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One of the goals of high school senior projects is seeing a need in the community and filling it. That's just what Ryan Rooney and Emma Martinsen are doing. The two teamed up when their shop teacher Winston Davies told them that boat carts had fallen into disrepair. They saw it as an opportunity to put their welding skills to use by building new carts for people hauling supplies to and from their boats. "It seemed pretty straightforward, and it didn't seem like there were very many carts...
Nick Allen, a 16-year-old high school junior, likes to draw boats. "I live in a fishing community," Allen said. "Been around boats my entire life. Drawing them was even cooler." Allen said he started drawing around the age of 12. First it was speedboats. About a year and a half ago he "moved into the commercial fishing side of art." "I drew a seiner first and it was terrible," he said. "To see the progress over a year and a half, it's insane." He's now making stickers of his artwork, and...
JUNEAU (AP) — A Sitka lawmaker broke two bones in his right leg after crashing his paraglider in Anchorage on Feb. 19. Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins returned to Juneau on Feb. 23. He had been recuperating in Anchorage following surgery and attending committee meetings remotely. He will be on crutches for about six weeks. Anchorage Rep. Laddie Shaw was out paragliding with Kreiss-Tomkins when the accident occurred at Flattop Mountain. “We just got together and went for a little hike on Flattop Mountain,” said Shaw, a former Navy SEAL who regul...
A mixed martial artist who was the inaugural flyweight champion on a 2017 television show - and made history as the first American Native woman Ultimate Fighting Championship title holder - punched in a short visit to Wrangell in February. The purple-belt jiu jitsu holder, who was in town to visit a friend, made a surprise drop-in on a Wrangell class Feb. 16 without telling the participants who she was, at first. "Normally, it's been Victoria Carney and I," Wrangell jiu jitsu instructor Matt...
This year’s king salmon catch limits in the Wrangell-Petersburg area are tighter for Alaska residents and nonresidents than the numbers that were in effect at the start of last year’s sportfishing effort. However, they are essentially the same limits as mid-season catch restrictions imposed last June to manage the runs. The sportfishing regulations announced last month close off most of the waters around Wrangell and Petersburg to retention of king salmon starting April 1 and continuing to either June 14 or July 14, depending on the area. It...
The Elks Lodge has presented four nonprofits with $7,500, bringing national grant funds to town. Last Friday, lodge members presented Wrangell Head Start and Little League with $1,000 each, $3,500 to the senior center and $2,000 to The Salvation Army food pantry. Lodge member Dawn Angerman said the grant money came from the Elks National Foundation, which funds the grants using member dues and donations. There are 444 Elks members in Wrangell. Angerman said if lodges meet their required member dues and exceed member donations, they could be...
The Ketchikan High School pep club’s “country” theme, for which some students dressed like cowboys for a basketball game against Metlakatla, wasn’t intended to be “racially provocative” but it had a negative effect that was “predictable and should have been prevented,” according to an investigation of the incident. The investigation, released last Friday, was conducted by the Ketchikan Gateway Borough School District following a Feb. 5 game between the Ketchikan Kings and the Metlakatla Chiefs. The report from the borough school board an...
A 45-page bill to restructure the Alaska Marine Highway System as a state-owned corporation, run by an appointed board of directors, similar to the Alaska Railroad, is going to take longer than one legislative session to review, amend and adopt — if even then. “This is going to take a big lift,” said Robert Venables, executive director of the Southeast Conference, an economic and community development nonprofit for the region that supports the concept of a ferry corporation. “This is aspirational,” he said Feb. 23, a day after the Senate Tr...
A former nominee to the Alaska Board of Fisheries and a prominent Cook Inlet commercial fisherman pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of unsworn falsification on Feb. 18, ending a six-year legal struggle that saw him accused of multiple counts of Permanent Fund dividend fraud and improperly obtaining resident fishing licenses. Roland Maw, nominated by former Gov. Bill Walker to the Fish Board in 2015 but never appointed, will pay a $500 fine and restitution of $9,582. He had been facing 12 felonies and five misdemeanors. The remaining...
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — Three states, including Alaska, that would be affected by a proposed 6-cent-per-gallon tax on fuel exported from Washington state are pushing back on the plan, and threatening to retaliate if it is signed into law. Most of Alaska’s North Slope crude oil production is tankered to West Coast refineries, including several in Washington state, which ship refined products back to Alaska. The tax — part of a $16.8 billion transportation revenue package that has cleared the state Senate and is working its way through the House...
JUNEAU (AP) — Legislative leaders are pursuing the idea of converting a building across the street from the Capitol into 33 apartments that could be used for lawmakers and staff during sessions in Juneau. The Juneau Community Foundation last year donated the building to the Legislature. The three-story building currently is used for private offices and for COVID-19 testing for lawmakers and staff. Tenants have been told their leases will not be renewed. Estimates prepared for the Legislative Council, a panel of House and Senate leaders, s...
The Wrangell school board will continue to evaluate its COVID-19 mitigation plan at its next meeting, scheduled for Monday. As case numbers continue to decline from the severe spike caused by the Omicron variant in December and January, some Alaska districts have voted for optional masking on school grounds. Effective Feb. 28, the Anchorage School District will make face masks optional for students and staff, Superintendent Deena Bishop announced last Friday in a letter to families. “As a career educator, I understand how critical it is to focu...
The Alaska Department of Transportation is asking anyone interested in taking ownership of the nearly 60-year-old Malaspina to speak up by March 7. The state has been spending about $75,000 a month to keep the unused ferry moored and insured at Ward Cove in Ketchikan for more than two years. The ship has not carried passengers or vehicles since late 2019, and requires tens of millions of dollars of repairs, steel replacement work and new engines to go back into service, according to the Transportation Department. “Holy crap, why don’t we sel...
