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Alaska has gotten more money per capita from the federal infrastructure law passed in 2021 than any other state, according to participants at a news conference where the latest injection of funds for the state was announced. Alaska’s member of the U.S. House, Rep. Mary Peltola, and officials from the Biden administration used the event at the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage to announce awards totaling $100 million for broadband service in three rural areas. That brings Alaska broadband funding from the Infrastructure Investment a...
First-time candidate John DeRuyter defeated incumbent school board member Esther Aaltséen Reese in Tuesday’s municipal election. DeRuyter was ahead 115-76 after election-day ballots were counted. Borough officials will tally absentee and early votes on Thursday, but there are not enough remaining ballots to change the outcome of the school board race. The school board seat was the only contested race on the ballot. Reese has served on the school board since her election last fall to a one-year term on the five-member board. DeRuyter is a me...
The school district overspent its student travel budget the past two years and is considering filling the gap with money from team fundraising accounts — the cash that athletes, their parents and supporters raise for equipment, uniforms and other extras not funded by the district. Pulling as much as $36,000 from what are known as “class and club” accounts is controversial, particularly since the district has fallen short of explaining the problem and the solution, said several high school team coaches who spoke at the school board meeting on Se...
A record number of people visited Anan Wildlife Observatory this season - the largest amount since 2004, when the permit system was implemented. Of the 2,905 visitors who came through the observatory in 2023, 548 were independent or unguided and 2,357 were commercially guided. Guide companies used nearly 80% of their available permits - only 610 commercial permits were unused. The visitor count was slightly higher than the pre-pandemic peak in 2013 and much higher than the lowest recorded visito...
The 2023 Permanent Fund dividend will be $1,312. Disbursement of the annual payments to Alaskans will begin Oct. 5 and continue over the following weeks, the Department of Revenue said Sept. 21. Applicants who filed electronically and selected direct deposit to their checking or savings account should see the funds in their accounts on Oct. 5. The department will mail paper checks later in October to applicants who did not ask for direct deposit — the same for Alaskans who filed their application by paper instead of online. The dividend this y...
High oil prices could provide an additional $500 for Alaskans a year from now. As part of the end-of-session budget deal put together by legislative leaders, particularly in the Senate, lawmakers in May adopted a provision in the fiscal year 2024 state spending plan that will provide a one-time “energy relief payment” next fall if state revenues exceed estimates. Global supply shortages, caused largely by production cuts in Saudi Arabia and Russia, have driven up oil prices and boosted state revenues for the first three months of the fis...
The Irene Ingle Public Library already offers robust programming to support literacy for children, from weekly story times to the summer reading program. But thanks to a new book club geared toward adults, kids won’t be the only ones reaping the rewards of reading. Starting next month, the book club will give grown-ups a chance to read, discuss, socialize and build a community of fellow literature-lovers. The first meeting is scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 21, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. at the library. So far, 17 people have signed up, which is ...
The process for recycling aluminum cans is about to get easier in the coming months. The Wrangell Cooperative Association’s Tl’átk - Earth Branch was awarded a $40,000 grant through the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium in July to purchase a compactor and baler for its aluminum recycling program. The consortium is working with the federal Environmental Protection Agency to provide solid waste disposal funding to tribes. For the past three years, Tl’átk – Earth Branch has collected aluminum cans outside Wrangell IGA and City Market. W...
A ballot initiative in Sitka aimed at capping cruise visitators at an interim level of 240,000 starting in 2024 — less than half this summer’s count — may be headed for a special election this winter. “Win or lose, it’s going to get some good discussion going,” said Larry Edwards, one of 45 co-sponsors on the application to put the visitor limit to a vote in a special election. Edwards submitted his application for the initiative to the city clerk on Sept. 15 and, pending approval by the clerk, he hopes to begin gathering petition signatures in...
With high oil prices driving up state revenues, Southeast legislators say to expect a larger capital budget next year for public works projects, more money for deferred maintenance and another attempt to boost state funding for public schools. That’s assuming oil prices stay elevated as the state works its way through the fiscal year that will end on June 30 and remain high in the forecast for the next year. Lawmakers will return to work at the Capitol on Jan. 16. With oil prices last week 30% higher than assumed in this year’s spending pla...
Wages rose and job opportunities increased across much of Southeast through 2022, but problems such as the lack of affordable housing and child care remain persistent throughout the region, an economic consultant told the annual gathering of the Southeast Conference. Meilani Schijvens gave Southeast’s economy an overall grade of A, the highest rating she has ever assigned for the region in her annual report, now in its 10th year. “Why did our economy earn an A? … Number One — our jobs were up by 5%,” she answered. “That’s an increase of 2,200 j...
Residents who will not be in town on election day Tuesday, Oct. 3, or simply would prefer to vote early can come to City Hall between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. weekdays through Monday, Oct. 2, to cast an absentee ballot. Election day voting will run from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Oct. 3 at the Nolan Center. People who cannot vote absentee in person by Oct. 2 can contact the borough clerk’s office at 907-874-2381 to request a ballot by mail or fax. Registered voters will cast ballots for two seats on the borough assembly, one seat on the school board and one p...
