Sorted by date Results 101 - 125 of 291
January Jan. 2: Along with the lights, trees and carolers, the Salvation Army's red Christmas kettles are a common sight during the holiday season. Lt. Jon Tollerud, Wrangell's new corps officer, said the red kettles brought in $10,469. Jan. 9: The Nolan Center celebrated the new year Dec. 31 with a murder mystery party. As this new year marks a new decade, a return to the '20s, the party had a 1920s theme to it. With jazz music, themed costumes and masks, partygoers had the chance to return to...
The Wild Alaskan Company based in Homer has taken “mission based” seafood e-commerce to a whole new level. While many Alaska fishermen and groups sell boxes of seafood directly to customers and can claim several hundred monthly customers, Wild Alaskan has notched more than 140,000 seafood regulars since 2018 and since Covid hit, the company is adding 100 to 200 customers every day. The average order for their subscription service is $160 per month. Founder Arron Kallenberg calls it a “three generation overnight success,” referring back to 1926...
December 17 Jamie Roberts, with the Wrangell EOC, reported that there are currently no active cases of COVID-19 in the community. Statewide, Alaska’s case count is 41,859 as of yesterday. This is an increase of 3,151 from last week. Wrangell received its first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines Wednesday afternoon, Dec. 16. According to SEARHC, following guidance from the Alaska Vaccine Advisory Council, vaccinations will be given to frontline health workers first, along with first responders, and l...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met Tuesday night, Dec. 8, for a work session and regular assembly meeting. There were multiple items covered during the night. Three big topics of discussion included a settlement with the Alaska Department of Environment Conservation, a fee increase for port and harbor facilities, and the acceptance of a grant from the State Homeland Security Division. Back in October, according to the meeting's agenda packet, city administration reported to the assembly that the...
Wrangell's port commission met last Thursday, Nov. 12. A large portion of their discussion that night surrounded the installation of ladders between slip spaces at Shoemaker Harbor. Shoemaker has recently undergone extensive renovations, replacing old docking and making the harbor more accessible for vessels. The commission was looking at installing ladders in between each slip space in the harbor. This would cost about $84,000, according to the discussion. Brian Merritt, with the Port...
To the Editor: I am extremely concerned that the State has decided to cut ferry service over the winter months to the community of Wrangell. The Alaska Marine Highway has determined that Ketchikan and Petersburg will each have 10 stops while Wrangell will have just two. We will have one north bound vessel in November and one south bound vessel in January. How is this possible? We are literally right between Ketchikan and Petersburg. The explanation provided by the State is that timing the tides...
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 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's Economic Development Committee met Monday, June 15, to workshop various grant programs to assist Wrangell businesses. The EDC has put together three local grants that businesses could apply for to get some financial assistance during the COVID-19 pandemic. The majority of the discussion revolved around eligibility requirements and dollar amounts for these grants. The first grant they workshopped was for small businesses. This grant program, according to a draft application the EDC rev...
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...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly met this week to begin their workshopping of Wrangell's budget for FY 2021. This first round of workshops looked at various city departments that are funded through the Enterprise Funds which includes the harbor, light and power, sanitation, wastewater, and water departments. There were two workshops over the past week, on May 19 and May 21. According to the meeting's agenda packet for May 19, there were several things for the assembly to keep in mind when looking...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly held a special meeting Monday evening, May 4, to discuss three agenda items related to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Governor Mike Dunleavy and the Department of Health and Social Services recently announced four metrics by which they would determine if restrictions need to be eased or rolled back, to protect public health. According to the meeting's agenda packet, the four metrics are: Epidemiology, tracking disease trends and forecasts; Testing, tracking overall...
With Health Mandate 16, part of Governor Mike Dunleavy's plan to reopen Alaska's economy safely during the COVID-19 pandemic, communities across the state are considering what the near future may look like. Revenues have fallen for the city and businesses have had to get creative to stay open. While there is optimism to be found amongst some business owners, uncertainties loom for the economy in general. Alan Cummings, of All In Charters and Grand View B&B, said that they are looking at a rough...
Representatives of the City and Borough of Wrangell and the local seafood industry held a workshop on Tuesday, April 7, to discuss how public health can be protected with fishing season drawing near. There were over 30 people who called into the meeting, in total. The meeting was chaired by Assembly Member Julie Decker. "I think, in my opinion, the goal is to move the city in a direction of a set of policies, and procedures, and requirements, for the seafood industry that keep the community...
