Sorted by date Results 426 - 450 of 505
More than 200 people met Saturday with local organizations at the Wrangell Cooperative Association's first membership rally. Representatives from the Association, the Indian Environmental General Assistance Program, Alaska Island Community Services and Tlingit-Haida registered, updated, collected and distributed information for 210 people by the end of the four-hour event at the Stikine Native Organizations building. Organizers from the WCA's Membership Committee had worked on organizing the...
Between 30 and 50 yachts will depart Seattle sometime in June and arrive in Wrangell June 17. The yachts will participate in the annual Salty Dog Rally, sponsored by Boating Puget Sound, a website dedicated to yachting in the Seattle area. Once they arrive, yachters will be welcomed by local Tlingit drummers and dancers and be feted in a gala dinner with the mayor. Borough officials estimate between 60 and 150 people will participate, though they won’t have official numbers until registration for the event concludes in April. Members of the W...
The borough assembly voted 5-0 Tuesday night to approve a no-bid design contract with Juneau-based Corvus Design. The contract allots $11,372 from a $35,000 state grant to renovate heritage harbor for that purpose. Port commissioners previously said the contract was designed to be no-bid in order to avoid a prolonged bidding process which might stretch past the June 30 expiration date for the grant. The money “is part of the starting of this thing?” assembly member James Stough asked harbormaster Greg Meissner. “Is that what this is?” The goa...
The Chief Shakes House rededication was easily the biggest event of 2013 in Wrangell. However, the year was filled with events and news stories big and small. On the first edition of 2014, the Sentinel pauses to recollect the stories throughout the year. January An electrical fire damaged the fish tank at the Nolan Center, causing it to be removed. A 7.5-magnitude earthquake struck off of Craig Jan. 4, rattling windows and nerves in town. The quake caused no major damage in town, but...
Want to know at a glance how many fishing boats call the Kenai Peninsula Borough home? It’s 1,089. Or what percentage of Wrangellites fish for a living? Just over 15 percent. Or how many skippers plus crew fish out of Juneau? That number is 705. To help policy makers and the public become better informed about how the seafood industry fits into the state’s economy, the United Fishermen of Alaska has compiled Fishing Fact sheets for 26 communities, plus statewide tallies for Alaska and Washington. A big misconception the well documented UFA dat...
While one part of the news was certainly somber at the informal end-of-year Outfitter Guide Meeting at the Wrangell Ranger District, the tone was light-hearted. First, the somber news. The Wrangell Ranger District faces a 30 percent cut to its recreation budget in preliminary figures. Ranger Bob Dalrymple cautioned that if that number were to hold – although he’s seen budget cuts fail to materialize in the past – the Anan Bear Observatory could be shuttered. The observatory is a marquee attraction for tourism in Wrangell, and drew 2,873 visit...
U.S. Rep. Don Young cancelled a planned public appearance in Wrangell and Petersburg Nov. 6 after reporting chest discomfort, according to a press release issued by his office. Young had originally planned for a public meet-and-greet following a tour of city facilities in Wrangell with borough department heads and assembly members. He completed the tour with department heads, according to Harbormaster Greg Meissner. When media representatives and officials later showed up for the 3 pm meeting with Mr. Young, a staff representative said Young...
Name: Ernie Christian Age: 48 Occupation: Manager, Ottesen’s Inc. What background or experience do you have that qualifies you to be an Assembly member? I have previously served on boards, committees, councils, and assembly. I am currently serving as Vice-Mayor on the City and Borough of Wrangell assembly and Vice-President on the Wrangell Cooperative Association board. I understand budgets and ask questions to make sure that I am accountable to the electorate. Why are you running for the A...
By Brian O’Connor Sentinel writer About thirty or forty tourists packed into the Chief Shakes House last Wednesday to take in the newly renovated house and learn about the sun, the moon, and the stars. However, first they had to learn a little bit about Raven. “Raven is considered a trickster,” interpreter Lu Knapp told the assembled crowd. Raven in this case was the figure from Tlingit mythology, and the story Knapp told that afternoon concerns the chief and three boxes in the possession of a...
The 2013 Bearfest celebration came roaring back to Wrangell last Wednesday as the Shtax’Heen Kwaan dancers presented a moving and eloquent recitation of traditional Tlingit dance and language – and fed the nearly 60 visitors with fresh baked and smoked salmon dishes at the Chief Shakes Tribal House. Wrangell Cooperative Association president Tim Gillen said the sharing of food is important to the Natives of Southeast Alaska as a way of keeping ancient Tlingit culture alive. “From my persp...
A series of capital projects led the way in Borough Manager Tim Rooney’s final report to the Borough Assembly last week as he highlighted the improvements on-going or planned in the Borough. Starting off, Rooney informed the Assembly about a number of projects related to the city’s Harbor Department, including upgrades at the Marine Service Center pier. “Pool Engineering has begun work on the pier upgrades and good progress is being made,” Rooney wrote. “The two new batter piles have been driv...
The Sealaska Heritage Institute “Latseen Hoop Camp,” which started on Monday at the Old Gym, features a combination of Tlingit language directions mixed with muscle-memory basketball as a way of teaching not only the sounds, but also meanings of words in the Native language of Southeast. Basketball fundamentals such as offensive and defensive skills are also taught and are at the core of the program – along with a set of lessons designed to teach leadership and cultural pride. According to th...
