arraigned Monday. Olson in May filed the charges against Sniffen, 58, and the grand jury returne...
Officials believe the borough can cover the entire annual debt payment on $3.5 million in school maintenance bonds by taking advantage of strong sales tax revenues and higher federal aid payments — without turning to property taxes. State lease payments for the community’s jail and investment earnings from Wrangell’s $10 million permanent fund savings account could help reduce the tax cost of the other bond issue on the Oct. 4 municipal election ballot — $8.5 million for rebuild and repair to the rot-damaged Public Safety Building — according...
The remnants of a massive Pacific typhoon that battered a thousand-mile stretch of Western Alaska dissipated Sunday morning, with floodwaters dropping and communities assessing damage from one of the worst storms on record. The storm left a trail of wreckage across coastal Alaska, with flooding, telecommunications outages and damage to buildings and infrastructure including roads, docks, seawalls and village runways. As of Monday morning, there were no reports of deaths, serious injuries or people missing, said National Weather Service...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has joined a group of other Republican governors in signing a letter to President Joe Biden opposing a recent move to forgive some student loan debt to eligible Americans. Biden announced his administration would relieve $10,000 to $20,000 in federal student loan debt for recipients making less than $125,000 individually or $250,000 as a household. In the Sept. 12 letter, Dunleavy and 21 other governors asked the president to withdraw the plan and criticized it as being burdensome to taxpayers and Americans who did not...
Eligible Alaskans will receive a $3,284 check, which includes the annual Permanent Fund dividend and a one-time energy relief payment, starting Sept. 20. Gov. Mike Dunleavy announced the exact amount of the payments during a live stream last Thursday at a grocery store in Palmer, highlighting, he said, why the check is needed to help Alaskans cope with high grocery bills and energy prices. This year’s check breaks down into a dividend amount of $2,622 per person and an energy relief payment of $662, the Dunleavy administration confirmed. A...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy last Friday vetoed a bill that would have raised the minimum age to purchase and legally possess tobacco products from 19 to 21 years old. The bill also included a tax on electronic smoking products that contain nicotine, which is what Dunleavy took issue with. Currently, Alaska has a cigarette tax of $2 per pack. Other tobacco products, like cigars, are taxed at 75% of the wholesale price. Electronic smoking products like vape pens that contain nicotine are not subject to tax at the statewide level, though some...
Democratic candidate for governor Les Gara and independent candidate former governor Bill Walker said that the best candidate is the one who shows up for public forums. The two had the stage to themselves at a Sept. 7 event sponsored by the Kenai and Soldotna chambers of commerce. The other two candidates did not attend. Incumbent Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy was absent, as was Republican Charlie Pierce, who last month resigned his job as Kenai Peninsula Borough mayor at the request of the borough assembly after an investigation determined...
A statewide coalition of fisheries and economic development organizations, led by the Southeast Conference, has won a $49 million federal grant to help build up Alaska’s mariculture industry. “This is a moon shot,” Robert Venables, executive director of the Southeast Conference, said of the challenges ahead and the potential rewards of growing the industry to raise and harvest shellfish and seaweed in larger commercial quantities. “It’s a big deal,” said Wrangell’s Julie Decker, executive director of the Alaska Fisheries Development F...
Whether Alaskans and the other 434 members of the U.S. House will be addressing Rep. Sarah Palin or Rep. Mary Peltola likely will be announced late Wednesday. State elections officials plan to announce that day the final vote tally and election winner under Alaska’s new ranked-choice voting system — it’s the deadline for any absentee ballots from overseas to arrive and be added to the count. In-person voting for the election was held Aug. 16. With a near-final ballot count released last Friday evening, more than 190,000 votes had been cast...
A legal dispute that began when Gov. Mike Dunleavy took office in 2018 will not be resolved before this year’s gubernatorial election. Last week, a federal judge set a 2023 timeline for a trial to determine financial damages in a case involving Libby Bakalar, one of four state employees who sued Dunleavy, his former chief of staff Tuckerman Babcock and the state after being illegally fired when Dunleavy took office. Babcock is now a candidate for state Senate and Dunleavy is running for reelection. The state has settled with three of the p...
The 2020 presidential election is over. Multiple judges in multiple federal and state courts have ruled multiple times against frivolous claims of voter fraud, conspiracy, computer hacking and criminal intent. Courts, prosecutors, most members of Congress, even former President Donald Trump’s attorney general all agreed there is no evidence that the election was stolen. No matter how much some want to believe otherwise, Joe Biden was legitimately elected president of the United States. Certainly, he could lose the job in 2024, but in an e...