Ken Perry of Timber and Marine Supply in Ketchikan, Alaska passed away on March 4. Service will be in Ketchikan, April 4 at the Ted Ferry Center. Time of service to be determined later....
Alaska shellfish farmers and divers fear they won't be 'open for business' much longer if they're forced to pick up the tab for federally required lab tests as outlined in Governor Dunleavy's budget. The Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has proposed shifting the state cost to the harvesters which last year totaled almost a half million dollars. Geoduck clam divers in Southeast Alaska, for example, pay about $150,000 each year to collect samples that are sent to the single...
The Wrangell Port Commission met last Thursday, Feb. 6, to continue their ongoing discussion of changing the city's rates for visiting cruise ships. Harbor Master Greg Meissner explained that the commission needs to consider increasing the fees Wrangell collects from cruise ships for a variety of reasons. For one thing, the cruise industry is continuing to grow. With more ships potentially visiting in the near future, he said they would need money to renovate and improve City Dock. Another...
It’s been a long time coming but payments should soon be in hand for Alaska fishermen, processors and coastal communities hurt by the 2016 pink salmon run failure, the worst in 40 years. The funds are earmarked for Kodiak, Prince William Sound, Chignik, Lower Cook Inlet, South Alaska Peninsula, Southeast Alaska and Yakutat. Congress ok’d over $56 million in federal relief in 2017, but the authorization to cut the money loose languished on NOAA desks in DC for over two years. The payouts got delayed again last October when salmon permit hol...
Below is the second half of The Wrangell Sentinel's review of 2019, covering the months of July to December: July July 4 - Wrangell Police Chief Doug McCloskey was recognized for his service to the community at last week's borough assembly meeting. With his retirement at the end of June, McCloskey has closed out 38 years of police work. July 11 - The Fourth of July was a hot and sunny day in Wrangell, but that did not stop many people from getting out and having a good time. Like all previous...
The borough assembly met Tuesday night, Nov. 12, for their only scheduled meeting this month. The meeting opened with a work session on Wrangell's local contractor policy. The policy was established in 2015, according to the meeting's information packet, and the borough wanted to start the process of seeing what needed to be clarified, updated, and changed. After the work session, the assembly got into their regular meeting to cover a wide range of topics. Three that stood out were a memorandum...
The federal government’s plan to raze more roads through the Tongass National Forest is facing strong headwinds from fishermen, Native groups and coastal communities throughout Southeast Alaska. Over 220 Southeast Alaskan fishermen signed a letter to the Trump Administration last week opposing the abrupt push to exempt the Tongass National Forest from a roadless rule in place for over a decade. The exemption would release more than 9 million acres from protection and open nearly 200,000 acres to logging. The U.S. Forest Service made the a...
They are certainly cute but the voracious appetites of sea otters continue to cause horrendous damage to some of Southeast Alaska’s most lucrative fisheries. How best to curtail those impacts will be the focus of a day long stakeholders meeting set for November 6 in Juneau. “All of the people who have anything to do with the otters hopefully will all be in the same room at the same time,” said Phil Doherty, co-director of the Southeast Alaska Regional Dive Fisheries Association (SARDFA) based in Ketchikan. A 2011 report by the McDowell Group...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly held an emergency meeting last Thursday night to adopt a "surplus property agreement" with the Nome Joint Utility System. The surplus property in question is a pair of diesel generators currently sitting in storage in Nome. Power has been a topic of concern around Wrangell, and amongst the assembly, thanks in part to the recent hydropower shortages at Tyee and Swan Lake. Wrangell currently has four diesel generators which it can use for power in the event of an...
Push that pasta aside. Noodles made from Alaska pollock are poised to become a center of the plate favorite. Alaska Pollock Protein Noodles from Trident Seafoods swept the awards at the 26th annual Alaska Symphony of Seafood new products competition in Juneau. The low carb, "flavor neutral" noodles contain 1O grams of protein per serving and can be swapped with any pasta favorites. The ready to eat item drew raves from judges and samplers from Seattle to Southeast who gave the noodles quadruple...
Guardian Flight has resumed their air medical transport service in six base locations across Alaska following a 63-hour search for an overdue Guardian King Air 200 medical life flight near Kake. While services have resumed in Anchorage, Deadhorse, Dillingham, Fairbanks, Ketchikan and Sitka, Guardian Flight base locations in Kotzebue and Juneau will reopen sometime in the future, according Guardian Flight senior vice president of operations Randy Lyman in a prepared statement. "Guardian Flight...
