Sorted by date Results 2652 - 2676 of 7954
After two years of COVID-19 closure, an easing of restrictions at the border between Skagway and Yukon Territory will make it possible for tour companies to run cross-border excursions this summer. That’s good news for many Skagway tour operators that take cruise ship passengers into Canada. But Skagway’s largest tour operator, the White Pass and Yukon Route Railroad, said its trains won’t cross the border despite relaxed COVID testing rules and faster processing times. On April 5, the railway notified its partners that it would not opera...
JUNEAU (AP) — The appointed board tasked with drawing Alaska’s legislative district boundaries has approved new state Senate districts for the Anchorage area, with the two members who opposed the plan calling it political. The new plan puts Eagle River, north of Anchorage, and Girdwood, south of Anchorage into the same Senate district, separated by about 25 miles of uninhabited Chugach State Park. The Alaska Redistricting Board adopted the plan by a 3-2 vote on April 13. The board had gone back to work after the state Supreme Court ruled tha...
MIAMI (AP) - A U.S. ban on seafood imports from Russia over its invasion of Ukraine was supposed to sap billions of dollars from Vladimir Putin's war machine. But shortcomings in import regulations mean that Russian-caught pollock, salmon and crab are likely to enter the U.S. anyway, by way of the country vital to seafood supply chains across the world: China. Like the U.S. seafood industry, Russian companies rely heavily on China to process their catch. Once there, the seafood can be...
WASHINGTON (AP) — In southwestern Pennsylvania, eight locks and dams that for decades helped barges move goods along the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio rivers will in a few years also generate enough power for 75,000 homes. Rye Development, a Boston-based hydropower company, is retrofitting the dams with turbines to generate electricity and says the upgraded structures will limit damage to the rivers’ water quality and fish. The project reflects a recent thawing between the industry and conservation groups, which had long opposed dams tha...
Of the more than 4.8 million Ukrainian refugees who have fled their country since Russia's invasion started in late February, one, an 82-year-old woman from Odessa, is now living in the Upper Chilkat Valley with no return ticket home. Alla Blazhko-Getman is living with her daughter and son-in-law, Natalia and Hans Baertle, at 26 Mile Haines Highway. Natalia Baertle, a former high school teacher in Ukraine who moved to Alaska in 2010 after marrying, said she attempted to fly her mother out of...
PORTLAND (AP) - Farms that rely on irrigation from a depleted, federally managed lake on the California-Oregon border, along with a Native American tribe fighting to protect fragile salmon, will both receive extremely limited amounts of water this summer as a historic drought and record-low reservoir levels drag on in the U.S. West. More than 1,000 farmers and ranchers who draw water from a 257-mile-long river that flows from the Upper Klamath Lake to the Pacific Ocean will have access to...
ABOARD THE SOUNDGUARDIAN, Puget Sound (AP) — Over the side it goes with a splash: three ears tuned for the sounds of orcas, and the noise that threatens their survival. In the deep, this trio of hydrophones rests on the sea bottom, recording the sounds of Washington's Puget Sound, including endangered southern resident orcas. The listening array, developed and deployed in March by SMRU Consulting, is attached to a buoy that marks its location, just about a mile offshore, north of Carkeek Park. The equipment will be in place for three months, in...
JUNEAU (AP) — Juneau has purchased a gondola in Austria for the city-owned ski area, but questions remain about long-term plans. Officials have expressed interest in working with the Goldbelt Native corporation on the project. City officials recently signed a purchase agreement to buy the gondola system for $1.33 million. Deputy City Manager Robert Barr said the city is seeking bids from transport companies to bring the gondola to Juneau. Eaglecrest Ski Area has been looking for ways to expand summer operations and create opportunities for a m...
The Alaska House of Representatives voted Saturday to turn an oil-price surge into money for schools, repayment of tax credits the state has owed to oil explorers for years, and $2,600 payments for Alaska residents this fall. The House voted 25-14 to send its state operating budget proposal to the Senate, which is developing its own version. The two budget plans, which set spending for public services starting with the new fiscal year on July 1, will be negotiated into a compromise bill and sent to Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who can accept or reject...
In a special session last Saturday, the school board approved the contract for a new elementary school principal. Board members unanimously accepted the contract for Ann Hilburn as Evergreen Elementary School principal beginning the 2022-23 school year. Hilburn is in her first year as the special education teacher at the high school and middle school, having moved to Wrangell from Mississippi last fall. Hilburn was part of an applicant pool of more than 30 people, which was narrowed down to eight to 10 applicants. Schools Superintendent Bill...
Schools try to prepare students for life beyond the walls of academia and sometimes that requires more than classroom education. Last Tuesday, high school and middle school staff held a health fair that centered around not only physical and mental health but financial health and planning for the future. Separate sessions were held for the high school and the middle school and each was brimming with students actively going to various tables, asking questions, playing games and competing with...
If visitors read the bear-sighting sheet at Anan Wildlife Observatory, which the workers fill out every season, bear names would sound more like tax forms: 7-05-A, for the first bear spotted on the stream to fish on July 5, and 7-05-B, for the second bear spotted on July 5. Well, humans only do so well with numbering systems before our penchant for nicknames kicks in: Casino, Crack and Scuba Sue, to name a few. Bear naming can be a controversial issue, Dee Galla, outdoor recreation planner at...
