Sorted by date Results 3423 - 3447 of 5678
JUNEAU (AP) – Alaska Gov. Bill Walker on Monday expressed renewed hope for working with the federal government on oil, gas and land issues, praising President Donald Trump’s pick to head the Interior Department as “just what we need.” Walker said he met informally with Interior secretary nominee Ryan Zinke while in Washington, D.C., for Trump’s inauguration. He said Zinke, a Montana congressman, understood the challenges Alaska has had with access to federal lands for things like resource development. “I think we’re going to have a very, very...
JUNEAU (AP) – Juneau officials have begun removing boats from city harbors after identifying dozens of boats that have not moved in years. City Harbormaster David Borg started a campaign to clear harbors of inoperable boats in August and found 39 boats that could be cleared from the waterways, the Juneau Empire reported Sunday. A few owners were ordered late last year to prove their boats could move under their own power or leave the harbor. Two owners have shown their boats are operable and three boats have been impounded. City code r...
Over 30 people turned out for a meeting to discuss long-term goals for developing the Scow Bay turnout last Thursday at the Halingstad-Peratrovich building. Members of the PEDC committee and the Harbor Advisory Board were in attendance and the meeting was led by Dick Somerville representing PND Engineers, Inc. in Juneau. Somerville displayed three drawings showing possible development options for the property. One proposed upgrading the existing ramp into a 40-ft. x 420-ft. concrete plank struct...
With the introduction of land exchange legislation in Congress, the Alaska Mental Health Land Trust has backed away from logging Trust lands in Petersburg and Ketchikan. John Morrison, Executive Director of the Trust Land Office (TLO) wrote in an opinion piece last week that with the introduction of S.131 and H.R. 531, 18,000 acres of Trust land would be traded for 20,000 acres of USFS land as an equal value land exchange. Morrison wrote, “We understand the importance of this issue to your community and are thankful for your engagement with u...
Petersburg Indian Association board member candidate Will Ware who submitted a challenge letter following the PIA election, withdrew as a candidate and clarified that the intent of the challenge was not to challenge the results but to bring attention to concerns about the process....
JUNEAU (AP) – A 21-year-old man caught transporting methamphetamine on a ferry running between Washington state and Ketchikan, Alaska, has been sentenced to nearly two years in prison. Jason Corey Vincent Alto was sentenced last week to 20 months in prison, the Juneau Empire reported Sunday. Court documents say Alto was stopped by Alaska troopers in May after a K-9 alerted troopers to 3.2 pounds of meth in his luggage. Federal prosecutors called it the single largest seizure of methamphetamine in southeast Alaska. Alto was charged with p...
WRANGELL – The Forest Service (USFS) announced its permits for visiting Anan Wildlife Observatory this summer will be available at the start of next month. At 8 a.m. on February 1 members of the public will be able to reserve permits at the Recreation.gov website. Twenty permits will be made available for each day of the season, which runs from July 5 to August 25. Visitation outside this time frame does not require a permit. Reservations and payment can also be made by phone, at the 1-877-444-6777 hotline. Permits for 2017 cost $10 api...
WRANGELL – A new sample site shows more butter clams carry the risk of paralytic shellfish poisoning for consumers, according to a report released last week. Since last year Wrangell Cooperative Association's Indian Environmental General Assistance Program (IGAP) staff have been collecting samples of various bivalves from the beaches around Shoemaker Bay on a weekly basis. It added a new site further south to its monitoring, near Pats Landing. It was here that the butter clam samples showed u...
WRANGELL – Taking up the mantle left by the Lions Club after it closed its Wrangell chapter last summer, the Garnet Grit Betties roller derby team is continuing its aluminum collection program. For two decades the club had raised money for itself through the program, as aluminum is one of the few recyclable materials which can turn a profit for collectors. Reprocessing the material is considerably more efficient than producing it from bauxite ore, a savings which makes it more profitable than i...
WRANGELL – Trident Seafoods will be welcoming a new manager for its Wrangell plant during the summer's production run. Nick Ohmer was named as the company's selection in a media brief last week. A lifelong resident of Southeast Alaska, in an interview Ohmer said he would be bringing to the job his local knowledge and personal connections with Wrangell's fishermen. Ohmer grew up in Petersburg, and even before fishing alongside those from the neighboring community he grew up with many of them t...
KENAI (AP) – The Alaska Board of Fisheries is asking the state Legislature to reconsider the state’s fish habitat permitting process. The board sent a letter to the Legislature earlier this month asking lawmakers to review how the commission of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game issues permits in streams determined to be fish habitat, the Peninsula Clarion reported Sunday. Any activity that may use, divert, obstruct or change the natural flow of a body of water determined to be fish habitat requires a permit, granted by Fish and Gam...
JUNEAU (AP) – Legislators on opposite ends of the political spectrum are supporting an Alaska Senate bill to restore the portion of Alaskans’ oil wealth checks cut by Gov. Bill Walker last year. Walker vetoed about half the amount available for checks after legislative sessions that focused on the state’s multibillion-dollar deficit ended in gridlock. Senators who want the rest of the checks restored disagree with Walker’s veto but they also have different ideas on what a fiscal plan should include. Signing on as co-sponsors to Republi...
