Sorted by date Results 1181 - 1205 of 7954
Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom has rejected a proposed legislative term-limits ballot measure, citing a Department of Law legal analysis that found the measure was likely unconstitutional. “The precedent set by the Alaska Supreme Court establishes that legislative term limits violate the Alaska Constitution,” she wrote in an Aug. 23 letter directed to the sponsors of the measure. As written, the proposed ballot measure would have limited state legislators to no more than 12 consecutive years in office and no more than 20 years in total. “I’m unhappy...
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has again rejected a request to list Southeast Alaska’s Alexander Archipelago wolves as endangered or threatened. The wolves, found in Southeast Alaska and British Columbia, range among the region’s large, old trees and are a subspecies of gray wolves. Putting the wolves on the endangered species list, either as endangered or threatened, likely would have resulted in new restrictions on development, logging and construction in the region. The state of Alaska opposed the idea, which was put forward by thr...
The number of Alaskans covered by Medicaid has dropped by more than 14,000 since April, after federal protections for the health care benefits ended with expiration of the COVID-19 emergency declaration. The number losing their benefits may increase as the state continues the process of determining who still meets eligibility requirements — the reviews were halted during the national emergency declaration. And while many Alaskans are losing their coverage or waiting to hear if they will, the state’s Health Department continues working to cle...
According to a new state report, nearly 200 Alaska Native or American Indian people went missing between the beginning of April and the end of June in Alaska. Two dozen of them have not been found. Violence against American Indian and Alaska Native people far exceeds the national average and Alaska has one of the highest rates of missing and murdered Indigenous people in the United States. The problem especially affects women and girls. In Alaska, calls for justice preceded Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s formation of a Missing and Murdered Indigenous P...
Four elected positions will be on the municipal ballot on Oct. 3, and as of Monday it was uncertain if all of the incumbents will seek re-election. Two seats on the borough assembly, one on the school board and one on the port commission will be on the ballot. All four are three-year terms. Esther Aaltséen Reese, the only incumbent on the five-member school board whose term expires this year, said last week she is undecided as to whether to run for the position again or not. Anne Morrison, who holds one of the assembly seats that will be on...
Last Friday and Saturday, WCA, Tlingit & Haida and the American Legion distributed backpacks and other school supplies to help prepare the community's youth for the academic year. A long line of students and families snaked out of the WCA Cultural Center on Friday morning, Aug. 18, as parents and children geared up for the task of backpack selection. "This is an important program to make sure that we're supporting our children and also our tribal families with school essentials," said Tribal...
Age is a major issue behind the Alaska Marine Highway System’s pending master plan, which will go to state legislators this month. The state ferry Columbia, which turns 50 next year, had been sidelined at the Ketchikan ferry dock for about three years until February. Management’s decision to park the vessel was based on the large expense of operating the ship, the costliest of any ferry in the fleet. Things changed when it was discovered that the 60-year-old Matanuska, which had suffered a series of maintenance setbacks, had more serious iss...
Anyone who’s spent the summer in Wrangell knows that tourists often say — and do — the darndest things, whether it’s standing in the middle of the road or inquiring about the town’s elevation as they look out across the water, only yards below them. With just over a month left in the tourism season, the community’s guides, tour operators and service workers reflect on their most amusing tourist tales from this summer and beyond. Several summers ago, Zach Taylor of Muddy Water Adventures was guiding a tour up the Stikine River. As the group r...
Santiago Bautista, the borough's construction manager on the job, right, talks about what clearing work has been completed so far at the Alder Top subdivision project, while Amber Al-Haddad, director of the Capital Facilities Department, looks on. Clearing and preliminary road work for the lower and entrance streets are included in the $1 million contract with Ketchikan Ready-Mix & Quarry. The completion date is Oct. 30. After further work, including installing utilities, the borough plans to...
Though not all children had enrolled before the scheduled start of school on Thursday, Aug. 24, due to migrant status or other reasons, district staff reported an increase of two students over their enrollment estimates from last November, which will help with a very small increase in state funding. A couple more students could add maybe $20,000 or so in state money to the overall $5 million school district operating budget. The budget for the 2023-2024 school year is based on 263 students, however, after the updated enrollment estimate, that n...
Ever wanted to learn how to hem a pair of jeans? Fix a bike? Patch a tire? Drain the fluids from an old car so that it’s ready for disposal? The Wrangell Cooperative Association’s upcoming fix-it clinic will help the community learn to maintain and repair household items, promoting sustainability and reducing waste. The event will be held at the covered basketball court on Monday, Aug. 28, from noon to 4 p.m. Marilyn Mork will be available to share her sewing and mending expertise, particularly hemming and attaching loose buttons. She pla...
The Alaska Marine Highway System last week announced its fall and winter schedule, showing Wrangell without any ferry service between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15. That’s a change from the draft schedule released in early July which proposed regular weekly northbound service but no southbound ferry stops in alternate weeks from Oct. 1 to mid-November. Ferry schedules in recent years have been constricted by a dwindling fleet of operable vessels and crew shortages. Despite a concerted push to hire more crew, the limitations continue. Though the ferry s...
Do you love playing sports, spending time outdoors or working with kids? Do you take advantage of Wrangell’s many recreational opportunities and feel a desire to give back? If so, you are likely the type of person the Parks and Recreation Department is looking for. The department put out a call to the community on Aug. 14, seeking residents to volunteer for its many activities, programs and events. The majority of Parks and Recreation programs, from water aerobics to wrestling camp, are run by volunteers, explained Recreation Coordinator D...
