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COVID-19 cases continue to rise, impacting the Petersburg Medical Center's staff and operations as the hospital approaches its breaking point. As cases go up, work effort and stress levels among hospital staff increase as they battle the virus. "...this spike ... is impacting practically every component of the community, and there's one, two, and three degrees of separation with each other, so it affects our staff, daycare, kids," PMC CEO Phil Hofstetter said. When a staff member is affected by...
The Clausen Museum is displaying the profiles of six Alaska Natives to mark November as Native American and Alaska Native Heritage Month. Clausen Museum Director Cindi Lagoudakis said the profiles she chose to write were of people who had some connection to Southeast Alaska and may not be well known. "We tell a lot of stories about Amy Hallingstad and Elizabeth Peratrovich, and not to take away from their importance in Alaska Native Heritage and history, but there are other people that have...
The Petersburg Indian Association has started a new program to help tribal households whose subsistence harvests have been impacted by COVID-19. According to Tribal Administrator Tracy Welch, the subsistence impact program was made possible through funding from the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 which she said was a follow up to the Cares Act passed by the federal government in 2020. Through the act, Congress designated $30 million for federally recognized tribes in coastal or Great...
The Petersburg High School Volleyball team has not had it easy this season, but the students are still persevering and preparing for their biggest tournament of the season so far. The team had to cancel its home and away matches last week against Wrangell High School after COVID-19 cases continued to rise in both communities according to Head Coach Jaime Cabral. “With Wrangell’s cases popping up and our cases still pretty high, we didn’t want to risk regions that is coming up this week,” Cabral said. Earlier in the season the North Seeding...
The Petersburg High School volleyball team traveled to Haines last weekend to compete in the Alaska School Activities Association Region V Tournament. Before arriving in Haines, the tournament was put in jeopardy after the ferry M/V LeConte experienced icing conditions in Lynn Canal, forcing the vessel to return to Juneau and delaying the arrival of the five teams on board. Head Coach Jaime Cabral said contingency plans were made if the tournament had to be moved to Juneau, but after some larger items were taken off the ferry, it was able to co...
Construction has finished on the Kake Access Road project and the road and boat launch opened to the public October 29 according to Garrett Paul, project manager with the Department of Transportation. The project improved between 20 to 25 miles of existing roads and added six miles of new roads. It spans a total distance of 42 miles from Kake to the new boat launch. The total cost of the project was $40 million, consisting of $34 million for the construction contract and $6 million for project...
The Borough Assembly approved an emergency ordinance Friday which requires that masks must be worn inside all public indoor spaces. Petersburg saw a dramatic increase in cases in the week leading up to the meeting. The Petersburg Medical Center reported 15 new cases November 1, one of the highest recorded in a single day, and Friday saw the total number of active cases stand at 63. Vice Mayor Jeigh Stanton Gregor called for the special assembly meeting to consider the emergency ordinance and...
Businesses in Petersburg are feeling the impacts of global supply chain challenges brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The manufacturing of some goods is slowing down and shipments are being delayed or canceled altogether, leading to shortages and stores guessing when to order more products. “It comes down to two main things: the labor shortage and the lack of resources,” Hammer & Wikan General Manager Jim Floyd said. While the company could previously rely on 80 to 90 percent of orders com...
The Petersburg Medical Center reported 21 new cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday, bringing the total active cases to 79, the most Petersburg has seen since the beginning of the pandemic. 64 new positives were reported in the past week. Community spread is escalating rapidly according to PMC which is asking people to follow mitigation recommendations. PMC remains in red status and though they will attempt to keep all appointments, they warned that they may experience limitations or rescheduling...
What’s wrong with this picture? To the Editor: Monday Petersburg had 67 Covid cases. Its winter population is probably around 2,500. Clallam County, WA had 37 new cases. Its population is 77,331. What’s wrong with this picture? John Hoag Compassionate care at our hospital To the Editor: My mother-in-law woke me at 1:30 AM. Or, maybe 2:30 as it was the end of daylight savings time. She was having terrible pain. I scooped up all her medications, walked her carefully down the icy ramp to the car and drove her to the emergency room. We were met...
Six students from the Petersburg High School wrestling team traveled to Anchorage last weekend to compete in the Anchorage Christian Schools tournament. The tournament is the biggest in the state for 3A and smaller schools with upwards of 30 teams according to Head Coach James Valentine. The meet allowed the team to have its first glimpse of its northern competition and offered both all-boys and all-girls tournaments. “We don’t see them very often, so it’s a good indicator of what state may look like in the future,” Valentine said. While the mo...
The Petersburg High School volleyball team’s North Seeding Tournament was canceled last weekend due to the high number of active COVID-19 cases in Petersburg according to Activities Director Jaime Cabral. PHS was set to host the tournament and welcome Double-A schools, and some Single-A schools who opted up a division, from across Southeast Alaska to Petersburg. According to Cabral, the schools did not want to risk exposure and jeopardize their seasons due to the high level of community spread. He wrote that it was not an easy decision to m...
