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The U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against the Alaska Division of Elections late Thursday, Oct. 22, seeking to block the division from certifying the result of the state's U.S. Senate election if the Democratic challenger, Mary Peltola, wins. President Donald Trump told reporters on Friday in Florida that he ordered the lawsuit be filed. "I'm the one that said, 'do it,'" he said. Peltola is the leading opponent to incumbent Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, and polls show her with a small... Full story
Turning down a request to wait until union members vote on the offer, the Petersburg Borough Assembly on Oct. 20 approved the second reading of an ordinance funding the borough’s last, best and final wage offer to its employees’ union. The final reading likely comes before the assembly next week. Ordinance 2026-22, which adjusts the fiscal 2027 budget to pay for the offer’s first-year raises, passed its second reading 5-1, with Member Donna Marsh opposed. A motion by Marsh to postpone the ordinance to Nov. 16 failed on a 3-3 tie. Marsh, Bob M...
Cyber attackers who locked up Petersburg Borough computers in July demanded about $1 million in Bitcoin, and the borough refused to pay, Borough Manager Stephen Giesbrecht told the Pilot this week. “We got a ransomware notice from an outside bad guy, basically saying if we wanted our computers to work again, we should pay them,” Giesbrecht said. “We’re not going to pay ransomware.” The borough disclosed the July 11 attack in a public notice issued Oct. 16, more than three months later. Giesbrecht said outside experts told the borough to stay q...
The Petersburg Borough Assembly will decide at its next meeting whether to make the land beside Fire Station 1 on Haugen Drive the permanent home for the volunteer fire department's training props. The props must leave Scow Bay by Nov. 30 to make way for the borough's boatyard project. At the Oct. 20 assembly meeting, Emergency Services Director Aaron Hankins presented cost estimates for two relocation sites. In the meantime, the three-story burn tower and six-container training prop will be...
President Donald Trump on Wednesday called for Alaska Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Mary Peltola to be criminally charged and drop out or be removed from the ballot. His comments followed the publication of a New York Times article revealing that her campaign worked with the national Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to recruit spoiler candidates that could dilute votes for her principal opponent, incumbent Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan. The U.S. Department of Justice has already filed a Trump-directed but legally dubious lawsuit... Full story
One week before Election Day, turnout in Alaska’s general election is nearing 10%. As of 4:43 p.m. Tuesday afternoon, according to figures published by the Alaska Division of Elections, 58,168 people had cast early or absentee ballots for the Nov. 3 election. The number of early votes cast through Tuesday afternoon already exceeds the number of early votes cast before the last midterm election, in 2022. Other states across the country are seeing a similar surge in early voting. According to a daily report published by the Alaska Division of E...
An Alaska Airlines aircraft was expected to depart Wrangell on Wednesday after spending six days in town for replacement of a failed engine. The right-hand engine - the starboard side, for mariners - failed as northbound Flight 65 was just starting its takeoff roll last Friday, Oct. 23. There were no injuries, and the plane returned to the terminal. Within a second or two of starting to rev up the engines and roll for takeoff, "there was a loud pop off the right side," said Orin Pierson, a...
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Students in Petersburg High School's new Emergency Trauma Technician course spent two days this month learning to cut into wrecked vehicles, then used those skills to free a volunteer "patient" from the cab of an overturned pickup. The training took place Thursday, Oct. 8, and Friday, Oct. 9, at the borough baler facility at the landfill, where several junked vehicles slated to be crushed were held back for the exercise. Six ETT students and 10 students from the high school's Certified Nursing...
A fire damaged part of a Petersburg apartment complex about two miles south of town on Friday, Oct. 16. No occupants were in the building when firefighters arrived, but a pet dog died in the incident, according to Volunteer Fire Department spokesperson Dave Berg. He said the apartment unit is now "uninhabitable because of the smoke and fire damage." Petersburg police, fire and EMS were called to the scene at a four-unit apartment building on Cornelius Road around 11:38 a.m. About 15... Full story
Petersburg experienced a power outage on Monday, Oct. 19, after a regional hydropower supplier’s system went offline. The town ran on diesel generation until around 8:00 p.m. once the supplier’s feed was available again. Petersburg gets much of its electricity from Southeast Alaska Power Agency, or SEAPA, which also supplies power to Wrangell and Ketchikan. Those two communities also reported outages Monday morning. SEAPA was working on its Tyee hydro project and needed to take its power feed offline on short notice, according to Pet... Full story
A Petersburg student biking to school was injured in a collision with a car on Oct. 15. The student is with their family and receiving care at the local hospital, according to Superintendent Robyn Taylor on the day of the incident. "As they were heading towards the school, a vehicle pulled out of a [parking lot], and the student and the vehicle struck paths. So, the student was injured," Taylor said. Taylor declined to share the child's name or grade, citing privacy concerns. Multiple sources... Full story
Petersburg's newest musical group held its first rehearsal Oct. 14 in the Petersburg High School band room. Matt Lenhard, the school's former band director, is starting the Petersburg Community Jazz Band, an ensemble for adult musicians. Before the first players arrived, Lenhard compared the evening to the start of a school year. "This is weirder than the first day of school," Lenhard said. "Because at least on the first day of school, I have a roster and I have some idea of skill level." He...
