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The scope of mass firings at U.S. Forest Service offices around Southeast Alaska is becoming clearer as former and current employees confirm the numbers. The agency’s public information offices have not provided any details of the dismissals. Nearly all U.S. Forest Service employees at the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center in Juneau have been fired in the large-scale, ongoing purge of the federal government workforce undertaken by the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency, according to officials and former employees. In Petersburg,...
A federal workers union expects a total of at least 1,378 federal employees in Alaska with probationary status to be fired by the Trump administration. David Owens, a national representative with the American Federation of Government Employees, said the union did not have current numbers of those already fired as of Thursday, Feb. 20, but expects the Trump administration to fire all probationary employees. Out of the 1,378 employees, 331 are veterans, he said. He cited an Office of Personnel Management database in giving the following...
Warren Hill spent more than two decades working at the Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, which spans 4 million acres of coastline, forests, lakes and glaciers in Southeast Alaska. Last summer, he was promoted to serve as maintenance supervisor, in addition to his roles as carpenter and mechanic. But because Hill was starting a new role, he was on probationary status when President Donald Trump ’s administration began firing thousands of federal workers who had less civil service protection. “I’m furious,” he said. “I am just a few years...
In a telephonic town hall Feb. 19, U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the recent mass firing of probationary federal employees violated the law and lacked “respect and dignity” toward the workers who lost their jobs, which in Alaska include more than 100 employees of the U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service and other agencies. In a call that drew more than 1,000 Alaskans, Murkowski also said that President Donald Trump’s efforts to withhold federal funding that had already been approved by Congress “cannot be allowed to stand.” “If we in...
In a series of hearings last week, members of the Alaska Legislature heard emotional testimony about the need for more education funding. As lawmakers consider the idea, it’s becoming increasingly clear within the Capitol that more funding for public schools will come at the expense of the Permanent Fund dividend. “The state of Alaska is probably facing its largest fiscal problem … in 30 years,” said Bethel Sen. Lyman Hoffman, chair of the Senate Finance Committee, on Feb. 11. Hoffman has been a legislator since 1987. Under the governo...
Dozens of Alaska students, parents and school board members from across the state visited the Legislature on Feb. 10, painting a picture of crowded classrooms, teacher shortages, agonizing school closures, loss of learning opportunities and uncertainty about the future. "We have cut and cut and cut, year after year after year, due to stagnant funding from the state," said Bobby Burgess, a school board member from Fairbanks. "We have trimmed the fat. We have cut into the flesh, and we are...
Almost one-quarter of the jobs in the state ferry system are unfilled, and the vacancy rate is highest among the positions that require the most training, Alaska Marine Highway System Director Craig Tornga told state lawmakers last week. Among wheelhouse positions, the vacancy rate is above 30%, he said at a House committee hearing on Feb. 11. The ferry system has been short crew for the past few years, limiting the number of vessels it can put into service and further eroding its passenger revenues. To operate the cross-gulf route between...
Passenger and vehicle traffic aboard the Alaska Marine Highway System moved slightly higher in 2024 from 2023, but still is less than half its peak from the early 1990s. The state ferries carried just over 185,000 passengers and about 65,000 vehicles last year on its routes stretching from Southeast to Prince William Sound and into several Gulf of Alaska coastal communities. That’s down from more than 400,000 passengers and 110,000 vehicles 1990-1992. And it’s down from more than 325,000 passengers as recently as the early 2010s. Marine Dir...
Mass layoffs in the federal workforce ordered by President Donald Trump began to hit Alaska employees last week, with workers losing jobs at multiple agencies across the state. The scale of the Alaska layoffs wasn’t fully clear, but by Friday, Feb. 14, included around 30 Alaska employees at the U.S. Forest Service and 30 with the National Park Service, according to employees and union representatives. U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said late Friday that “dozens of Alaskans — potentially over 100 in total” had lost their jobs, criticizing what sh...
Southeast Alaska residents are used to choppy waters, so while they may be getting seasick over the waves of uncertainty in federal programs and funding stirred up by Donald Trump’s return to the White House, smoother sailing is on the horizon, U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski told a conference of regional business and community leaders Feb. 11. A mix of uncertainty, optimism and concern about the Trump administration’s impacts on the region was expressed by other federal, state and industry officials participating in the opening day of Southeast Con...
In a 5-2 vote, the Alaska Board of Fisheries rejected a proposal to cut by 25% the allowable egg harvest for Southeast salmon hatcheries. The proposal, submitted by former board member and North Pole resident Virgil Umphenour, sought to “reduce the permitted egg take of pink and chum salmon of each applicable Southeast hatchery … by 25%.” The board voted Feb. 8, the next-to-last day of its 13-day meeting in Ketchikan. Similar proposals to significantly cut the egg harvest at Southeast hatcheries have come before the board at least four previ...
Vaccinations successfully guarded children from pertussis, a respiratory disease also known as whooping cough, during last year’s spike in cases of the disease in Alaska, a new state report says. Unvaccinated children were more than 13 times as likely as vaccinated children to get the disease during the outbreak, according to a bulletin released by the Alaska Division of Public Health’s epidemiology section. There were more confirmed cases of pertussis in Alaska last year — over 500 — than in all the years from 2016 to 2023 combined, accordi...