Stedman Elementary School will transition to remote learning for the rest of the week due to the impact of COVID-19 according to an announcement Monday from Superintendent Erica Kludt-Painter. Kludt-Painter wrote that the elementary school is experiencing multiple staffing issues as Petersburg continues to see high community spread. Contact tracing efforts within the school district are also being impacted by the high number of cases and close contacts both inside and outside of the schools.... Full story
The Petersburg Medical Center reported 12 new cases of COVID-19 Wednesday for a total of 48 active cases. Community spread is rapidly occurring, causing closures and staff shortages, and PMC is asking people to follow mitigation recommendations. 37 of the 48 cases were identified within the past seven days according to the Petersburg COVID-19 Dashboard. 93 COVID-19 tests have been sent to a reference laboratory and results are expected in the next 3-5 business days. PMC has moved into red...
After months away from family and friends, Joseph Tagaban hopes to return home to Petersburg in time for Thanksgiving. Joseph was checked into Seattle Children's hospital in January after it was discovered that a lump underneath his tooth was a type of cancer called acute myeloid leukemia (AML). So far he has gone through four rounds of chemotherapy and is now finishing his recovery from the fourth round. He was also taking an experimental drug called gilteritinib but is now off of it and is awa... Full story
The Borough Assembly approved ordinances #2021-15 and #2021-17 during Monday's meeting in each of their third and final readings. Ordinance #2021-15 would move a chapter of the old city code which centers on disease control into the borough code. The ordinance limits the powers of the health officer, such as the power to compel vaccination, and makes it so the officer must act under and report to the assembly and the borough manager. It was reviewed by the Petersburg Medical Center, the police...
Trish Oppenheim was not actively seeking out opportunities for work, but when she heard about the need for a nurse at the Petersburg School District, she stepped up to the challenge. Oppenheim has 14 years of ICU experience in a range of settings including the NICU, PICU, recovery room, and the operating room. For the last two years she worked in triage for Providence battling COVID-19. "I'm typically an ICU nurse, but teaching is obviously a huge part of our job as a nurse," Oppenheim said....
The Petersburg High School wrestling team traveled to Haines last weekend to compete in its second tournament of the season. Since many teams had to cancel coming to the first meet in Petersburg, the team was looking forward to this opportunity to see more of the competition. Unfortunately, only teams from Haines and Juneau were able to travel and even though the team was disappointed, Head Coach James Valentine said the students improved since the first meet. "Our wrestlers did well, they tight...
The Petersburg High School swim season came to a close after the 2021 Region V Swim & Dive Championship in Ketchikan last weekend. Prior to the meet, the team lost half of its students due to COVID-19 related issues according to Head Coach Andy Carlisle, some of whom had the best chances to make it to the state tournament. COVID-19 continues to affect the school district which announced Tuesday that all extracurricular practices would be canceled for the near future. Though the team lost some students, Carlisle said the ones that were at the me...
The Petersburg Medical Center Hospital Board met Thursday to discuss the latest COVID-19 outbreak attributed to the delta variant and its effects on the community. PMC CEO Phil Hofstetter presented a graph highlighting the two highest spikes in COVID-19 cases in Petersburg since September of 2020. The first spike occurred near the end of February and beginning of March 2020, shortly after Alaska's emergency declaration expired, and peaked at just under 70 cases. The second spike occurred near...
The Petersburg Medical Center is recovering since the most recent outbreak of COVID-19 in Petersburg according to PMC CEO Phil Hofstetter. The number of cases across the State of Alaska began to climb in July of 2021 and hundreds of new cases are still being reported each day. The case count is causing high alert levels in many boroughs and census areas statewide according to the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services' COVID-19 Dashboard and the state activated its crisis standard of...
The active COVID-19 case count in Petersburg rose to 11 Wednesday according to the Petersburg COVID-19 Dashboard. The count is up from the five reported on October 20 with six new positives in the last seven days. According to the dashboard, the risk level to both the Petersburg School District and the Petersburg Medical Center is moderate. The school district has continue to enforce universal masking and contact tracing is underway. 67.38% of Petersburg Borough residents are fully vaccinated...
After two years of COVID-19 impacting the livelihoods of performers and artists, the Petersburg Arts Council is looking to reunify people and bring about a return to normalcy. Canadian musical artist Royal Wood will come to Petersburg November 2 for a concert hosted by the arts council in the Wright Auditorium. At the onset of the pandemic Wood, like all other live performers, had his world flipped upside down as he faced the struggles of his new reality. "I've been in motion as a touring...
The Petersburg Medical Center reported 15 new cases of COVID-19 Monday, one of the highest recorded in a single day, bringing the total active case count to 30. Community spread is occurring and PMC is asking people to follow mitigation recommendations. 28 of the 30 cases were identified within the past seven days according to the Petersburg COVID-19 Dashboard. 67.6% of Petersburg Borough residents are fully vaccinated according to the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services Vaccine... Full story
There are now 5 active cases of COVID-19 in Petersburg as of Wednesday according to the Petersburg COVID-19 Dashboard. The count is down 14 cases since the Petersburg Medical Center last put out a press release on October 11. The dashboard labels both PMC and the Petersburg School District risk levels as moderate. The Alaska Department of Health and Social Services reported 830 new cases of COVID-19 in the state Tuesday. There were also 19 new resident hospitalizations and eight Alaska resident...