The Oktoberfest Art Share returns to the Petersburg Community Gym on Saturday, Oct. 24, for its 50th year, with a full slate of local artists, crafters, nonprofits and food vendors. Doors open to the public at 10 a.m., and the event runs until 3 p.m. The Muskeg Maleriers, Petersburg's longstanding rosemaling group, host the event. Sally Dwyer, one of the Oktoberfest organizers, remembers that a local arts council started the art share 50 years ago, but after four or five years the Maleriers...
Petersburg audiences will get a sampling of four centuries of Western drama later this month, when a cast of local adults and high school students stages a theater revue built from six scenes from six plays. The show runs 7 to 8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 30, and 7 to 8 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 1, at Wright Auditorium. Tickets are $10 and are available at Lee’s Clothing and at the door. Organizer Elsa Wintersteen, who teaches drama at Petersburg High School, said the format will be new to many local theatergoers, who are more used to full-length productions l...
The Viking Swim Club’s annual auction returns this Saturday. This year’s theme is “The Price Is Right.” “It’s something we’ve been wanting to do for a few years,” said organizer Marlena Newman. “So it’s been really exciting to watch it come together.” The auction will be held Saturday, Oct. 24, at the Sons of Norway Hall. Doors open at 5:30 p.m., dinner will be served around 6:30 p.m. and the live auction will begin shortly after. Tickets are $50 and available at Lee’s Clothing. Jamie Cabral serves again as auctioneer. “His energy is just unm...
Abbey Jackson Ferree – who grew up in Petersburg, swam for the Viking Swim Club and now lives in Fairbanks – swam across the Catalina Channel off Southern California on Sept. 11. The crossing made her the third Alaskan ever to complete the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming. She entered the water off Santa Catalina Island at about 11 p.m. on Sept. 10 and reached the mainland shortly after 11 the next morning. Her official time was 12 hours, 2 minutes and 55 seconds, for a crossing of about 21....
The Petersburg Borough Assembly took two steps toward regulating data centers on Oct. 5. In a 6-0 vote, members directed Borough Manager Steve Giesbrecht to draft an ordinance establishing a nine-month moratorium on certain data center development. In a second 6-0 vote, they directed him to begin drafting amendments to Title 19, the borough’s zoning code, to address data centers specifically. Neither vote puts rules in place yet. The moratorium and any zoning changes must each come back to the Assembly as ordinances and pass three readings. The...
Getting rid of solid waste - trash, in a single word - is expensive in Alaska, particularly in Southeast communities that lack road access to haul and dump garbage in a nearby landfill. "It's a problem that's never going away," said Tom Wetor, director of Wrangell's Public Works Department and a board member of the Southeast Alaska Solid Waste Authority, or SEASWA. The collection of nine Southeast municipal governments, in conjunction with the Southeast Conference and a consultant, has been work...
Petersburg certified the official tally of votes for its municipal election on Oct. 9, finalizing the results. When the polls closed on election night, there were two questioned ballots and two mail-in ballots outstanding. The questioned ballots were invalid. The outstanding ballots did not arrive before the Petersburg Borough Assembly met as the canvass board to certify the results on Friday. But those potential votes would not have changed the outcome of the preliminary results - at least not... Full story
The Petersburg Medical Center has received a three-year grant from the state health department to offer free case management services to seniors in Petersburg and Wrangell. Brandy Boggs, PMC’s hospital patient navigator, explained the new program during KFSK’s PMC Live show in late September. “Case management services under this grant would be for anybody 60 and older,” Boggs said. “Or if you’re under 60 and you have Alzheimer’s disease or related dementia or something similar.” Boggs said the purpose of the program is to help connect elders... Full story
The weather station atop Five Finger Lighthouse is operational again after more than two months offline, and it came back this fall instead of next spring thanks to the insistence of the volunteers who care for the lighthouse. Three NOAA technicians replaced the station's tower and instruments Oct. 3 and 4. They teamed up with the Five Finger Lighthouse Society for the haul of gear and transportation of techs to and from the island. The new and improved weather station "is up and running, and...
By the time Petersburg's polls closed on Tuesday night, 1,120 ballots had been cast and counted. That's about 160 fewer than last year. The preliminary results remain unofficial until the election is canvassed. Ballot propositions Three questions were on Petersburg's municipal ballot this year. Proposition 1 came from the Borough's power department, and authorizes a $3.3 million revenue bond for a diesel generator project south of town in Scow Bay. Unofficial results show Prop 1 passed by a...
The Petersburg Borough Assembly on Monday overturned the Planning Commission's denial of a minor subdivision at 1200 Haugen Drive, moving the Central Council of the Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska a step closer to buying the borough lot next to the fire hall where it plans a broadband tower. Sitting as the Board of Adjustment, the Assembly voted 6-0 to grant Tlingit & Haida's appeal and approve the subdivision, Assembly Member Scott Newman was excused from the meeting. Tidal Network, a t...
Alaska Timber and Truss has secured a $2.5 million financing package to modernize its sawmill on Falls Creek Road, connect it to Petersburg's hydroelectric grid and install an additional mill built to process young-growth timber. Co-owner Brett Martin said the goal is to have the expanded operation running well by the middle of next summer. "We're taking a gamble," Martin said. "We're obtaining a couple of loans to expand our mill, or essentially retool our mill to bring it up to modern...