When U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg's flight from Juneau to Haines was rained out on Aug. 16, he changed plans and did what Alaskans have done for decades: He boarded a ferry. Sen. Lisa Murkowski traveled with Buttigieg and said the last-minute switch in travel plans "was a typical Alaska jump ball." It was an appropriate capstone to Buttigieg's three-day Alaska visit: a trip intended to emphasize the benefits of the Biden administration's infrastructure law, passed by Congress...
When Leigh Horner slipped out of her house on the outskirts of Fort Seward in Haines last week for a Mai Tai at the distillery, she didn’t realize someone was watching her, waiting for a chance to steal some of her things. But the someone wasn’t a person — it was a grizzly bear, who Horner believes waited in the trees for her to leave and sauntered over to her glistening carrot patch. “They only got the orange carrots, and he very carefully pulled them out of the ground,” said Horner. “The bear was very neat and tidy. I was impressed....
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy is naming a ship after decorated Alaska Native veteran Solomon “Sol” Atkinson, of Metlakatla. Atkinson, who died in 2019, was one of the first Navy SEALs. He was deployed to Korea and completed three tours in Vietnam, for which he was awarded a Bronze Star and Purple Heart. Among his many acts of service, Atkinson also trained astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in underwater weightless simulations. The Navy announced plans Aug. 7 to name a future Navajo-class oceangoing tug and rescue ship — which are traditi...
More than 150 Alaska Airlines flight attendants demonstrated outside the Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport on Aug. 15, part of a broader protest nationally as the airline’s attendants demand what they’re calling their first meaningful pay raise in nearly a decade. “Record profits, corporate greed, Alaska pay us what we need,” they shouted. They hoisted yellow signs with messages such as “pay us or chaos.” First-year flight attendants at the airline make an average base pay of less than $24,000 annually, said LeiLauni Scheideman,...
The Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. intends to open an office in Anchorage by the end of the year, the chairman of the corporation’s board of trustees said Aug. 10. When the office opens in space leased by the Department of Environmental Conservation, it will be the first time since its creation in 1976 that the corporation has opened a satellite branch outside Juneau. “The principal policy driver behind this is recruitment and retention of employees,” said board chair Ethan Schutt. The corporation, which manages the $78 billion Alaska Perma...
For the past year, Sea Quester, a seaweed farming company based in Juneau, has been making progress growing kelp. Among its creations is a kelp burger — sales topped 500 at the Southeast Alaska State Fair in Haines in July. But its main focus is improving on ways to farm sea kelp for more than just burgers, and scalability is the key. Sea Quester is one of 15 companies — seven in Southeast — awarded grants totaling more than $1.27 million from the Alaska Mariculture Cluster Joint Innovation Program through the Alaska Fisheries Devel...
A federal judge has upheld decisions by President Joe Biden and the Department of the Interior that temporarily suspended work needed to open the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas drilling. In a 74-page order published Aug. 7, U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason ruled in favor of the federal government and against the state of Alaska, its state-owned development corporation and several other plaintiffs. The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, the development bank, is the sole remaining oil...
A landmark environmental court ruling in Montana on Aug. 14 has striking implications for Alaska, particularly with a vow by the organization behind it to bring a similar case here. It won’t be the first time they’ve done it, but this time there’s a lot more science — and precedent. The Montana case is being heralded as a groundbreaking victory because it is the first time a judge has found a governmental duty to protect citizens from climate change. The case, brought by 16 youths ranging in age from 5 to 22, found state agencies in Montana...
A custom homebuilder in Anchorage said it can now take a full year to complete a house, twice as long as they once did, because workers are hard to find amid a labor shortage that’s predicted to get worse. There aren’t enough framers to erect walls, so concrete foundations can sit untouched for months on end in a “painful waiting game,” Bill Taylor said. Electricians, plumbers, sheetrockers, roofers and others are in high demand, too, so labor costs are higher. “It’s been going on aggressively since COVID,” said Taylor, who owns Colony Builde...
Alaska will receive $44 million in federal aid to replace fish culverts By Jeff McMurray, Associated Press The U.S. Department of Transportation on Aug. 16 announced nearly $200 million in federal grants to upgrade culverts — the tunnels that carry streams beneath roads but can be deadly to fish that get stuck trying to pass through. More than $44 million of the money will go to Alaska projects, including replacement culverts under roadways on Prince of Wales Island and in Metlakatla and Yakutat. About one-quarter of the money is going to t...
Oversupply from bumper harvests last year and inflationary pressures squeezing household food budgets have made it a terrible year for Alaska salmon prices. A near-record pink salmon harvest in Russia isn’t helping by adding more fish to the market. “It’s a challenging year for all Alaska seafood,” said Jeremy Woodrow, executive director of the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute. Pollock prices are down, “we’re seeing impacts on crab too, and other whitefish species,” he said Aug. 10. And now, “salmon is getting the microscope.” Th...
Nine copper-engraving students sketched out designs, squinted through magnifying goggles and slowly etched away at thin sheets of metal using handheld tools. The students were three-and-a-half hours into an eight-hour day of carving at the Wrangell Cooperative Association's Cultural Center on Saturday, Aug. 12. The class's mood was one of quiet concentration. Students took occasional breaks to stretch their legs or massage their cramping fingers, while instructor Abel Ryan offered advice and...
