Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 162
It wasn’t a downpour but it was enough to raise the water level at both reservoirs and ease fears of shortages, Public Works Director Tom Wetor said of the rainfall Sunday and Monday. “Overall, I’m feeling pretty good,” he said Monday morning. With just a few weeks left of the heaviest water demand for salmon processing, and with the traditionally rainy weather of early fall approaching, Wetor thinks Wrangell will make it through the summer. “We’re in pretty good shape right now.” The borough last week urged residents to conserve water after a...
Working together in long, tandem strokes, Terry Gardiner and John Sund rowed beneath looming cruise ships along Ketchikan's waterfront on July 10, then turned into Bar Harbor to meet a couple dozen friends and family waiting for them on shore. It was the end of a 925-mile rowing trip from Seattle to Ketchikan for the two men, born and raised in Ketchikan, now in their 70s. The two have been partners in personal and professional escapades for years. Gardiner served in the Alaska House of...
Trident Seafoods is on schedule with preparation work to reopen its processing plant on the Wrangell waterfront after a three-year closure. “We expect to start handling fish the week of July 10,” focusing on chum and pink salmon, Southeast regional manager John Scoblic said May 15. The company expects to have 100 to 110 workers on the job, somewhat under the count of past years, he said. Trident has said weak chum returns were behind the decision to keep the plant closed since 2019. Some workers will start before the first salmon come into the...
At a time of year when most students are more concerned with sunshine and playing than with academia, one class is giving them the ability to plan for their future so they don’t miss out on sunnier days. A job skills and career planning and exploration class taught by Julie Williams, the Wrangell High School counselor, teaches students how to map out a path to prosperity. According to the U.S. Department of Education, about 8.3 million high school students took some form of career and technology education (CTE) class in the 2020-2021 school yea...
As the market continues to shift from canned salmon toward more frozen product, “the company wants more frozen pinks,” said Trident Seafoods Southeast regional manager John Scoblic. Which means Trident will freeze pinks along with chums at its Wrangell plant this summer. After a three-year closure due to weak chum returns, Trident plans to reopen its Wrangell plant, buying and freezing salmon in July and August. “We’ll be testing out some new things there,” Jeff Welbourn, Trident’s senior vice president for Alaska operations, said at last wee...
Wrangell has come up short in good economic news in recent years, what with business closures, the loss of Alaska Crossings a year ago, not-so-great salmon runs and crab harvests, rising consumer prices and worker shortages. So it was especially welcome news when Trident Seafoods announced it will open its Wrangell plant this summer after a three-year shutdown. The company plans to start work at the downtown waterfront plant within the month, getting it ready for the summer season to handle pinks and chums for the fresh-frozen market. The...
After a three-year closure blamed on weak chum returns, Seattle-based Trident Seafoods plans on running its Wrangell processing and cold storage plant this summer. “We’re going to operate in July and August,” focusing on chums and pinks, employing a little over 100 workers for the season, said Shannon Carroll, Trident’s director of public affairs, on Jan. 26. That would be a smaller payroll than in past years, he said. Chum salmon returns to Southeast have improved the past couple of years. In advance of running the processing lines again, work...
Southeast Alaska saw a “stronger than expected” 6.5% increase in jobs in 2022 compared to the previous year, due to ongoing recovery from being one of the state’s hardest-hit regions during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Alaska Department of Labor. A slower 2.5% increase in jobs is forecast for 2023, with a record cruise ship season plus growth in several industries including construction and a partial rebound of seafood processing. Tourism-related industries and transportation had the highest rates of growth in Southeast Alaska as the r...
The biggest fish processing plant in the Haines borough will stay closed next summer for the third straight season, OBI Seafoods’ Excursion Inlet plant manager Tom Marshall said last week, citing a low pink salmon forecast and the company’s ability to handle the regional load at its Petersburg plant. The continued suspension of processing at Excursion means the borough will see another year of low raw fish tax revenue. Haines averaged about $200,000 in taxes on fish landed locally in the five years prior to the Excursion plant’s closure, compa...
Readers can find both an optimistic view and gloomy numbers in the borough’s annual economic conditions report, issued last month. “With some of the lowest electrical rates in Alaska, the highest school district test scores, the potential to grow its visitor industry, the lowest unemployment rate on record, and a high level of entrepreneurship (more than a quarter of all workers are self-employed), Wrangell has potential to improve its prospects,” says the report, prepared by Juneau-based consulting firm Rain Coast Data. However, the repor...
The borough assembly unanimously approved a resolution to amend Trident Seafoods’ lease of the borough-owned cold storage facility. The new five-year lease establishes building maintenance guidelines and raises the rental rate from $1,370 to $2,990 per month, with 2% yearly increases to account for inflation. The changes are part of the borough’s ongoing effort to update its leases, explained Borough Manager Jeff Good. Though the company’s new agreement lasts longer than its previous one-year lease extensions, Trident is still deter...
After mostly dry weather in June and early July, the more typical rain of late has helped refill the community’s water reservoirs. The lower reservoir was looking pretty low around the Fourth of July and the borough was looking to start siphoning water from the upper reservoir to ensure enough supply to meet community needs, Public Works Director Tom Wetor said last week. “That’s when we got all the rain,” he said, adding that water levels are much improved. “It looks like we’re going to get through this year without any major factors.” Rain is...
