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JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took an unusually strong step Tuesday and blocked a proposed mine heralded by backers as the most significant undeveloped copper and gold resource in the world because of concerns about its environmental impact on a rich Alaska aquatic ecosystem that supports the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery. The move, cheered by Alaska Native tribes and environmentalists and condemned by some state officials and mining interests, deals a heavy blow to the proposed Pebble Mine. The int...
The state Board of Game has approved a proposal to reopen an elk hunt on Zarembo Island, though the odds that a local could nab a tag and take a bull will be low — a small number of tags will be available and the drawing will be open to hunters nationwide. The first drawing will likely take place this fall, with the hunt set for fall 2024. There hasn’t been an elk hunt on Zarembo for nearly 20 years, due to concerns about the small population’s sustainability, explained Petersburg-based state Fish and Game biologist Frank Robbins. “The last ye...
The federal ship has come in for the Alaska Marine Highway System, carrying more than $284 million for upgrades to old vessels, money to help pay for a new ferry, dock repairs, additional service to small communities and even a proposed electric-powered ferry for short runs. The Federal Transit Administration announced the awards last week. The grants were awarded under a competitive application process, but Alaska’s congressional delegation wrote the provisions of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2022 with the intent of s...
Alaska’s backlog of untested sexual assault examination kits has all but disappeared after a five-year, multimillion-dollar effort, according to a report presented to the Alaska Legislature. The kits, colloquially known as “rape kits,” are used to collect physical evidence after a sexual assault. Figures published by the Alaska Department of Public Safety and dated Nov. 1 show only 75 untested kits, all at the state crime lab. In 2017, a statewide survey found almost 3,500 untested kits across the state, many held by local police depar... Full story
The Biden administration will ban new logging roads and most development in much of Southeast Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday. The decision, which repeals a 2020 USDA action under the Trump administration, continues a quarter-century of action and counter-action over development in the region, which contains the world’s largest temperate coastal rainforest and is home to more than 72,000 people. “As our nation’s largest national forest and the largest intact temperate rainforest in the... Full story
Washington, DC — U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, both R-Alaska, announced Wednesday that the Federal Transit Administration is awarding more than $285 million of investments to improve the reliability and service of Alaska’s ferry system, which serves more than 30 communities across 3,500 miles of coastline. The funding, all awarded to the Alaska Marine Highway System, is designated to replacing an aging vessel, upgrading ferry dock infrastructure in rural communities, modernizing four vessels, procuring an electric ferry, des...
Other than still needing crew if it is to put the Hubbard into service for the first time since it was built a few years ago, the Alaska Marine Highway System believes it has enough staff to operate the confirmed runs of its proposed summer schedule this year. The state ferry system has been plagued by staffing shortages the past couple of years due to retirements, resignations and hiring efforts coming up short, temporarily sidelining vessels on occasion. “We’re still really pushing hard on recruitment,” Shannon McCarthy, communications direc...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) – Summer Myomick bundled her baby against the freezing winds whipping off the Bering Sea and stepped outside into a blur of blowing snow. It was a short walk from the school where she had visited relatives to the health clinic about 150 yards (137 meters) away, but the young mother could hardly have seen where she was going _ or the terror that was approaching. Myomick, 24, and her son, 1-year-old Clyde Ongtowasruk, made it just beyond the front of the Kingikmiut School in Wales, Alaska, just below the Arctic Circle, w...
The state ferry Matanuska will not return to service from its winter overhaul as scheduled next month and will require millions of dollars more of steel replacement work if it is ever to get back to work. In its place, the Alaska Marine Highway System plans to put the Columbia back to sea after almost 30 months in layup status to save money. The loss of the Matanuska will mean more than a month without ferry service for Petersburg. The ship had been scheduled to resume sailings the first week of February to replace the Kennicott, which was...
The Organized Village of Kake is looking into using a U.S. Forest Service facility at Portage Bay as a cultural healing and rehabilitation center. The overall goal of the program would be to reconnect people with their cultural identity, improve their mental health, and counsel those recovering from alcohol and substance abuse and other issues. The cultural healing center has been a dream of Joel Jackson's, the president of the OVK, for years. "What I had in mind was getting people to teach them...
It’s past time for the Southeast and coastal Alaska communities to be heard regarding the collapse of our ferry system. It’s time to more forcefully make our Alaska Marine Highway needs known by energizing the Southeast Conference, the Southeast Conference of Mayors, and other organizations. Southeastern and coastal Alaska are entitled to have a highway functioning just like our roaded neighbors to the north. The newly passed Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill provides the federal funding to make this happen if we don’t let it slip away The AMHS...
AP KETCHIKAN — A police chief in Alaska pleaded not guilty on Dec. 29 to charges that he assaulted an intoxicated man while he was off-duty at a resort restaurant, including allegedly shoving the man head-first into a wall and putting him in a chokehold. A grand jury returned an indictment Thursday for Ketchikan Police Chief Jeffrey Harrison Walls for felony third-degree assault. He is also charged with three counts of fourth-degree assault and two counts of reckless endangerment, which are misdemeanors. During an arraignment Friday, defense a...
