Sorted by date Results 301 - 325 of 336
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — More than 200 scientists have signed onto a letter asking Congress to enact legislation protecting 1.9 million acres of salmon habitat in this country's largest national forest. The proposal is billed at the “Tongass 77,” referring to the number of watersheds in the Tongass National Forest that would be protected from activities like logging, mine development and road-building. There is currently no bill pending in Congress but the roughly 230 scientists who signed the letter, dated Monday, as well as other activ...
June 7, 1913 – The Seattle Times says that a chain of ten hotels is intended to be built at the most interesting points throughout Alaska and the Yukon Territory, and at the cost of $30,000 for each. One of them will be built each year. The first is now finished and is located at Atlin Lake. Each hotel will be located on a tract of 120 acres of land and will be supplied with steam heat and all other modern conveniences. Mr. Dickeson, manager of the White Pass and Yukon Railroad in speaking of the project, said “The people of the United Sta...
SITKA (AP) — A couple escaped a landslide by running down a narrow, pebble beach away from the shifting mountain. The slide happened Sunday just as Kevin Knox, 41, and his girlfriend, Maggie Gallin, 28, returned from fishing in a rowboat to the National Forest Service cabin at Redoubt Lake, about 15 miles southwest of Sitka, KCAW reported. “We had just tied the boat up and Maggie was in the cabin, and it just let loose _ a huge piece off of the side of the mountain. I yelled for Maggie to run, to get out of the cabin. We started running dow...
Tonka Mess To the Editor: Thanks for this truth. Additionally, the Tonka mess goes far beyond these later-made changes. The Final EIS is devoid of important habitat & wildlife information that ADF&G put on record earlier in the Tonka planning process. That was removed at the direction of the State's Tongass timber tzar (in DNR), who executed the Parnell administration's political policy. The governor is entitled to his policy, but an EIS must be a fact-driven document. The Forest Service failed the public interest Larry Edwa...
ANCHORAGE (AP) — Alaska's challenge to the Clinton administration-era roadless rule in national forests was rejected Monday by a federal judge, who said it came too late to be considered. The rule that was put into place in January 2001 restricts road construction in national forest areas without roads. The Bush administration in 2003 exempted the vast Tongass National Forest, the nation's largest at nearly 26,563 square miles on Alaska's Panhandle. A federal judge in March 2011 overturned that decision and the state of Alaska sued to o...
During the March 5-6 meeting of the SEAPA Board of Directors, the reports of operations manager Steve Henson and special projects director Eric Wolfe highlighted a number of projects and new information related to the Tyee Lake Hydroelectric project. An analysis of a Petersburg electrical tower that is sloughing is a topic of importance in the report. “Petersburg Municipal Power and Light discovered a bank that was sloughing near the outside set of anchors on Tower 76-1M on Mitkof Island. There are two anchors per pole of the three pole s...
March 2, 1983 – The Crystal Lake Hatchery staff has a proposal before the Alaska Legislature to double their rearing capacity. Jim Billi, hatchery manager, told a large crowd of fishermen and interested townspeople at the February 18 meeting at the Counciil Chambers that it would only take a capital outlay of $3,000,000 and an additional $75,000 operating expenditure to do this. At the present time 800,000 kings and over 2,600,000 cohos are hatching out at the hatchery, Billi said. The hatchery will be releasing these smolts from 1981 a...
March 9, 1983 - Ground breaking for construction on a two-story addition to the Petersburg High School this summer will be recommended to the Petersburg School Board by an ad hoc committee. The ad hoc committee, set up by the school board, completed their study of school construction March 3. The recommendations of the 11 member committee and a possible floor plan were presented to school board members March 4 so they would be able to look over the proposals and act on the recommendations at their March 8 meeting. “The school board asked for t...
Senator Mark Begich has once again introduced legislation to repeal the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule. “It’s past time to eliminate this cookie cutter federal regulation that is stifling the Southeast Alaska economy,” Senator Begich said last week. “Southeast communities and small businesses need options to strengthen the region’s economy through responsible resource development like potential mining projects on Prince of Wales Island as well as economic timber sales.” Begich also added that roadways would be a path to greater eco...
Cruise ship sewage mixing zone To the Editor: It is with a feeling of pride that I can now tell family and friends that I am now a 'Cruise ship sewage mixing zone Alaskan commercial fisherman'. Imagine, out on the beautiful waters of Southeast Alaska, catching salmon from the fecal and heavy metal polluted waters. It's only a million people or so a season on the cruise ships. And for sure, once word gets out salmon and seafood consumers around the world will all want to purchase our fecal and heavy metal laced seafood. A nod of thanks to our...
WRANGELL — After carbon testing, a skull found on Government Slough last year has been found to be more that 1,000 years old – and is of Native Alaskan heritage. The skull, which was discovered by Wrangellite Vena Stough while hunting near the slough on Oct. 5, was first turned over to the Wrangell Police Department, who then handed it over to the Tongass National Forest supervisor’s office in Petersburg. According to U.S. Forest Service District Ranger Bob Dalrymple, the testing showed a range...
Dilution is the solution for pollution sums up the Parnell Administration policy when it comes to cruise ship discharges in Alaska waters. A bill being moved quickly by state lawmakers will repeal a 2006 citizens’ initiative that requires cruise ships to meet Alaska water quality standards at the point of discharge, and instead create mixing zones for dumping sewage, hazardous chemicals and other wastes. Alaskans won’t know where those zones are, as House Republicans rejected amendments to require disclosure of the locations. The measure, intro...