The state wants to send the Matanuska, the oldest vessel in the Alaska Marine Highway System fleet, into a shipyard for the equivalent of a full-body scan. Management wants to find out just how much of the ship’s steel has rusted, and how far the rust has eaten into the thickness of the metal. The 60-year-old Matanuska has been tied up at the dock in Ketchikan since last November, waiting for the state to decide whether to repair the vessel and restore it to working order, or give up on the ship. “We know we have bad steel,” Craig Torng...
Alaska Airlines would like to improve passenger flow at its Wrangell and Petersburg airport terminals. The idea of making any changes to the buildings was put on hold during the pandemic. “We’ve got to find a way to improve the passenger flow in both those terminals,” Scott Habberstad, the airline’s managing director for Alaska, said last week. The tight space for people waiting to board after they clear TSA security screening creates a logjam on heavy traveler days that can slow down the boarding process. But the terminal buildings are hem...
The Alaska Division of Motor Vehicles is considering whether to eliminate the month and year registration renewal stickers that owners are required to put on state license plates. In a request for information published early in September, the division issued an open call for pros and cons of the idea. The agency, through a spokesperson, said it didn’t have much to share about the request at this point. “This is DMV exploring and trying to learn the landscape,” said Ken Truitt, a spokesperson for the Department of Administration, which manages t...
Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom has approved signature gathering for two ballot measures and disqualified a third from advancing to that next phase. The two measures — if they gather enough petition signatures for a spot on the ballot and then win voter approval — would impose new financial limits on political campaigns and grant an array of rights to workers, including mandatory sick leave, a higher minimum wage and the ability to opt out from employer-mandated political and religious instruction. The rejected measure would have barred the state fro...
A couple of sweet-tooth bears raided a Krispy Kreme doughnut van that was stopped outside a convenience store on Anchorage’s Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson during its delivery route. The driver usually left his doors open when he stopped at the store but this time a sow and one of her cubs that loiter nearby sauntered inside, where they stayed for probably 20 minutes Sept. 19, said Shelly Deano, the store manager for Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson JMM Express. The bears chomped on doughnut holes and other pastries, ignoring the banging on t...
The state of Alaska, a coalition of business groups and a pair of electric-power organizations have opened a new round in the generation-long fight over environmental protections in Southeast Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. On Sept. 8, the state and two other groups of plaintiffs filed three separate federal lawsuits to challenge a Biden administration rule restricting new roads in parts of the forest, which is home to some of America’s last stands of old-growth trees. Each lawsuit asks U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason to ove...
When Brandy Barnes got the first notice that she might be dropped from Medicaid, she was worried. One of her teenage sons is autistic and needs significant care to lead a full life. “My main concern is that my son is disabled,” she said. “He has therapies, medications, doctor appointments that cannot be dropped. I started asking around, and apparently this was happening to everyone.” She said everything from his education to his bus pass is dependent on his Medicaid status. Barnes was proactive during the pandemic and updated her paperwo...
During the budget process next year, the school district will need to cut about $500,000 from its current $5.1 million operating budget to maintain financial sustainability as it prepares for the end of federal pandemic relief funding. This could mean staffing cuts and major changes to school facilities and programs, unless new sources of money are found. Over the past three years, the district has relied on pandemic aid to help cover its costs, but this funding is ending soon. Those federal aid grants, which will run out in fall of 2024, curre...
Holland America Line, Princess Cruises and Cunard Line — among the biggest names in Alaska summer cruises — have added Wrangell to some of their longer itineraries. The traditional seven-day Southeast Alaska cruises from Seattle or Vancouver, B.C., don’t leave time for adding new ports after the companies book stops among the popular destinations of Ketchikan, Sitka, Juneau and Skagway, and cruising through Glacier Bay or Tracy Arm/Endicott Arm south of Juneau. Longer cruises, however, allow the addition of new ports of call. The compa...
In an effort to make more housing available in the community, the planning and zoning commission has accepted a draft set of rules to allow the addition of a detached rental unit on the same lot as a single-family home. Such rentals currently are not allowed under municipal code. The vote on Thursday, Sept. 14, will set the proposal for a public hearing and further consideration by the commission, which could then forward the recommended ordinance to the borough assembly for another public hearing and approval. “As the housing market c...
A state parks official said staff shortages and lack of information about commercial tour operations led to the situation where the state didn’t realize until this summer that businesses were failing to register or pay the required permit fees to bring visitors to the Petroglyph Beach State Historic Site. Though the Petroglyph Beach was designated a state historic site in 2000, the division never specifically publicized or enforced the annual permit and per-person fee on commercial operators taking people to the Wrangell attraction. ...
The borough needs to fill a funding gap of almost $10 million before it can upgrade its water treatment plant. The new design would increase the plant’s water output and storage capacity to accommodate future growth. The low bid for construction came in at $19.6 million, but borough officials estimate that the total cost will be closer to $24.2 million — a figure that factors in engineering and inspection costs. The borough has $14.3 million available for the project, mostly state and federal money. On Aug. 31, the borough submitted an app...
The borough hopes to partner with the U.S. Forest Service to give the Chugach - a wooden Forest Service boat built in 1925 - an improved permanent home outside the Nolan Center, complete with a viewing deck and interpretive signs. Currently, the boat spends most of the year wrapped in a protective plastic covering, though it is occasionally unveiled for events like the Fourth of July. The 62-foot vessel is the last of the Forest Service's ranger fleet, which was once 11 strong. The boat was...
