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Once again, Alaska legislators have gaveled back into special session because Gov. Mike Dunleavy wants to show his constituents that he believes in one thing above all else: The largest Permanent Fund dividend in state history. He’s like a wide-eyed kid in the candy shop, only he’s got a record-setting Permanent Fund balance jingling in his pockets and wants to spend some of it to buy chocolates for everyone in the state. Talk about a dangerous sweet tooth that can only decay the future growth potential of the state’s only savings accou...
Maybe someday COVID-19 will be like the flu, which kills an average of 36,000 Americans a year, rather than the coronavirus which has killed more than 700,000 people in the country over past 18 months. Maybe vaccines will become even more effective, health officials will approve the shots for children of all ages, researchers will develop new medicines to heal the sick and new treatments to ease the suffering. Although science can do a lot to block the virus and lessen its death sentence, no pill or shot or wishful thinking can make it go away...
The Lower 48 TikTok craziness continues. September’s challenge was to vandalize school bathrooms. Wrangell schools got off lightly — a few messes in the bathrooms and small items like soap dispensers and toilet paper were stolen. Overall, nothing too serious. In fact, I was feeling fairly confident that we had gotten ahead of this trend, and that we could focus on better and more important things. Unfortunately, there is now a “devious licks” challenge for each month of the school year. October’s challenge is “Smack a Teacher;” December’s ch...
I served in the U.S. Army from mid-1966 to mid-1968 and I have written Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan to let him know that I find the Marine Corps. putting Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller in the brig for his two Facebook comments about the way the U.S. handled its withdrawal from Afghanistan to be unacceptable and sanctimonious. I would hope that Sen. Sullivan, as a member of the military and representing a state with a large active and veteran military population, would feel the same way. I understand the conflict of disobeying a direct order, especially i...
Recently, in a social media post, the mayor of Wrangell called persons who have not received the COVID-19 vaccine “idiots.” I would like to appeal to the mayor's less arrogant self to remind him that unvaxxed people are unvaxxed for many different reasons, many less idiotic than he may be able to perceive from the heights of his ego. Some have legitimate medical issues such as allergies or genetic anomalies that have made them concerned for their health if they get this never-used-previously medical technology. While I understand that bei...
As a former governor of Alaska (2002-2006) and a U.S. senator (1980-2002), I am appalled at the secretary of the Department of the Interior’s cavalier action challenging the legitimacy of recent sales of leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. I must remind the secretary that the sale was advertised and consummated with payment made by the state-owned Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority and accepted by the U.S. government. Any attempt to void the sale will be seen as a taking, and litigation will result in substantial d...
It was the same day that Gov. Mike Dunleavy announced the state would help hospitals cope with record numbers of COVID-19 patients by assisting with decisions to ration care, and the same day that the state’s chief medical officer, Dr. Anne Zink, said Alaska is “at the worst place in the pandemic that we’ve had this entire time.” It was the same day that the governor announced Alaska would spend $87 million to bring in out-of-state medical workers to help relieve pressure on overwhelmed hospital staff. And it was the same day Alaska set a r...
Filling out an election ballot isn’t very hard. Ink in the ovals, being careful to stay within the lines, and then turn in the single-sided piece of stiff paper for counting. It’s not much to ask of residents once a year. Wrangell holds its municipal elections next Tuesday. And while several races are uncontested, three school board seats and a borough assembly seat will be decided by voters. This is a chance for residents to have a say in the direction of the borough and the school district, which combined spend more than $10 million a yea...
Earlier this month, the Alaska Legislature gaveled out of its third special session. During the special session, we discussed the recommendations of the Comprehensive Fiscal Plan Working Group, weighed the merits of a COVID-19 bill, and passed an $1,100 dividend. We also considered Senate Bill 3006, a health care bill aimed at providing temporary telehealth and flexible background checks for our hospitals. However, after additional amendments drew concerns from health care providers, the bill did not pass. As our communities fight against this...
The public library would like to thank all of the individuals, businesses and organizations who donated prizes for the Summer Reading Program. We appreciate your continued support in assisting us by encouraging children to read during the summer and improve their reading skills. We would also like to thank: First Bank, for the funds to purchase Rechargeable Hug Lights for all those who completed the program; Alaska Airlines, for the funds to purchase prizes; the City and Borough of Wrangell; Jeff Angerman for his ongoing support; and the...
There is no precise count but it looks like federal pandemic aid distributed or allocated over the past 18 months to Wrangell residents, businesses, the borough, school district, tribe and nonprofits totals close to $30 million. That's about equal to all the income earned by every household in town in half a year, according to U.S. Census numbers. It's almost three times the annual budget of the borough and school board combined. Most of the money came as grants or simply as federal aid to keep...
The math is simple. Take the 2020 Census for Alaska and divide by 40, so that each state House district represents the same number of residents - 18,335. But then nothing beyond the math is easy. It's impossible to carve up the state into 40 districts of exactly the same population. A battle ensues every 10 years over where the lines should be drawn for legislative seats, taking into account areas of population growth and population shrinkage. The job of the Alaska Redistricting Board is to foll...