A Canadian parliamentarian has submitted a bill in the legislature of British Columbia seeking to protect the Stikine, Nass and Skeena rivers Nathan Cullen, Minister of Parliament for the Skeena-Bulkley Valley of Northwestern B.C. has introduced a member’s bill that he says will put the protection back into what he calls a government-gutted Canadian Navigable Waters Protection Act. Cullen said he submitted the bill believing that the Conservative government of Canada has removed what he calls “9...
The festivities scheduled during the 2013 Fourth of July celebration will feature three new events – with all of them being food-related. First up, on Sunday, June 30, a pie-eating contest will be one of the attractions of the Welcome Home Picnic, which will be held from 5-9 p.m. at Shoemaker Park and is being sponsored by Wells Fargo, the Wrangell Cooperative Association, Bobs’ IGA and City Market. Two more events, one new and one returning for the first time since the 1960s, will be featured on July 4 at the sidewalk near the Totem Bar and...
With the Chief Shakes Tribal House project completed earlier this month, and the rededication ceremony written in the history books, the main objective of the Wrangell Cooperative Associated has shifted to their next major building effort – a carving shed for traditional Tlingit woodwork. The shed, which is currently under construction on Front Street at the corner of Lynch Street, will be about 3,600 square feet in size and will have a training room, a carving room, as well as totem storage a...
It took more than a year to complete, but the Chief Shakes Tribal House came together late last week as project manager Todd White and his crew installed the newly carved Bear screen and put finishing touches on the interior of the structure. The house cost nearly $1 million to rebuild and saw a crew of adzers spend the majority of last summer carving away at monolithic planks of nearly foot-thick cedar that would go into the new construction. A part of that million-dollar price tag was a $222,000 award from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust...
On May 4, the sun rose on Wrangell Island under gray skies – though those skies would part slightly and sunshine would descend upon a place that is the spiritual heartland of the Tlingit in Wrangell as the Chief Shakes Tribal House was rededicated for the first time in more than 70 years. Last week, over the course of May 2-4, Wrangell entered the pantheon of history as nearly 1,000 visitors from the Native communities of Southeast Alaska and beyond traveled to the Borough to witness the r...
During the rededication of Chief Shakes Tribal House, Wrangell saw an uptick in retail sales and money spent by nearly 1,000 visitors on lodging, food and services, providing a much needed boost to the local economy. Ernie Christian, who is both a member of Wrangell Cooperative Association’s Tribal government and manager of Ottesen’s True Value in downtown said that although he has not crunched the numbers, the Front Street events and the numerous visitors to Wrangell were a boon to his business and others in downtown. “It was a good weekend, I...
The new Chief Shakes Tribal House did not reappear magically overnight. It took a number of years of planning, funding acquisition and construction to see it through to completion, which happened last week in Wrangell. The following stories are a look back in time during 2012 – and what it took to get from there to here – and how the new Shakes House rose in place of its predecessor built in 1940 by the Civilian Conservation Corps. Jan. 26, 2012: Over the next year, the over 70-year-old Chi...
The Shtax’ Heen Kwaan canoe group held a blessing ceremony last weekend for a canoe that will lead the dozens of participants from the One People Canoe Society into Wrangell during the Shakes Island rededication on May 2. The OPCS paddlers began their voyage to Shakes Island on Wednesday, April 24 from a number of communities throughout Southeast, with canoes coming from Yakutat, Juneau, Kake, Petersburg, Sitka, Prince of Wales, Hydaburg and Klawock. Nearly 50 members of the community were on h...
The Wrangell Cooperative Association has submitted a letter to the Borough Assembly requesting that the Wrangell Institute Property be donated to WCA. The letter requests that the possibility of WCA acquiring the land be placed on the April 23 Assembly agenda for discussion. According to Borough Manager Tim Rooney, the item will be placed on that meeting’s agenda. In a March 25 letter to the Borough, WCA board president Tim Gillen lays out his reasons for the request of the property that f...
The final touches on the Chief Shakes Tribal House are currently underway in preparation for the May 3-4 rededication ceremony on the island – and last week saw a colossal parade of students from Wrangell High School and the Native community down Front Street to restore a pair of cedar house posts to their rightful place in the Tribal House. The posts, which were carved by Steve Brown and Wayne Price, traveled from the James and Elsie Nolan Center in a flatbed trailer and were accompanied by m...
Ground has been broken on a new carving shed for the Wrangell Cooperative Association on property adjacent to the SNO Building in downtown. The construction, under the direction of WCA project manager Todd White, began with grading and underground work and will progress over the coming months to include pouring a foundation, framing, and ultimate completion of the one-of-a-kind structure. According to White, the work will begin in earnest once warmer temperatures arrive and the snow gives way...
The Southeast Alaska Power Agency Board of Directors held their regular bi-monthly meeting in Wrangell on Tuesday and Wednesday, March 5-6 to discuss a number of items of both new and old business – and to announce the agency is working with a public relations firm to try to “foster a positive public image.” In SEAPA CEO Trey Acteson’s report to the board, he outlined his plans for improving the image of the agency – and challenged that misinformation and inaccuracies are abundant in local med...
