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Petersburg was paid a visit by longstanding United States Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) on Monday, part of a wider tour of Southeast that includes Ketchikan and Juneau. Extra chairs had to be brought into the Borough Assembly chambers to accommodate the audience, and people stood at the room's back and sides. Seated front and center, Young explained the session would be an informal way for people to give input and ask questions. "I'm here primarily to hear what's on your mind and what you'd like to...
Fluoridation proven safe To the Editor: The safety and effectiveness of community water fluoridation has been scientifically proven and documented for 60 years. Dental decay is still the number one disease of children. Water fluoridation can greatly reduce decay across the population. The safety and efficacy is supported by over 100 National and International organizations, the American Dental Association, the American Medical Association, the U.S. Public Health Service(CDC), the American Cancer Society, the World Health Organization, and the...
WRANGELL – The Stikine River Birding Festival celebrates the spring arrival of migratory birds, including hundreds of thousands of shorebirds to the Stikine River Delta. The 20th year of this Wrangell festival takes place April 27-30, 2017. This year’s schedule is now available online at www.stikinebirding.org. Highlights include family activities, photo and art competitions, birding excursions, bird banding demonstrations, and guest speakers. Presenters this year include Dan Ruthrauff from the USGS Alaska Science Center, who will share his...
The Petersburg Borough Assembly approved a resolution opposing H.R. 232 — an act sponsored by Alaska Congressman Don Young that would transfer up to 2 million acres of Tongass National Forest to the state of Alaska. The assembly voted to table the resolution during its last meeting and rewrite some of the language member Bob Lynn said wasn’t in the best interest of the borough. The rewritten language, in part, states, “…transferring ownership of major portions of the Tongass National Forest within the Petersburg Borough to the State of Alaska w...
We find the Borough Assembly’s opposition to H.R. 232 to transfer up to 2-million acres of the Tongass National Forest to the State of Alaska very short sighted. According to their Resolution #2017-07 they would trade shrinking numbers of government jobs, dwindling federal handouts in the form of Payments in Lieu of Taxes and Secure Rural Schools funding for the opportunity to move acres of federal land into State ownership. Make no mistake. Government is a poor landlord. But with the transfer of Federal land into State hands, the landlord m...
The Petersburg Borough Assembly tabled a resolution opposing H.R. 232—an act sponsored by Alaska Congressman Don Young that would transfer up to 2 million acres of Tongass National Forest to the the state of Alaska. The land that would go into state control includes subsurface lands, roads, campgrounds and cabins and the resolution cited concerns that logging would supersede other land uses. “Whereas, the Alaska Timber Jobs Task Force from which this federal land transfer strategy originated was heavily weighted to timber industry rep...
Rethink flouride To the Editor: I would like to request the Borough reevaluate its practice of adding fluoride to our water supply. It is time to investigate what the current research is on the safety of fluoride after so many years of public use. I found that fluoride in drinking water does give dental benefits to people across the board, and over and over I read, “the benefits outweigh the risks.” But that made me wonder, if there are recognized risks associated with fluoride introduced into the drinking water of municipalities, why don...
The bill giving the green light to an exchange of thousands of acres of land between the Alaska Mental Health Trust and the U.S. Forest Service was introduced in Juneau this week. Rep. Dan Ortiz, I-Ketchikan, filed House Bill 155 on Monday. It authorizes the trust to go ahead with an exchange of more than 17,000 acres of trust land for 20,000 acres of rural Forest Service timber land. In the process, the exchange would eliminate the possibility of logging on trust-owned land on Deer Mountain and above the Mitkof Highway in Petersburg. Those...
A snag in Sitka that was holding up progress on a state bill to help the Alaska Mental Health Trust with its land exchange — and thereby prevent logging on Deer Mountain — has been resolved, putting the bill on track to be introduced this session. State and federal lawmakers, at the behest of the trust, have been working on legislation that would mandate the U.S. Forest Service exchange more than 20,000 acres of rural timber land for approximately 17,000 acres of trust land located near Ketchikan, Meyers Chuck, Petersburg, Wrangell, Sitka and...
WRANGELL – In its first meeting of the new year, the governing board for Southeast Alaska Power Agency looked ahead to political reshufflings at the state and federal levels. Meeting in Petersburg February 8, members of the board learned from SEAPA executive officer Trey Acteson a change in administrations at the federal level could be useful to the agency’s future operations. For example, only two commissioners sitting on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission – which licenses hydropower projects – remain in place since the swearing in of 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...
January 20, 1917 – Postmaster Refling has received advice from the department at Washington that, owing to the difficulty in obtaining paper and skilled labor, the furnishing of “office-request” envelopes has been suspended for the present. These are the envelopes with the words, “After – days, return to - , Petersburg, Alaska,” printed on corner. It is stated, however, that there is ample stock of envelopes with only the stamp printed thereon; also that “special request” envelopes – bearing the printed card of the purchaser – may be had. Jan...
The state has so far not received any applications from a number of floathouse owners contacted last autumn. Since October, the Department of Natural Resources has been reaching out to identified owners of floating facilities anchored along the Stikine River’s tidal area, the land which is under its clear jurisdiction after resolving a longstanding dispute with the United States Forest Service last March. The floathouses being targeted are those anchored within the tidal influence of the river, which ends just beyond the terminus of Shakes S...