I used to believe that living on our island isolated us from all of the craziness of the Lower 48. I've often bragged about how in Wrangell we still lived the white-picket-fence, kids-playing-in-the-streets life of the 1950s. Unfortunately, that is no longer something I can say. Social media is pumping all sorts of Lower 48 craziness into our town. You can find the latest craziness by going to #deviouslicks on TikTok. There you will find hundreds of short videos from all over the country...
The anti-vaccination politics rolling across the country - much like a pandemic - have gotten so bad that the Alaska state Senate could not even manage to pass a bill last Friday allowing more telemedicine without lawmakers amending it into a debate over personal liberty. Much of the discussion had no connection whatsoever to patients and doctors working together online to diagnose and treat ailments often totally unrelated to COVID-19. The Senate amendments were targeted at blocking...
Former President George W. Bush on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on our country showed Americans the difference between a statesman and a showman. In a speech at a memorial last Saturday in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where one of the hijacked planes crashed, Bush honestly and strongly confronted the growing divisiveness, hostility and political battles that have consumed America: "A malign force seems at work in our common life that turns every disagreement into an...
B.C. mining industry meets highest standards State Rep. Dan Ortiz's letter to the editor in the Sept. 2 Sentinel about British Columbia's mining regulations is misleading and largely inaccurate. Continuous improvement is foundational to B.C.'s mining sector - in environmental management, community engagement, operational efficiency, innovation and more. The fact is B.C.'s mining industry meets some of the highest regulatory standards in the world for environmental assessment, operational...
Assembling a long-term fiscal plan for Alaska has been like putting together a jigsaw puzzle with some key pieces missing from the box. It's frustrating and you can't win, no matter how much you try pounding the pieces to fit together. In this case, the puzzle would fit together better with a governor who doesn't stretch the numbers to suit his arguments, and who thinks more about public services that can build the state's future and less about dividends that can build his reelection campaign....
At this point, anything is worth a try. If a healthy life, caring about family and neighbors, and wanting to dream about perhaps someday flying without a face mask isn’t enough of an incentive, maybe a chance at winning the Alaska vaccination lottery will be just the shot in the arm some people need. Literally. The state has decided to use $1 million in federal pandemic aid to offer a lottery — a weekly $49,000 prize for eight lucky adults (age 18 and over) of the 49th state who figure a chance at cash is worth a little ache in the arm. The...
I grew up in a small rural town in California where we played in the streets, kept our doors unlocked, built treehouses, and stayed out late until our parents called us in. That all changed over the years. Sure, I left the state here and there, but I always returned for family or just because it was familiar. With my children grown and moved away, I decided it was time to find a place that was more suited to my personality. Let’s not gloss over the fact that people in California’s Bay Area hav...
Life teaches us there is a price for making mistakes. Or least the important ones. There is no penalty for picking up the wrong flavor of ice cream at the store, other than you have to eat the entire half-gallon before you can go back and get the correct flavor. Actually, that sounds like a prize, not a penalty. I'm talking the kinds of mistakes that a lot of people notice or that lead to other problems. Just like a football team gets penalized valuable yardage for their blunders on the field,... Full story
Discussions and medical decisions about the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 should be based on facts, not scientifically untested and unproven rumors spread on social media. And certainly not on irresponsible health care advice prescribed by an elected official who seems to think a drug that kills worms in horses and cows might also destroy the coronavirus in people. A polite person might say "horse feathers" to such medical guidance from an unlicensed politician. A not-so-nice person...
This August marked the seventh anniversary of the Mount Polley mine disaster. Mount Polley, located in British Columbia, is a large open-pit mine and its tailings dam collapsed, bringing significant negative impacts on the Quesnel Lake and Frasier River ecosystems, as well as local communities and cultures. Since that time, no significant regulatory or legal changes have been made in British Columbia to address the risks of large-scale mines. Although we do not have jurisdiction in B.C., we are...
Sometimes a pause in the hustle is necessary. Our transboundary watersheds, the Taku, Stikine and Unuk rivers that flow from Northwest British Columbia into Southeast Alaska, face an onslaught of too many industrial mining projects proposed for locations too close together to each other in far too sensitive areas. Those projects, and the way they are being approved without the consent or input of many of those who could be impacted, including tribes and Southeast Alaskans, give many reasons for a pause in business as usual. After the infamous...
Forget politics, rumors, social media, accusations from all sides and everything else that has turned the vaccination debate into a circus — but without the fun, excitement and cotton candy. Too many Alaskans are getting sick (about 5,800 cases the past two weeks), too many are ending up in the hospital (121 in beds as of Tuesday), and too many are dying (419 since the start of the pandemic count, as of Tuesday). Though about two-thirds of the deaths have been recorded in Anchorage and the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Southeast Alaska c... Full story
It should be pretty easy to look at residential utility hookups, Permanent Fund dividend application statistics, housing occupancy and other data points to refute the U.S. Census Bureau count that shows Wrangell lost 242 residents between the federal government’s official tallies in 2010 and 2020. Anyone who has tried to find housing to buy or rent would certainly dispute the notion that all those people left town, putting empty homes or apartments on the market. But this mathematical dispute is much more than frustration over tight housing a... Full story