An award-winning film chronicling the Metlakatla boys basketball team's run to the 2018 state championship will make its Wrangell screening debut next month. "Alaskan Nets" plays at 6 p.m. Saturday, March 5, at the Nolan Center. Tickets are $20. Californian Jeff Harasimowicz, director and producer of the documentary film, said he got the idea in 2017 when he was scrolling sports stories, which he loves, on ESPN.com and came across a 2016 photo story by photojournalist Samuel Wilson about the...
The borough is considering purchasing the 38.59 acres at the former sawmill site at 6-Mile Zimovia Highway for a possible tourism or other collaboration with Sealaska, the regional Native corporation for Southeast. Finance Director Mason Villarma said the borough met with Sealaska CEO Anthony Mallott on Feb. 9. Discussions, which are still in a very preliminary stage, included a potential partnership with Sealaska for the property as a deep-water port for tourism or a specialty mill for the corporation’s wood products division. Sealaska o...
What has been talked about for months has finally happened: Ottesen's True Value is now Ottesen's Ace Hardware. The sale was finalized on Feb. 15 to David Roemhildt, of Cordova, who has big changes in store for the business, but some things will stay exactly the same. "The thing I kept hearing from everyone was, 'Oh, that's a good store. It's got a lot of history,'" Roemhildt said. "There's a lot of goodwill and customer loyalty to this location and this family. It's going to remain Ottesen's,...
The Wrangell Ranger District wants to restore a parking area at Roosevelt Harbor. The problem is about 70 vehicles in various stages of decay on top of it, going back a couple of decades at the site on Zarembo Island, about 12 miles southwest of the Wrangell City Dock. Roosevelt Harbor is vulnerable to pollutants and sediment from runoff at the parking lot, said District Ranger Clint Kolarich, of the Wrangell Ranger District last Tuesday. The harbor is a popular spot for hunters and campers,...
Residents have until Saturday afternoon to get rid of scrap metal, free of charge, including vehicles. Juneau-based Channel Construction will have its barge at the former sawmill site at 6.3-Mile Zimovia Highway and is accepting any type of scrap metal, as long as any oil, gasoline or other fuels and fluids have been drained, the borough announced last week. The company collects scrap metal throughout Southeast, hauling it south for proper disposal or recycling. In late 2018, Channel Construction picked up an estimated 50 tons of scrap on one...
The port commission has voted to increase most of Wrangell’s port and harbors rates, generally about 2% per year for the next five years, sending the new fee schedule to the borough assembly for consideration. The new rates would take effect this July and apply to most port and harbors services, including long- and short-term storage and haul-out rates at the Marine Service Center, transient and reserved moorage in the harbors, electricity hookups, use of the gridiron and hoists. The borough had generally been raising port and harbor rates a...
State Transportation Department officials last week told legislators the ferry system needed to quickly hire at least 166 new crew in order to meet minimum staffing levels for this summer’s schedule starting in May. “Staffing goals for the summer season will not be met at current recruitment rates,” the department reported in its presentation to the House Transportation Committee on Feb. 15. Insufficient staffing could result in scaling back ferry service plans. About 350 new hires would be even better, covering vacancies due to sick leave and...
A Southeast drug enforcement task force seized 24 grams of methamphetamine valued at $3,600, along with $11,440 in cash Feb. 15 after searching three homes in Wrangell. A man and a woman were detained but not arrested, pending further investigation, Police Chief Tom Radke said. The investigation, which has been underway for a couple of months, revolved around a package mailed to Wrangell, believed to come from north in the state, Radke said. The task force — Southeast Alaska Cities Against Drugs, or SEACAD — consists of police departments fro...
Last Thursday morning, seniors Jamie Early and Kendra Meissner lugged a crab pot filled with their books through the halls of Wrangell High School. It was part of Spirit Week and "Anything but a backpack" day. It was a combined effort between the cousins, much like many other things they do, including their senior project. Early, 18, and Meissner, 17, decided in October to tackle the Evergreen Agricultural Testing Site (EATS) garden for their project, cleaning up weeds, preparing soil beds,...
Got a question about getting started in gardening? Need to know about potatoes? Southeast Master Gardeners can help you plow ahead with answers. A new program called “Weedy Wednesdays,” offered by the Southeast Alaska Master Gardeners Association, will offer four one-hour online question-and-answer sessions with various areas of focus. On March 16, gardening experts will answer previously submitted questions on potato growing in a session “Spuds 101.” March 23 will cover seed starting; March 30 will be about preparing a new garden for use; an...
Almost three years after pulling pollution monitors — called Ocean Rangers — from large cruise ships, Gov. Mike Dunleavy has proposed legislation to replace the onboard state personnel with regular inspections by shoreside staff while ships are in port and underway. The Ocean Rangers program was written into state law when voters approved a citizen’s initiative in 2006 to step up oversight of the cruise ship industry. However, start-of-season and random inspections during the summer “are a more effective use of available funds,” Emma Pokon, dep...
Archery is on target at the community gym through March 25 to keep the blues from the winter cold and the winter rain at bay. Instructor Winston Davies oversees the activity, and has a few bows, arrows and sheaths to clip to your belt or waistband on hand if you don't have one of your own. It's not an instructional class per se, but Davies is happy to give a few pointers to people who've been removed from the sport for a while, even if it's been nearly a decade. Davies taught math and science...