The state budget plan adopted by the House last weekend includes an additional $143,000 in one-time funding for Wrangell schools, almost a 5% boost from a state aid formula that has not changed in five years. The district has been relying heavily on federal pandemic relief money and reserves to fill budget holes the past couple of years, and plans to do the same for the 2022-2023 school year. District officials acknowledge it’s not a sustainable financial plan. State funding to school districts is based on a per-student formula, and Wrangell h...
Tribal members can apply for a fourth distribution of federal pandemic relief funds administered by the Wrangell Cooperative Association. This round of financial aid is limited to $2,000 per household. The application period closes May 16. Tribal members can select to receive the assistance for utilities, groceries, heating fuel or gasoline, or a combination of any of the four choices in increments of $500, $1,000 or $2,000 if the applicant prefers that the aid go all to one category. Previous rounds were limited to covering utility bills or...
Art students are decking out their deck shoes. Wrangell High School was one of 250 schools across the country picked to participate in the Vans Custom Culture art contest and could win up to $50,000. It was an opportunity that almost didn't happen. "We were supposed to get the shoes mid-February. (Vans) sent them but they got lost," said art teacher Tasha Morse. She contacted the company, which told her to keep a lookout for the shoes. If the two pairs didn't arrive, they would send...
The Alaska Marine Highway System has been hoping since last August to bring back the Columbia to service this year after an almost three-year absence, but with the start of the summer schedule only weeks away the state has not announced a decision on the ship. The Columbia’s summer return is contingent on hiring enough crew to replace staff that were laid off, retired, quit or moved to other ships since the state’s largest ferry was pulled out of service in the fall of 2019. “We’re pouring a lot of effort into recruitment, but headway has bee...
The Port and Harbors Department wants to strengthen municipal code to lessen the burden of paying for derelict and impounded vessels. It drains the department’s coffers when clunkers take on water or sink, leading port staff to foot the cleanup efforts and the department to foot the bill. The port commission is asking the borough assembly to amend municipal code to hold boat owners liable for disposing of derelict boats. The commission has also begun discussing whether to require boat owners to have insurance if their vessel is moored in a W...
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate confirmed Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court last Thursday, shattering a historic barrier by securing her place as the first Black female justice. Cheers rang out in the Senate chamber as Jackson, a 51-year-old appeals court judge with nine years experience on the federal bench, was confirmed 53-47, mostly along party lines but with three Republican votes. Alaska’s two Republican senators split on the issue. Sen. Lisa Murkowski was one of only three Republicans to vote in favor of confirming Jackson. Oth...
Longtime Anchorage civic activist and trailblazing politician Arliss Sturgulewski died last Thursday, her family said. She was 94. Raising a young son after her husband died in a plane crash, Sturgulewski became involved in Anchorage politics in the 1970s and later served as a state senator for more than a decade, shaping important institutions of modern Alaska with a collaborative, moderate approach. In 1986 she became the first Alaska woman to head the ticket for a major political party’s gubernatorial campaign. The moderate Republican’s cam...
The Port and Harbors Department plans to select a company this month to design a surveillance camera system for installation at Wrangell harbors by the end of the year. The department has about $407,000 from two federal grants — $148,000 in fall 2020 and $259,468 in fall 2021 from the Department of Homeland Security — for the design, purchase and installation of a security camera system. It’ll help keep an eye on things, and prevent theft and illegal dumping of garbage, such as a ‘70s-era Volkswagen Beetle chopped into pieces found in a dumps...
An official with a U.S. Department of Agriculture program that has awarded more than $820,000 to the Wrangell borough, Forest Service and tribe said more could be on the way. The Wrangell Cooperative Association was awarded $620,000 from the Southeast Alaska Sustainability Strategy, part of a $25 million federal grant program intended to help diversify the economy of Southeast communities. The borough was awarded $100,000 to manage lands for the improvement of wild blueberry harvests and $103,000 for trail upkeep. The program also provided...
Picking a senior project was just like ringing a bell for Caleb Garcia. Since 2013, the 17-year-old has been involved with The Salvation Army, so being the volunteer coordinator of the nonprofit's Red Kettle fundraising effort made perfect sense. Born in Indio, California, in the Coachella Valley, Garcia grew up in southern part of the state around Los Angeles, where there's no shortage of people in need. His mother, Lt. Rosie Tollerud, of The Salvation Army, said her son was always ready to...
A new plasma torch purchased by the school district will provide shop class students with a more versatile way to cut and build metal projects - and it won't cost the district a penny of borough funds. The new computer numerical control (CNC) machine is like the shop's current CNC machine, a computer-driven router, but it uses a plasma torch, which cuts with electrically charged, superheated gas. It will give students much more choice in projects, according to shop teacher Winston Davies. "I've...
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A subsidiary of one of the largest U.S. providers of renewable energy pleaded guilty to criminal charges and was ordered to pay more than $8 million in fines and restitution after at least 150 eagles were killed at its wind farms in eight states, federal prosecutors said April 6. NextEra Energy subsidiary ESI Energy was also sentenced to five years probation after being charged with three counts of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act during a court appearance in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The charges arose from the deaths o...
Concerned that a contentious, political rewrite of the state constitution could destabilize Alaska and jeopardize private investment, a new bipartisan group has launched a campaign to convince voters to reject a convention to change the state’s founding set of laws. Voters will be asked in November whether they want to convene a convention to rewrite the constitution, a question which the constitution requires go before voters every 10 years. In a meeting with reporters on April 7, co-chairs of Defend Our Constitution announced more than 150 A...