Two key economic indicators are falling in Wrangell—the unemployment rate, and the number of people in the labor force. Combined, the two datapoints help explain the ongoing worker shortage in the community, stressing out business owners who have to manage as best as they can with too few employees. The unemployment rate for May was 5.1%, down from 5.5% in April, down from 7.2% a year ago, and the lowest in at least the past 12 years, according to state Labor Department statistics. It’s probably the lowest rate going back 20 years or so, but...
Running has provided Mason Villarma with the discipline needed to set and achieve goals, not only with the sport but in other aspects of life. It's training he will lean on as he is taking on two new part-time jobs in addition to his full-time work as the borough's finance director. On June 20, the school board voted to accept two contracts for Villarma: One as the high school assistant cross country running coach and another as the activities director for the school district. Villarma sees...
Seattle-based Trident Seafoods will not open its Wrangell processing plant this summer, the third year in a row the operation has been closed. As in the past two years, the company cited weak chum salmon returns for its decision not to run the plant. Company officials did not return calls to the Sentinel last Friday or Monday. News of the plant closure was presented in Borough Manager Jeff Good’s report for Tuesday’s assembly meeting: “They have notified us that they do not intend on running this year but are hoping for next year.” “We wou...
Some commercial fishermen prefer to sell their hauls in Wrangell. Some look for the best price, even if it's a few cents higher. Some decide where to sell based on services offered. No matter what determines where a fisherman will sell, processors try to lure as many their way throughout the year, including buying a bevy of different species. "What Pacific Seafood does here in Wrangell, we have our hands in a little bit of all of it," said Cody Angerman, general manager at the processor's plant...
The owner of a Wrangell company that makes body care products learned by a text that she had won the grand prize at a state competition for commercial goods made or derived from Alaska seafood. She had just returned to town from a trade show in New York City. Waterbody, owned by Angie Flickinger, won the grand prize for its Deep Blue Sea Bath Soak at the 2021- 2022 Alaska Symphony of Seafood awards ceremony on Feb. 24 in Juneau. Flickinger's company is among the top 10 finalists given booth...
Waterbody, operated by Angie Flickinger, of Wrangell, won the grand prize for its Deep Blue Sea Bath Soak at the Alaska Symphony of Seafood awards ceremony on Feb. 24 in Juneau. Made with bull kelp and sea salts, the soak is described as “smelling like that first breath of fresh sea-salted air as you resurface from a skinny dipping swan dive.” Flickinger started her business in 2015 as Gathered and Grown Botanicals, when she wanted to give handcrafted soap as a gift. She later changed the name to Waterbody and expanded her offerings. The Ala...
The U.S. grows less than one-100th of 1% of the world’s $6 billion seaweed market, but Alaska has the goods to grow into a major contributor. A new report assesses the pros and cons of six communities as locations for seaweed processing facilities to assist companies interested in operating in Alaska. It was compiled by McKinley Research Group for the Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation, which has played a central role in keeping Alaska seaweed in the resource development spotlight. The six study communities were evaluated based on three c...
There were about 1,000 stories in the Wrangell Sentinel last year, covering state and local budgets, the ailing state ferry system, ongoing pandemic and more — including a new owner for the Sentinel. On Jan. 1, Larry Persily bought the newspaper — for the third time over the past 45 years — with a promise to return the operation to Wrangell, expand the paper and its staff, and focus on more local news. “We plan to add more news from around Southeast and the state, but not at the expense of crowding out news of Wrangell. It’s not one or the ot...
The Wrangell Senior Center is in need of food donations, especially subsistence foods. In particular, the center is seeking turkeys and hams, plus fish, deer meat, moose meat and liver. Moose or deer is preferred, but cow liver is fine too, because one of the center’s menu items is liver and onions. Donations will be collected through Jan. 31. Site Manager Solvay Gillen said all the donations benefit the seniors, and people in town also can donate other food items, such as produce and seafood, if they’d like. Donations can be dropped off at...
A lifeline for food and supplies needs fixing - one of the flotation tanks beneath Wrangell's barge ramp has a hole. Port Director Steve Miller said harbor staff at the end of August noticed the ramp wasn't raising high enough. There are two buoyancy tanks below the ramp. By adding or removing air, the ramp, originally constructed in 1977, can be raised or lowered to meet the deck of the barge to match the tides. A second flotation tank was added in the 1980s to handle the additional weight when...
It’s looking to be a very good summer for pink salmon commercial fishing, much better than last year’s dismal catch. The pink harvest in Southeast was just over 44 million fish as of Sept. 3, over 50% more than the 28 million forecast issued after the 2020 season, according to the state’s preliminary commercial salmon harvest report. And more than five times the catch of last year. “For pink salmon, we’re around 40 million for the harvest for the Southeast region,” said Paul Salomone, a management biologist for the commercial fisheries d...
Trident Seafoods has notified city officials the company will not reopen its Wrangell plant this summer. Plant manager Nick Ohmer called on Tuesday with the expected news, Borough Manager Lisa Von Bargen told the assembly at its evening meeting. "I had a conversation with him about what it would take to get the plant back open here in Wrangell," Von Bargen said. Ohmer responded that the seafood processor would need "to see somewhere between 40% and 50% more fish chums than were projected to retu...
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...