An obscure clause in the just-passed $1.7 trillion federal omnibus budget law has awarded the University of Alaska a plot of land half the size of the state of Rhode Island. The clause begins on page 2,819 of the 4,126-page law and calls for the university to receive 360,000 acres of federal land within the next four years, fulfilling the amount owed to it because of its status as a land-grant school. The university earns between $7 million and $8 million per year in revenue from 151,000 acres it already owns, and development of the new land is... Full story
The Southeast Alaska Power Agency Board approved a wholesale rate increase at its Dec. 8 meeting, raising the price to 7.3 cents per kilowatt hour-a 0.25 cent increase-beginning in January 2023. According to Vice Mayor Bob Lynn and Utility Director Karl Hagerman, who reported on the SEAPA Board meeting at last week's Petersburg Borough Assembly meeting, the decision to raise rates followed a review of a rate study completed this year. A draft of the rate study, which was presented at the last...
A man who allegedly stole $58,000 from a Haines tour operator earlier this fall was apprehended Dec. 6 in Riverton, Utah, according to Haines Police. As of Dec. 13, Charles was in a Utah jail pending extradition to Alaska. Haines Police Officer Maxwell Jusi said Riverton police arrested Charles after Haines police received a tip about his whereabouts. Two Riverton police officers made the arrest at a movie theater in a shopping mall, according to a Riverton police report. One of the officers worked with an acquaintance of Charles to coordinate...
Shoppers hoping for a little relief at the grocery store for their holiday meals will be disappointed by the Consumer Price Index released Tuesday. The CPI shows inflation cooling but food prices — particularly for some holiday staples — remain high. The CPI increased 0.1% in November, which was lower than some economists expected. Over the last 12 months, it rose 7.1%. Food went up 0.5% last month after an increase of 0.6% in October. The food index climbed 10.6% over last year. “The headline inflation numbers are encouraging for the gener... Full story
The lowest crude oil prices of the year are coming at a bad time for Alaska. This week, as required by state law, Gov. Mike Dunleavy will unveil his first budget plan of his second term. Accompanying that plan will be a significantly smaller state revenue forecast. This spring, the Legislature passed — and Dunleavy signed — a budget that anticipated $8.3 billion in general-purpose revenue. With Dunleavy preparing to release his first draft for the budget for the 12 months starting in July 2023, preliminary indications are that the state wil... Full story
WASHINGTON — The Department of Education announced last month it is extending the pandemic-era pause on federal student loan repayments until June 30 while legal challenges to the administration’s student debt relief program are fought over in the courts. The agency said if the student debt relief program has not been put in place by June 30, and if litigation is still tied up in the courts, student loan payments will begin 60 days after that. “Payments will resume 60 days after the Department is permitted to implement the program or the litig...
The Central Council of the Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska announced last Thursday that it has been awarded a nearly $50 million grant to expand broadband deployment in the region. The grant is one of 18 awarded recently awarded to tribal entities in 11 states as part of the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program (TBCP)-a nearly $3 billion grant program, funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, and part of the Biden-Harris...
All three incumbents likely clinched final victory in Alaska's statewide elections Friday, as the Alaska Division of Elections updated results with thousands of additional absentee, questioned and early ballots from this fall's general election. Final unofficial results will not be available until 4 p.m. Wednesday, November 23, when the division implements the state's new ranked choice sorting system, but voting trends have made the results clear in most races. With 264,994 votes counted,... Full story
Democratic candidate Donna Mears overtook Republican candidate Forrest Wolfe in a closely watched Alaska House race as the Alaska Division of Elections counted 27,178 early, absentee and questioned ballots, about three-fifths of the number outstanding from the Nov. 8 general election. Additional absentee ballots are expected to arrive in the coming days, and the Division of Elections’ next scheduled count is Friday. With Mears taking a lead, the 40-seat Alaska House is split exactly in half. In 20 seats, Republicans lead. In the other 20, D...
WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court on Monday issued a nationwide injunction indefinitely blocking the Biden administration’s student debt relief program in response to a challenge by six GOP-led states. The unanimous ruling by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis came after the six states — Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina — argued that the loan relief program threatens those states’ future tax revenues and that the plan by the Biden administration overrode congressional authority. “The injunction...
The 2022 general election polls closed Tuesday night, putting an end to the campaign season and kicking off a two-week waiting game as ballots are counted until the final results tabulation on Nov. 23. As of Wednesday evening, 80% of the ballots cast statewide have been reported according to the Associated Press. With Alaska now using ranked choice voting in statewide elections, those ballots are only reporting votes for candidates whom voters ranked as their first choice. So far in Petersburg...
In votes counted through early Wednesday morning, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy appeared on pace for re-election to a second four-year term. Dunleavy, a Republican, built a substantial lead over challengers Democrat Les Gara, independent Bill Walker and Republican Charlie Pierce, holding 52% of Tuesday's 216,364 first-choice votes. If Dunleavy's vote share stays above 50%, he will win the election outright without going through Alaska's new ranked choice counting process. Gara and Walker had less... Full story
The nation's eyes are on the U.S. Senate and House races in Alaska, but anyone wanting to know the outcome will have to be patient. Defending their seats are two high-profile women. In the Senate is Lisa Murkowski, a Republican who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump – and who has been the target of ire from Trump and from hard-liner conservatives. She trailed Republican challenger Kelly Tshibaka by a small margin, 42.7% to 44.4% of the first 216,000 votes counted. But Murkowski w... Full story