January Public Works rolled out the borough's highly anticipated blue cart recycling program. The borough received $820,117.61 from the annual raw fish tax. Dave Zimmerman was hired as the new Tongass National Forest Petersburg District Ranger. The assembly continued discussing the reallocation of the Kake access road funding. Representative Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins took part in a budget crisis presentation at Sons of Norway Hall. The visit was the first of many by representatives throughout the...
JUNEAU – Plans for managing the nation’s largest national forest call for changes in timber harvests that one critic says will be “the demise of the timber industry.” The Tongass National Forest released a management plan update Friday that it says emphasizes young-growth timber sales in the forest covering much of southeast Alaska over old-growth timber. The plan would allow for a logging rate that management says will meet projected demand. Kristen Miller, with the Alaska Wilderness League, says the plan protects important places that sup...
WRANGELL – A number of Petersburg and Wrangell residents have been receiving letters from the state, informing them their float houses anchored along the Stikine River need to be permitted or else move. Since the late 1970s, the placement of float houses and temporary cabins along the river have made it convenient for locals making use of the river basin, be it for subsistence fishing, hunting, trapping, work or recreational purposes. While a number are there on a seasonal basis, this year some 18 have been identified as being situated y...
A changing climate is altering rain and snowfall patterns that affect the waters Alaska salmon call home, for better or worse. A first of its kind study now details the potential changes for Southeast Alaska, and how people can plan ahead to protect the fish. One third of Alaska’s salmon harvest each year comes from fish produced in the 17,000 miles of streams in the Tongass rainforest. More than 50 species of animals feed on spawning salmon there, and one in 10 jobs is supported by salmon throughout the region. “Global climate change may bec...
The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities proposed Alaska Marine Highway System (AMHS) schedule pattern for summer 2017 is now available online for public review. The documents can be accessed through a link on the AMHS homepage at FerryAlaska.com or directly through the following web address: dot.alaska.gov/amhs/share/schedule/considerations.pdf This is an opportunity for communities to review and comment on the proposed schedule in consideration of community events. Written comments will be accepted prior to Oct. 24 via...
When it comes to restoring an early-1900s house to its original condition finding fixtures can be tricky, not to mention time consuming. Greg Katason's love for the Buschmann house at 407 South Nordic Drive is obvious in the way he speaks about it and the countless hours he's spent planning its restoration. "I wanted to keep it as original as possible," he says. "Roger Heimdahl sent me pictures of the house when he was growing up." The Heimdahls owned the house in the early 1900s, years after...
PETERSBURG – Southeast Alaska biomass experts believe that the low price of oil shouldn’t put wood heat projects on the chopping block. When the price of diesel remained higher than $4 a gallon, wood-fired boilers were sold as a relatively cheap heating option for public buildings in Southeast. The campaign to promote wood heat has been successful in Southeast – especially in the Ketchikan and Prince of Wales Island areas – as all levels of government, tribal governments and private enterprise invest millions of dollars into biomass project...
Suzanne Wood, co-founder of Mitkof Highway Homeowners Association, on Sept. 1, sent a letter to the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority seeking records for the 11 August 2016 Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority’s Resource Management Committee Meeting and Executive Session and for the 24 August 2016 AMHTA Board of Trustees Special Meeting. The documents, according to the letter, “are necessary for us to ascertain how the Trust could transition from the ongoing and forward-moving AMHTA-US Forest Service administrative land exchange process to s... Full story
KETCHIKAN, Alaska (AP) – A dog is back home safe with its owners after a pilot who had just landed a floatplane spotted it struggling in an Alaska waterway and rescued it. Pilot Mike Hudgins pulled the miniature sheltie named Misty from Tongass Narrows on Sunday. The animal had been swimming alone in the channel between the Ketchikan International Airport ferry dock and Taquan Air’s floatplane dock. Hudgins had finished giving a tour to a family when he called out to Misty, who was about 40 yards ahead of where he landed. “She started to turn...
Thinking outside the box To the Editor: The Greater Southeast Alaska Conservation Community believes there are better solutions than a land exchange to solve the highly controversial Alaska Mental Health Trust debacle. The exchange is detailed in Senator Murkowski’s Alaska Mental Health Trust Land Exchange Act of 2016 (S.3006). Specifically, what should be pursued instead is either a federal buy-out or a land transfer with the State, not Feds, from existing State forestlands. Clearly, AMHT’s threats that Murkowski’s bill be passed— or else—ha...
tWRANGELL – The City of Wrangell is applying to the United States Forest Service to give a historic boat a new home. The M/V Chugach was one of 11 ranger boats operating in the state during the first half of the 20th century. Built at the Lake Union Dry Dock and Machine Works in Seattle in 1925, the vessel was assigned to Cordova for work in the Tongass and Chugach national forests. It remains the last of its kind in the USFS fleet, continuing service until last year. The boat was restationed in Petersburg in 1953, it served from there more t...
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) – A bear that mauled two cruise ship wilderness guides during a hiking excursion in Alaska attacked so quickly that there was little time to defend against the animal, the CEO of the cruise ship company said. The attack occurred after the guides and a group of hikers from the cruise vessel Wilderness Explorer rounded a “semi-blind corner” and found themselves between the bear and her cub, UnCruise Adventures CEO Dan Blanchard told the Juneau Empire in an interview published Tuesday. “I can’t express enough about how rapid...