The number of nonresidents working in Alaska hit a new record in 2023 and all major industries are relying more heavily on workers who do not live in the state, according to the state Department of Labor. Nonresident workers in Alaska totaled 92,664 in 2023 and comprised 23.5% of the workforce, the highest percentage since 1995, according to an annual report published by the department that is mandated by state law. Typically, about one in five workers in Alaska is not a resident of the state, and certain seasonal industries, such as seafood...
Federal fishery managers took steps on Feb. 11 to impose new rules to prevent Alaska chum salmon from being scooped into nets that go after Bering Sea pollock, an industrial-scale fishery that produces the nation’s largest single-species commercial seafood harvest. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council advanced a suite of new protections intended to combat the pollock trawlers’ salmon bycatch, the term for the incidental catch of unintended species. Proposed steps in the package include numeric caps on total chum salmon bycatch, wit...
The state is bringing in less money than it is spending and is on pace to finish the current fiscal year with a deficit of $171 million, according to figures presented Feb. 4. Lacey Sanders, Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s top budget official, told the Senate Finance Committee that spending from the Constitutional Budget Reserve Fund likely will be needed to close the gap before the Legislature’s scheduled adjournment in May. That would require support from three-quarters of the House and three-quarters of the Senate — usually a politically fraught negot...
On a windswept beach near Haines, Tim Ackerman walks down a hill with a pair of gloves, a knife and a bottle of Dawn dish soap to kneel beside the carcass of a harbor seal. It's one of a handful that have washed ashore in Haines since late November. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's regional stranding coordinator said they've not figured out what's killing the seals but it's not an uncommon scene for Ackerman, a Tlingít hunter and maritime expert who has spent decades...
The Alaska Senate rejected giving themselves and other state leaders automatic pay raises linked to inflation with the unanimous passage of a bill Friday, Feb. 7, declining a commission’s recommendation to implement such raises. Senate Bill 87 rejects recommendations made Jan. 29 by the three-member State Officers Compensation Commission that would adjust salaries every two years for the Legislature, Gov. Mike Dunleavy and top officials at state agencies to match the Consumer Price Index — up or down — after the 2026 state election. The recom...
The shipshape third-floor conference room inside the Marine Exchange of Alaska's Juneau waterfront building is as efficient and functional as the vessel tracking operations center one floor lower. Executive Director Steve White and founder Ed Page look comfortable and relaxed seated at the deck-plank style conference table. The room is surrounded by nautical artifacts, maritime photos on the walls, and a huge video screen rotating images of ships, ports and lighthouses. The captains' relaxed...
In the early days of President Donald Trump's second term, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski has openly challenged or rebuked him at least three times - stunning for a congressional Republican who has faced his wrath before and yet remains unbowed by pressure to embrace his agenda. Murkowski is a moderate with a history of bucking her party and Trump when she has felt it was the right thing to do. She was the first GOP senator to publicly break ranks with Trump on his nomination of Pete Hegseth as...
In a series of hearings last week in the Alaska Capitol, advocates from across the state presented hours of impassioned and often emotional testimony in favor of a bill to sharply increase state funding for public schools. The state funding formula has increased just 2% over the past decade, but a pair of cold-blooded financial hearings by legislative committees showed that the education request may have to compete with the Permanent Fund dividend and aid for aging state buildings in the next budget. In December, Gov. Mike Dunleavy offered a st...
A wide-ranging education package with provisions that include allowing students to attend any public school in the state was introduced Friday, Jan. 31, by Gov. Mike Dunleavy at the State Capitol. The legislation also revives numerous policy goals by the Republican governor such as more state money for homeschooling and state authorization of new charter schools instead of leaving that decision up to school districts. The governor’s package contains no increase to the state's per-pupil funding number for school districts, the Base Student A...
Facing a deficit of $111 million, the Anchorage School District released its draft budget on Jan. 31 calling for massive cuts to programs and positions. The cuts represent about 20% of the district’s spending plan for the 2025-2026 school year. In a letter to Anchorage parents, Superintendent Jharrett Bryantt said the deficit is “driven by more than a decade of flat state funding and rising costs due to inflation.” The budget proposal came on the heels of Gov. Mike Dunleavy rejecting a plan by Alaska lawmakers to significantly increase state...
On Jan. 28, more than 2 million federal workers received an emailed offer to resign but be paid for eight months, part of an aggressive effort by the administration of President Donald Trump to drastically cut the size of the federal workforce. The move could have major consequences in Alaska, a state with 15,000 federal workers. The “deferred resignation” plan is part of a suite of changes the Trump administration is trying to make to the federal government, including slashing equity programs and ordering remote workers back to offices. Wor...
State political campaign regulators have issued a second heavy penalty against the organizers of a failed campaign that sought to repeal Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system. On Jan. 27, the Alaska Public Offices Commission fined Alaskans for Honest Elections, Alaskans for Honest Government, the Ranked Choice Education Association and Anchorage resident Arthur Matthias a combined total of almost $157,000. The commission imposed the maximum allowable fines on the parties, stating that they have “proven themselves shockingly poor at com...
A state commission is recommending automatic inflation-driven pay raises for Alaska’s governor, lieutenant governor, members of the state Legislature and top officials at state agencies. The recommendation, approved by the three members of the State Officers Compensation Commission on Jan. 29, will become effective after the 2026 state election unless the Legislature and Gov. Mike Dunleavy approve a measure within 60 days rejecting the pay hikes. “If we’re really going to have a system where anybody can run (for office) and be able finan...