Sorted by date Results 201 - 212 of 212
WRANGELL - As of last week, employees, contractors and volunteers with the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium, which operates in 19 communities, must show proof of vaccination against COVID-19 or risk losing their jobs or access to the facilities. Exceptions will be allowed for staff who are pregnant or breastfeeding, have a history of anaphylaxis or allergy to the vaccine, or "persons whose sincere religious observances and practices related to life, purpose or death oppose vaccines,"...
Blame legislators for overspending and underachieving at the underlying need for a long-term fiscal plan for the state - if it makes you feel better. They certainly have made some poor decisions. But Alaskans need to look at their own reflection in the mud puddle of politics and realize we share in the blame for electing and encouraging bad decisions by many of those same lawmakers. We're just as guilty for decades of irresponsible requests for state funding, unreasonable expectations that the...
As of Wednesday morning, nearly half of the 118 Petersburg applications for financial help with rent and utilities had been approved or were pending a final decision, according to the state agency running the federally funded program. Stacy Barnes, AHFC Director, Governmental Relations & Public Affairs emailed the Pilot that 52 of the applications had been approved and $94,192 has been paid to Petersburg landlords and utility companies. The Alaska Housing Finance Corp. received about 30,000...
The last time Alaska changed the state tax on motor fuel, gasoline cost about 36 cents a gallon at a Lower 48 pump, the average home price in the United States was $24,000, and the average price of a new car was about $3,500. The motor fuel tax rate in Alaska in 1970 was 8 cents a gallon, about half the price of a cup of coffee. Gasoline now runs about $2.50 a gallon in the Lower 48, $3 in Anchorage, and closer to $4 a gallon in California. The average home price in the country is over...
"Confidence in an economy matters," Dan Robinson, research chief at the state Department of Labor, told the House Ways and Means Committee earlier this month. "There is an economic cost of not solving these problems." He was talking with legislators about the state's job loss, population loss, economic loss and inability to agree on a fiscal plan to pay for public services long term. For most of the past 30 years, Alaska has taken from savings, prayed for high oil prices and rejoiced at any...
Legislators started the session in January amid a shortage of revenues and debate whether the state could even afford a dividend this fall unless it exceeded its annual limited draw from the Permanent Fund. Significantly higher oil prices and more than $1 billion from this month's federal pandemic aid package may fix both problems, though only temporarily. The Alaska Department of Revenue told legislators last week that higher oil prices could produce an additional $790 million in revenues this...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy wants to create a new state ferry system advisory board with one state official and 10 public members to replace an existing advisory panel, similar to a separate proposal from coastal lawmakers. The difference being that the legislative proposal would protect board members from dismissal by a governor, while under Dunleavy's bill the members would "serve at the pleasure" of the governor. The governor would appoint the entire board under Dunleavy's bill, while the Legislature...
After spending almost $1.1 million to keep the vessels out of service to save money and safely tied up the past several years, the state last week sold its two fast ferries - built at a combined cost of $68 million less than 20 years ago - for just over $5 million. Mediterranean-based catamaran operator Trasmapi had offered about $4.6 million for the Fairweather and Chenega. The company serves the Spanish island of Ibiza, about 70 miles off the coast. The state was able to negotiate the final...
Predictability and dependability. More than anything else, that's what the communities served by the Alaska Marine Highway System need. The communities need to know the schedules further in advance so that they can plan school sports, scholastic and musical events, regional festivals, and confidently market to tourists in a post-COVID world. Residents need the dependability of ferry service for medical appointments, commerce and shopping, vehicle repair appointments at dealers, and of course...
WRANGELL - Between state budget cuts, a mainline vessel engine breakdown, a halt to port calls in Prince Rupert, B.C., and COVID-19 travel restrictions, the Alaska Marine Highway System has struggled the past year to provide service to Wrangell and the rest of Southeast. Under the governor's proposed budget for the state fiscal year that starts July 1, the ferry system would have even less money to provide service. "Woefully inadequate," Ketchikan Rep. Dan Ortiz, who also represents Wrangell,...
Maybe the answer is fish. No, not the answer to what’s for dinner tonight. The answer to solving the increasingly acrimonious debate over the amount of this year’s Alaska Permanent Fund dividend. Figuring out how to share the investment earnings of the Permanent Fund between community services, such as schools and the university system and state troopers, and with individual Alaskans through the fall dividend payment is a lot like sharing salmon between multiple competing interests. The commercial fishing industry, sportfishing ent...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy is right. The Legislature and governor the past three years appropriated money for individual Permanent Fund dividends contrary to the 1982 formula in state statute. So what? They did it for good reason. They did their job. The Legislature voted to pass a responsible budget based on Alaska's fiscal reality, balancing the needs and wants of individuals vs. the needs and services of the entire state. Despite what the new governor promised voters last fall, communities do not...