According to the Tongass National Forest District Rangers, there is a growing problem with abandoned vehicles and long-term parking on remote road systems near Petersburg and Wrangell. Rangers claim these vehicles are impacting public and contractor access to public lands, creating a safety concern, contaminating the environment with hazardous materials and creating an eyesore for the public. The Ranger Districts are responding to public requests to control the problem by designating long-term p...
January An elderly man was hit by a vehicle while crossing the street at Gjoa and Nordic Drive. The gentleman was crossing inside the crosswalk and was grazed by the vehicle’s mirror as it passed. The victim was thrown approximately 20 feet. He was on crutches at the time. Rock-N-Road Construction was granted a contract to demolish the Romiad Building to make room for the new library. The building was demolished for $22,499. The Petersburg City Council discussed condemning LeConte RV Park for s... Full story
Planning and preliminary design work has begun for a new electrical transmission line intertie that would extend west across the Tongass National Forest, from the Petersburg area to Kake on Kupreanof Island. According to Project Manager for the Intertie, Mark Schinman, the Kake – Petersburg Intertie would transmit power to Kake at either 69 or 138 kilovolts and consist primarily of single wood pole structures. Schinman also explained that two primary alternative routes are being considered. The two routes generally follow previously i... Full story
Nick Popp, Petersburg High School's Vocational Shop Teacher, addressed the Petersburg City School District School Board in order to bring the board up to date with the equipment that was given to PCSD through a Forest Service grant that began some years ago. The history of the Forest Service grant began several years ago with Paul Anderson. Anderson, at the time was on the Resource Advisory Board, RAC. Popp explained that RAC was spending a lot of money on signs for the Tongass National Forest and Anderson suggested that RAC and the Forest...
The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation has notified the Forest Service of an investigation into allegations of misrepresented and omitted pertinent information from its application for permission to store logs from the Tonka Timber Sale during log transfer to Klawock. DEC’s letter requires the Forest Service to respond in writing by Dec. 19 and was prompted by a request by Earthjustice, an environmental law firm on behalf of its client, the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council i...
A skull found near the mouth of the Stikine River in October may require radiocarbon date testing to determine if it came from a Native Alaskan. The skull, which was discovered by Wrangellite Vena Stough while hunting near Government Slough on Oct. 5, was first turned over to the Wrangell Police Department, who then handed it over to the Tongass National Forest supervisor’s office in Petersburg. According to Forest Service anthropologist Jane L. Smith, the office of the Alaska State Medical Exam...
October 13, 1982- She hasn’t heard a phone ring since early childhood and the ring of the doorbell is lost to her ears. The noises that keep life running smoothly for most of us still evade Petersburg resident Kathi Hammer, but a scraggly, two-year-old mutt is changing that. Bingo, a tri-colored springer spaniel trained at the Applegate Behavior Center in Jacksonville, Ore., was delivered to Mrs. Hammer recently and is one of the first hearing ear dogs placed in Alaska. The dog aids its master in the same manner as a seeing-eye dog s...
KETCHIKAN (AP) — The Tongass National Forest stakeholders’ group known as the Tongass Futures Roundtable has voted to support a proposed land exchange in Southeast Alaska. The Tongass Futures Roundtable voted earlier this month to support the land exchange between the U.S. Forest Service and the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority. The deal involves nearly 39,000 acres of federal and Mental Health Trust lands. As proposed, the exchange includes about 20,900 acres of federal land in the Ketchikan and Prince of Wales Island area, and about 18,...
Master carver Tommy Joseph poses near the Main Street totem poles which he carved for the city in 2000. Joseph last week during the Tongass Rainforest Festival taught Carving Halibut Hooks, a 13-hour workshop. He also was the keynote speaker, presenting Warriors of the Tongass, and was the special guest of a potluck at the Seaside restaurant....
THORNE BAY — The Thorne Bay Ranger District is mourning the loss of District Ranger Kent Nicholson, who passed away unexpectedly last weekend at his home on Prince of Wales Island. Although Nicholson had held his current position in Thorne Bay for less than a year, he enjoyed a long career in Southeast Alaska. Nicholson joined the Forest Service in Hoonah in 2004, when he was hired as a civil engineering technician. Soon after, Nicholson accepted a promotion to forester at the Petersburg R...
Due to very low public use, the cabin at Binkley Slough has been removed from the U.S. Forest Service’s public reservation system – a situation not unusual among other structures in Southeast. Because of this, the USFS is looking for public comment on whether a number of cabins across the Tongass should be removed from public use. “Many of these cabins are dilapidated and have not been on the cabin reservation system for many years,” stated Tongass National Forest supervisor Forrest Cole in an email. “The cabins that were available for rent...
Listen to Your Dog - with certified professional dog trainer Vickie L. Buchholz. Wednesday, Sept 5, 6:30 pm. Learn how to listen to and understand your dog. Understanding how they communicate, at various skill levels, with one another and with humans, will help us build a stronger relationship with our dogs. Tongass Rainforest Festival - Halibut Hook Carving Workshop with master carver Tommy Joseph. Sept 5 - 8 - Wednesday & Friday 6 – 9 pm, Saturday 9 am – 4 pm - Free - Must be able to attend ALL classes and be 16 years of age, call the lib...