The Petersburg Borough Assembly held the first reading of an ordinance designed to amend municipal code regarding the local improvement district (LID) process on Tuesday night. The program is aimed at taking advantage of the SECON asphalt plant while it’s in town by offering residents of select neighborhoods the opportunity to pay for their streets to be paved. Lake Street resident Joel Randrup spoke to the assembly last week about the issue, and did so again this week. He wanted to reiterate his characterization of the LID as having a “majorit...
The Petersburg Indian Association held board elections earlier this month, but it took until Tuesday for the results to be certified because of a candidate challenge, according to a press release. The challenge, brought by William Ware, resulted in a challenge committee being formed on Jan. 11. The challenge committee was comprised of one election official, two election committee workers and two PIA tribal members. However, on Jan.15, Ware withdrew his challenge in a letter clarifying the intent of his challenge as regarding the election...
David Plagens worked as a police officer in west Texas on the border of New Mexico and Mexico prior to accepting a position with the Petersburg Police Department. He has four years of law enforcement experience, including three years as a deputy and one as a jailer. Plagens is married and his wife Jolie will be moving to the island this spring, maybe mid-April. Plagens has only been in town a couple of weeks, but he already has a healthy respect for the local fishing community and wet weather. "...
JUNEAU (AP) – Alaska legislators agree on the need to address the state’s multibillion-dollar budget deficit. But rifts remain over how best to do that, with divisions forming over taxes, how much to keep cutting spending and whether the state needs to tinker with Alaskans’ beloved yearly oil wealth checks. A new 90-day legislative session begins Tuesday, with many lawmakers citing a sense of urgency amid the continued drawdown of state savings. Last year’s regular and special sessions were snarled by gridlock ahead of a heated electio...
ANCHORAGE (AP) – Esteban Santiago stood alone in the cold one day last month outside Mom & Pop’s liquor store in Anchorage. He was waving his arms and having a terrible argument in the parking lot. “He’d just be talking to himself ... screaming as if he was having a battle with himself,” said Naomi Harden, a clerk at the store, situated across the street from the motel where Santiago lived. Last week, Santiago got off a one-way flight from Anchorage at the airport in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, arriving with a single piece of checked luggage:...
After spending four years with the U.S. Navy working military police, Luis Waechter is looking forward to the slower pace of life in Petersburg. "The last three years of my Navy contract I was deployed out in the Middle East, so everything about Petersburg is better in that aspect," he says. "I like the quiet, small town community here." Waechter recently moved to the borough after accepting a position with the police department. He is originally from South Carolina and fell in love with...
ANCHORAGE (AP) – State officials have announced that tests of Alaska seafood continue to show no detectable amounts of radiation, five years after a deadly earthquake and tsunami set off a nuclear disaster at a Japanese power plant. More than 16,000 people were killed in 2011 after Japan’s 9.1-magnitude earthquake, which led to nuclear meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Since then, U.S. and international agencies have been conducting tests to determine the health of marine life along the U.S. and Canada, KTVA-TV rep...
The average temperature for Petersburg last year was 46 degrees, the warmest on record, and it also marked the 34th driest, according to NOAA warning coordination meteorologist Joel Curtis. Local records were set for warm weather in March and a new lowest recorded rainfall happened in October. The minimum temperature was also the warmest on record, he said. As for precipitation, Curtis said it was just under 93 percent of normal, with 101.18 inches falling. That's an 8.05 inch departure from...
KETCHIKAN (AP) About an acre owned by the Craig Tribal Association will be the first Alaska Native land to go into trust with the federal government. The U.S. Department of the Interior announced the decision Friday, reported the Ketchikan Daily News. “It’s a historic day for the Craig Tribal Association and for all tribes in Alaska,” said Clinton Cook Sr., president of the Craig Tribal Association. “It’s a biggie.” A July court decision ended a long-standing practice barring Alaska Native land from going into trust. “The elimination o...
WRANGELL – A state task force set up to further develop a sustainable mariculture industry is setting up several advisory committees as part of that process. The Alaska Mariculture Task Force was set up by Gov. Bill Walker following recommendations by the state’s marine industry. The group announced January 13 that after five meetings it is on its way to proposing an implementable plan by its deadline of March 1, 2018. These recommendations will address public and private investment, regulatory issues, and research and development needs. To tha...
The Petersburg has one confirmed case of Pertussis or whooping cough, according to a notice sent out by Superintendent Erica Kludt-Painter on Tuesday afternoon. “We have been working with the Medical Center and Public Health Nurse to determine the best course of action for sharing accurate and helpful information with staff, parents, and community members,” Kludt-Painter wrote. “This is not a public health emergency, but we need to be cautious and aware.” The email described the case as being found in a small child, but did not specify if it w...
Susan Ohmer was raised to work. She learned what it meant to work hard early in life, so the idea of taking months off work for a sabbatical is truly foreign to her. As the executive director for Petersburg Mental Health, Ohmer was recently chosen as one of six Alaska nonprofit executives to be recognized by the Rasmuson Foundation Sabbatical Program. "It still doesn't seem like it could happen, like it's real," she says. "It's ironic that I'm someone who for 23 years has had difficulty taking...
WRANGELL – Alaska’s 30th Legislature convened for its new session on Tuesday, with the state’s finances presenting a daunting challenge for the next 90 days. The spending deficit is projected at around $3.1 billion this year if the budget is left as-is. Agency spending has come to just over 13-percent since FY15, and the budget as a whole has taken a 29-percent cut when capital projects and other funding is considered. Revenue has failed to cover operating expenses since FY13, but has covered an ever-dwindling proportion since. This year the $...
